Chapter 46: Conversations in the Dark
Despite the alcohol and the very late hour, Hermione Granger was wide awake.
The main reason for the witch's insomnia took another deep quiet breath and melted impossibly further into her body.
Hermione bit her lip and took a deep breath of her own.
Bellatrix changed into a silk nightgown before turning in. The proper sleep clothing was sheer and felt like nothing, and it gave Hermione too many ideas... which she had neither the energy nor the nerve for at the moment... or at all.
Hermione's hand rested over Bellatrix's midsection. Her fingers brushed absent-mindedly over the too well-defined ribs.
The evening, despite its rocky start, went better than expected.
There were many things to muse about.
The kiss, of course...
The admission about the potion...
The fact that Bellatrix, according to the truth quill, didn't abhor their physical interactions... Bellatrix was as satisfied with that part of their life as Hermione was with their intellectual engagements... A very curious puzzle. Hermione's own feelings on the subject were greatly impacted by what she thought Bellatrix felt about their interactions, and about her. And it appeared Bellatrix wasn't feeling what she thought she was feeling...
She stared thoughtfully at the dark lightly twinkling ceiling and walls.
Perhaps she could try to speak to the witch and not at the witch... about those things.
Bellatrix Lestrange was troubled. The times were surely dark when she couldn't read a Gryffindor... or sort through her own plan and motivations.
She humored the girl in her request for interaction.
She played the silly game. She shared the requested truths... mostly truths. She performed the ridiculous tasks.
Somehow between humoring the girl and appeasing her own loneliness, she ended up enjoying the evening.
Seven generations of her esteemed pureblooded ancestors were surely rolling in their graves…
Bellatrix was tempted to join them.
Instead she sighed and shifted slightly. When they cuddled just right the girl's heartbeat was felt against her back.
Pathetic as that was, she liked the odd sensation.
Allowing the girl to stay went beyond ensuring the girl's good will… Asking for physical affection... there was no good reason to lower herself to that. Wishing this to become a repeated occurrence once again... that held even less respectable sense.
'They weren't required to' as the girl screamed at her that day.
Yet here they were...
So pathetic!
The girl said she missed their old interactions.
Surely, a lie.
The numbers in green ink popped in front of her mind's eyes.
"..4... ..3... ..5... ..2..."
There was nothing there to miss.
She stumbled into the knowledge by accident. She went to the girl's room to see whether the girl left for good after the fight, and neglected to tell her. All the things were still there. She was about to leave when the Quiz copy sort of fell into her hands. Once she saw the first few green inked scores it was impossible to unsee.
To add to the humiliation, her own responses looked much more... content, and refused to lower to the girls levels.
"..6... ..4... ..5... ..5..."
"..marriage... ..heart... ..mind... ..body..."
She was on her best behavior, and yet the girl was miserable.
So she stopped antagonizing the girl.
No notes to Hogwarts.
No arguments.
No dark jokes.
Polite.
Accommodating.
Speaking only when spoken to.
All propriety lessons finally shone through. Mother would've been so proud.
If she continued in the same manner she'd surely turn into Narcissa at her most annoying... Or explode!
Exploding often felt like a more attractive option.
Bellatrix sighed again, and pushed unhappy thoughts away. The drinks set her brain to a happy hum. She didn't want to spoil it. There were several things she wanted to clarify for the girl. And she couldn't do so if she became annoyed and they ended up fighting.
The lazy caresses were distracting, and not entirely unwelcome.
She wondered whether those were aimless or intentional; whether the girl expected the evening to end in sex...
The number two in green ink mocked her. It grew in her mind's eye, exploded into many tiny two's which kept on multiplying. Whatever the girl expected, Bellatrix clearly failed to provide.
The hand ran higher still.
'Don't,' her own hand stilled the girl's without thinking.
They both were drunk. She should never allowed the girl to stay.
'Sorry...' The arm slid lower, and stilled on her stomach.
Green twos in her mind reappeared, then started to pop out of existence, only to be replace by ones and zeros.
She sighed again.
'Your ceiling is pretty.'
The embers in the fireplace died. The darkness made the twinkling of the ceiling and the walls more obvious.
'Looks like a night sky...'
The fingers started tapping lightly over Hermione's hand.
It took a full minute before the dark witch replied.
'In Azkaban... it's hard to focus... inside or outside your mind… magic forced in... magic stripped out... the Dementors...' The tapping sped up. 'there is no sky... just the clouds... the bloody shades of grey...' The tapping sped up even more. 'So I recalled the skies... and potion recipes... and dueling scenarios... but eventually only the sky maps remained. It didn't make me happy, of course, but it made me gone.'
Hermione tightened her arms around the witch in a impromptu hug.
'Don't need your pity, girl' for the first time since Hermione's arms settled around her, Bellatrix's body went taut.
'Good, as I'm not pitying you.' Hermione muttered heatedly but she didn't let go. 'Longbottoms don't even know what a constellation is.'
Bellatrix relaxed back.
'It is the sky map. Not finished.' Bellatrix twisted in Hermione's arms to lay more on her back than side, leaning on the younger witch's front. 'Ursa Major is there. And Ursa Minor with Polaris is a bit further back... above the study's window.'
Two distinct dipper shapes came into view. The brighter specks signified the stars, but also, when Hermione squinted just right, the whispers of light between the specks appeared to hint at the expected shapes.
'Draco goes between them and over the bookshelf, but it's not there yet.'
Bellatrix then pointed to a different spot on the ceiling, the best area to see by anyone reclining on the bed.
