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CHAPTER 32

A fire is already crackling in the hearth in the living room of the cottage, and a sharp tinge goes down my spine. "Did…did you do this?" I ask, pleading that she did and that no one else is here, that no one like the Dark Lord will be joining us.

"Yes," she says a moment later. "You can calm down. No one's going to hurt you here."

I grin at her, feeling relieved yet somehow doubtful that she's right, then hoist my rucksack higher, release her hand, and start toward the back room. I place the bag onto the bed. Yes, this is the room with the larger bed, and I have again claimed it for my own. Without my mother around, I venture to the smaller room where I stand in the doorway and look over the room with a mixture of sadness and anger. I once lived in this room. Sure, I had only been a small baby, but this had been mine. It was mine. I had my own room. I want to know what it was like with the three of us living here.

A hand rests on my shoulder, and suddenly Bellatrix is standing next to me. "I thought you would have claimed the other room," she says, not unkindly. "That's what you did last time."

"I already claimed the other room," I say with a slight laugh. "I just wanted to…I don't know…see the room I was meant to grow up in. This was mine, wasn't it? Back when I lived here with you and Rodolphus?"

She nods, and my eyes peruse over the Slytherin colored room, the silver and green sheets, the black rug, the dark wooden furniture. I walk over to the twin-sized bed and sit down, my hands running over the sheets. My mother waits a moment before walking over to me slowly and sitting down beside me. She doesn't look at me though. Instead she looks around the room with a sadness in her eyes I have never before seen. "It was the same colors then, but rather than the bed it was a crib." Her chest rises and falls evenly, as if she purposefully breathing calmly despite how much she seems to desire emitting some type of emotion. "After we sent you to Alphard, we changed it to a bed in a way to get you off our minds. We thought 'if the crib isn't here, then we won't think of her.'" She sighs quietly. "It didn't quite work that well, as we were always fighting about you.

"He believed we should have sent you off with someone in his family. He had a cousin whose wife had a baby roughly around the time I had you. He believed they could've passed you off as theirs as well, say they had a set of twins, and that you would have been safer with them. It turns out he was right." Her eyes meet mine, and my throat begins burning. "I should've listened to him. After your death, Rodolphus and I couldn't be in the same room together without breaking into some sort of fight. I eventually left to live in Malfoy Manor with Cissy, which was a good distraction for a while. I was able to help her—she having just had Draco. It made things a slight bit easier."

She clears her throat and looks down at her hands. It doesn't matter that she's already told me some of this because hearing anything about my past brings me joy. "The only time we ever managed not to fight and shout was when we went with Rabastan to carry out orders from the Dark Lord."

I reach over and take her hand but do not look at her. "How old was Draco when I was presumed to be killed?"

"He was five months old. Cissy and I spent those months planning what life would be like for the two of you—you and Draco. We thought I would get you back. The Dark Lord had consented to us sending you away, so we believed he would keep an eye on you, ensure your safety. There were some doubts about certain followers, and he seemed more than pleased with the idea of keeping the Lestrange child away from them. Even then he told us he had plans for you—we just never thought... When we knew you'd be safe, Rodolphus and I planned on bringing you back."

"But everyone thought I died," I whisper.

She nods. "And our plans for you and Draco disappeared with your death."

"What kind of plans?" A sad smile comes to my lips.

"Plans to have the two of you grow up together. We wanted the two of you to grow up together, learn magic together, be the siblings that Cissy and I are."

I clear my throat. Draco and I have spoken about some of the same things. It hurts more to know that it actually could have happened. "Where does Rodolphus live now?" I ask, wanting to drop that subject as well because it is beginning to make everything worse, it seems.

"With Rabastan, in their father's place. At the Lestrange Estate." Great, I grew up in an orphanage, and my family has had an estate this whole time.

I lean over and put my head on her shoulder. "I know we just got here, but I'd kill for some strawberry tarts."