'My star, in the Orion constellation.'
The brightest stars in the constellation even had the various shades, reddish tint for the brightest speck, blueish tints of the others.
Bellatrix pointed out more constellations. Taurus and Gemini, near Orion; Virgo, over the coffee table; Delphinus, over the desk; Crux, over the door; Aquarius, at the top of the study wall, above the framed newspaper; Aries, Andromeda and Pieces, overhead at the top of the bedroom wall.
Now that Hermione knew what to look for, the distinct shapes of major constellations were easy to recognize.
'And that one is Narcissus'
The witch pointed to faint colorful stars outlined into circle on a stick on the wall above the nightstand.
Hermione glanced absentmindedly at the group of stars above the bed.
'Wait. There is no Narcissus constellation. Is there?..'
The midsection under her palm shook in quiet amusement.
'On my sky there is.'
The pleased grin played on the witch's lips.
Hermione felt like hugging the witch again.
Silence lingered. It wasn't heavy or awkward, but it felt restless.
Bellatrix was quiet in her arms, but very much awake. The older witch's fingers tapped with increasing speed over the blanket.
'I didn't show you the memory for the reasons you seem to believe.'
For a person who refused to speak of their argument, Bellatrix certainly was bringing up a number of things from that night.
'There aren't many memories to show I ever wanted more than what I had… what I was… when you met me. There was a time when I wasn't a child, but not yet a nightmare... When I expected normal life... I can never be her again of course, but...'
Bellatrix gave the one shoulder shrug.
'You said about being good to each other... or at least not miserable. I think… maybe I can try to want that too?…'
Fingers stilled.
'And, I don't find you repulsive... Yes, surprised me too.'
Hermione glared at the curly head on her shoulder thinking she should really be more offended.
'Why did you do it?'
Bellatrix hummed questioningly and looked up.
Hermione turned her forearm slightly. The darkness of the room hid the scar, but the move clarified the question.
She left the arm uncovered more often than not. Yet Bellatrix never addressed it. Initially, the witch was likely too out of it to pay attention, but she still acted like it was nothing.
'Why did you do it? Surely you knew it wasn't more uh… effective than your Crucios …'
Bellatrix folded her arms and frowned.
'You want to talk about it now?'
'I want to know.'
Bellatrix moved out of Hermione's arms, and turned to face Hermione.
'I knew you would remember, spawn. The war could've been won or lost. I could've been killed, kissed, locked away… If you lived, happily or miserably, no matter. A day, a year, a lifetime away. You… would... remember.'
Mid-speech Bellatrix's voice took on a chanting inflection, and Hermione fought the shiver.
'I am a torturer.' Bellatrix finished heatedly. 'I wanted you tortured. Is that what you wanted to know?'
'And you aren't sorry, are you? Not at all?'
'Fine. I'm sorry.'
'You don't mean it.'
'I don't.'
'Why the hell not?!'
'It was war. You, unlike many others, weren't grabbed from a street while minding your own business. You had information I wanted. I can't be sorry. I'm not sorry.'
Hermione sighed. She suspected, and now she knew.
Lazily she acknowledged she should likely be more outraged… upset… scared…
'Do you hate me?'
'I should… shouldn't I?'
Bellatrix agreed.
The girl should hate her.
She certainly would have. She would have hated and she would have gotten even.
Girl's plans remained to be seen.
The evening seemed to be over. She doubted the girl was in the mood for further chatting.
She pulled the covered tighter around herself and settled for sleep. The bed lightly shook as the girl did the same.
'Tell me something curious about yourself.'
Bellatrix startled. She was almost asleep.
'Pet, have you heard of sleep?'
She curled into a tighter ball hoping to fall right back into the slumber.
'I don't want that thing you said… about torture… to be the thing I fall asleep with.' The younger witch whispered stubbornly. Bellatrix's hand peaking from under the blankets was covered by the girl's. 'Do you want me to? You promised not to torture me again.'
Bellatrix didn't want to torture her again at all. But she already spoke about herself a lot.
The silence grew. Hermione frowned at the blankets which hid Bellatrix.
'My father taught me many things about magic. But his Patronus was an incorporeal shapeless blob. It was my mother who taught me to cast true patronus.'
'Bellatrix! The game was called truth or dare!'
'I never said I couldn't cast. I said, and I quote,' at that the curly head emerged from under the blankets for a moment, 'I said, DADA was barely taught my last few years at Hogwarts. You were oh so quick to assume... a life of woe I suspect... so understanding... Who was I to dispel your righteous assumptions...'
The witch was infuriating!
On the bright side, she wasn't thinking about torture anymore.
'A Marsh Harrier'
'Marsh Harrier... Your Patronus was a bird?!'
'A bird of prey.' snapped without much malice from under the blanket.
'Clearly' there was a smile and an eyeroll in Hermione's statement.
Hermione traced constellations on the half-finished sky map with her eyes.
The older witch was quiet, the hand under Hermione's stopped its fidgeting awhile ago.
A bird.
A predator.
Smart and cunning.
Strategic and patient…
She glanced at her sleeping bed companion wondering how much of the old self remained in this adult version of Bellatrix.
'Good night, Bellatrix,' She whispered into the quiet. 'Maybe we could chat like this again soon... Maybe kiss too... when we are not tipsy... and well.. other stuff if you'd want that... nothing new is good too...'
Several long moments passed, and a quiet We could was muttered from inside Bellatrix's sleep cocoon.
End of Chapter 46