She rubs the back of my hand. "Come on then." Together we stand and leave my little old room behind and make our way to the kitchen. I take my place on the counter as I'd done last Christmas. I cross my ankles while she begins preparing the tarts. I need to learn how to make these the way she does.

Before she's even finished making the dough, she stops, her hands frozen in the flour, and hangs her head for a brief moment. Then she sighs and turns to me, a towel flying into her hands so she can wipe them clean. "Aurelia." I slide off the counter and land on my feet. I cross my arms and lean against the counter, suddenly uncomfortable with this arrangement of spending my birthday with my mother, almost afraid that she might attack me or something, which is ridiculous because I think—I believe—is all in the past. "I—I am sorry."

"You're not about to hurt me, are you?" I ask, only a very light humor in my voice.

Bellatrix shakes her head. "No. But I—I feel the need—Aurelia… For the—the Mudblood—her death—"

"I don't want to talk about her." I clear my throat. "I don't want to talk about that. Let's just make some food."

"Au—"

"Stop. I don't want to talk about her." Tears spring up in my eyes. "I'm—I'm—going to go get something from—"

"I know you loved her."

"Please stop."

"And you know I can't approve, nor will I ever."

"If you're going to shame me for falling in love with a Muggle-born girl, I think I might just leave. And you won't be able to stop me. And you certainly won't be able to find me."

Bellatrix takes a step closer to me. "I never wanted you to go through that pain."

"Bellatrix."

"I'm angry at you for loving her, for giving a Mudblood your heart, and I don't know if I can truly forgive you for it. I'm angry because it could have caused serious issues with the other Death Eaters and caused you great harm. I'm not sorry that she's dead, and I'll never be sorry that she's dead, but I am sorry that it happened to you like that. I never wanted you to go through that pain."

The sob tears through me, and before I can stop myself, I find myself falling into her arms. I don't say anything to her, and she doesn't say anything to me, but we stand there like that for what feels like a long time. I let myself weep into her shoulder, nearly falling to the floor as my grief consumes me, making it difficult to stand, and she holds me tighter. My mother's embrace tugs at something in my chest, and I pull her closer, still crying, still trying not to, growing furious with myself for still showing Bellatrix my weakness in regards to Zoe and her death. Especially since she doesn't even care that Zoe is dead. She is only sorry that I went through pain, not that Voldemort murdered Zoe.

After a while of this, my mum pulls away from me and tells me that I should go lie down on the sofa for a while and get some rest while she finishes the tarts. I do not argue. I go straight to the living room and sit down, then pull my knees to my chest and try to tell myself that I will be okay, that this is not the end of me.

I wake up to the smell of something warm and sweet in my face, and when I crack open my eyes, I see my mother crouching before me, a plate of tarts beside my head. I grin at her, another round of tears threatening. With great effort I push myself up. "Can I eat one of these now?" I ask.

"I wouldn't have brought them in here otherwise."

"Good." I take the plate and begin eating them, the gooey warmth making some of my sorrows melt away, the sweetness drying up the tears in my eyes. "Eat one with me." She takes a seat beside me and does not argue. "You'll teach me to make these one day, yeah?"

"Yes."

In silence we enjoy our tarts, my sorrows slowly disappearing, and once the plate is empty—Merlin, I probably ate too many, I can already feel my stomach aching, but Severus might be happy to learn that at least there's something I can eat a lot of—she waves her wand. A small gift bag flies into the room and onto Bellatrix's lap. "I thought about waiting to give you this," she says, "but I don't think I can bring myself to do it." She places the bag in my lap. "It's not of much value compared to the ring I gave you last Christmas, but I think you might like it."

She watches me, a happy gleam in her eye. It doesn't take long for me to remove all of the tissue paper, and once that is out of the way, I reach inside and feel something made of fleece, something extraordinarily soft and fuzzy. I pull it out.

In my hand is a tiny blanket, one almost the size of two pillows. In the very center of this black blanket is a silver and green Slytherin symbol. Something about this blanket seems oddly familiar, comforting even, and again I am tempted to cry. I pull it up to my face and rub it against my cheek. It envelopes me with warmth and security. It could take me far away from here and wrap me up and keep me safe forever. Nothing would harm me ever again if I only let the blanket take me to wherever I need to go.

"What is this?" I whisper. "I saw this in your—back when I first visited Malfoy Manor and Draco took me down to your room." Her brows furrow—this is the first she's hearing about this, obviously. "I was curious about you." The wrinkles around her eyes almost make me think she's amused. "It was on the back of that chair."

Bellatrix gingerly takes the blanket from my hands, and my heart sinks when it is no longer in my possession though I don't know why I am suddenly so attached. "When you were a baby, you wouldn't sleep unless you had this with you. You would take it in your hand like this"—she grabs a corner and demonstrates how I would wrap it around my hand until it was hidden in the fabric—"then you rest it by your head and whine until we covered your legs with the bottom of the blanket." She smiles. "It was almost like a subconscious thing. It was the only way you would allow yourself to fall asleep." She untangles her hand from the blanket and drapes it over my legs.

She continues, "Then, in your other hand, you would clutch onto the paw of your teddy bear." Bellatrix closes her eyes for a moment and turns her head to the side as if trying to contain herself. "I made sure you had your blanket and your bear when we sent you to Alphard. I was always worried you wouldn't get any sleep. I would toss and turn at the thought of you in some other house with someone other than me watching over you. Your father was always good at calming during times like those, but I never stopped worrying." She releases a shaky breath. "When we thought you died, Rodolphus and I went back to get what was yours before anyone could ransack the place and find out that you had been there.

"I was able to recover the blanket and your clothes, but I could not find your bear. I would love to be able to give that to you as well, but I haven't seen it since we sent you to live with Alphard."

I run my hands across the blanket on my legs, smiling, trying to pretend that I'm not about to cry. This is from my past. At last I have something from my past. I don't even know what to say to her. This is the greatest thing she could have done for me. My mum. Her hand finds mine and holds tightly to it. "I know you can't very well use this blanket at Hogwarts, but it's a piece of you." I close my eyes to trap the tears where they are. "I wanted you to have it, to remind you that your parents loved you more than anything in the world, that we still love you." I look back to her, smiling again. "I do love you, Aurelia."

I quickly wrap my arms around her neck. "I love you too, Mum." A relationship with my mother is something I never thought possible, and now here I sit in my mother's arms. I'm disgusted with myself for being so happy about a Death Eater loving me, for being so happy to be held by her, for being so happy that I finally have a mother even though she is a Death Eater who killed many people before she was finally incarcerated.

After a few moments, we break apart. "I had something like this when I was in the orphanage," I say, wiping my damp cheeks. "A blanket about this size, I mean. Mrs. Stoico gave one to me. I had it until I was seven. I think one of the others stole it…but it couldn't be proven. She did her best to find it but…it was no good. It was just gone."

"If she were here, I believe I would thank her for taking such good care of you," Bellatrix says quietly.

"I really don't think I would be here right now if not for her."

"What do you mean?"

"She protected me on many occasions. For some reason the older orphans had a certain hatred of me, and some of them took it upon themselves to right the wrongs done to them, which somehow in their minds had something to do with the fact that I was Mrs. Stoico's favorite." It almost feels wrong to talk about her to Bellatrix, a Death Eater, after she was tortured and killed by one of Bellatrix's colleagues, but I press on, because I like to talk to her even if I know I shouldn't. Perhaps it would've been best to listen to Severus and not let myself grow attached to Mum. But it's too late for that. "I have no doubt that one of the older orphans would have killed me. There was one boy who tried beating me with a bat. In fact, he got in a few swings before she arrived to save me. He most likely would have killed me. I think he was a—" I stop short. "Despite her turning against the Dark Lord"—Bellatrix's brows furrow—"she is the reason I am alive. Without her, I don't think I would have lived to be eight."

"She never turned against the Dark Lord."

I pause. "…what?"

"She was under orders of the Dark Lord. Her mother was not. Her mother actually did turn away from him, but Abigail—I have spoken with the Dark Lord on this subject—she was under orders to watch after you. The Dark Lord has always been watching over you, Aurelia. Your safety is of the utmost importance to him. Even if I was not allowed to protect you and care for you, he wasn't going to let you wander through life without someone there to watch and ensure your safety." She says this like it's the most obvious thing in the world, but I can't seem to wrap my mind around it.

"Of course, none of us even knew you survived, and I doubt if she even knew who you truly were. She just knew that she had to protect the baby—you. Those were her orders, so she did what needed to be done. The only Death Eaters who were allowed to collect you from the orphanage were Lucius or Narcissa. She was to stop all others or die trying. From what I've learnt, she grew an attachment to you—something that is hard not to do." A gleam in her eye tears at my heart. "She didn't want you to go through your duty. So, in a way, she did turn against the Dark Lord, but she was still serving him.

"She died following the Dark Lord's orders to stop anyone from taking you. He did not trust some of us in the Inner Circle. Rightfully so. There were those who were wary of him after a while. And though Abigail didn't want you to fulfill your duty, she did all that she could to protect you, as the Dark Lord had commanded. She might have strayed in one sense—and maybe she protected you because she cared about you and not because that was what was commanded of her, but it started out as—"

"Please stop," I whisper, feeling the tarts threaten to return.

"What's wrong?"

"I thought…I thought she loved me. I thought I meant something to her—"

"You did. She didn't want you to go through your duty. She tried to protect you from it."

"She did everything on the Dark Lord's orders! I thought she loved me! She was the only mum I had for—" I swallow down the bile forming in my throat. "She meant the world to me. I was…I was devastated when—" I exhale. "I hated myself for so long because I thought I got her killed, but now I learn that she was working for the Dark Lord the whole time!"

Bellatrix places her hand on my knee. "She did truly care for you, you needn't worry about that."

"I GOT HER KILLED!"

"There there, calm down."

"I've hated myself for years! Because I got my mum killed, and now—she wasn't even—she was working for him the whole time! I was right to feel betrayed when I found out she—I was right to be angry with her! She should have told me!"

"She did all that she could to try to protect you."

"Because the Dark Lord commanded it!"

"Did the Dark Lord command that she try keeping you from your duty to him?"

I deflate rapidly. Of course he didn't. So maybe everything is not a lie. Maybe the part of my life when I had a mum who cared for me was true. I do my best to breathe evenly. "Who else knows about this?" I swear if Severus knew I'm going to have an issue with him.

"I am the only one with whom the Dark Lord has entrusted this information."

Relief floods my chest. Severus didn't know. He didn't keep this from me. "No one else knows?" I whisper.

"No."

I hang my head. I suppose it doesn't matter if Mrs. Stoico was a Death Eater on orders of the Dark Lord. It doesn't matter because she tried to save me from him, regardless if it started out as a mission to keep the miserable child safe from harm until he could come back and impregnate her.

"I'm sorry I shouted at you," I mumble.

A smile cracks across my mother's face, and she takes my hand again. "Nonsense. You were shocked."

Before either of us has a chance to say anything else, there is a loud pop!

I know this person, but I do not know how to react. The last time I saw him he was helping my father drag me and Zoe from her flat so long ago. Rabastan Lestrange. Where is my father if Rabastan is here?

The bag that held my blanket, as well as the blanket itself, disappears, gone to some hidden place, and my mother releases my hand and moves slightly farther away from me, as if she has been caught in some heinous scheme for which there is a price to pay. Rabastan finally notices us, and his mouth drops open. No words come out before there is another pop!

In the living room of Lestrange Cottage stand both Rabastan and Rodolphus.

I'll try to have the next chapter up next week at some point!