Ultimate Aphrodisiac

Chapter Two

Octavian

"The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family." - Thomas Jefferson

Considering that Bellatrix, Sirius, and Regulus were all in residence and awake, Ebony Manor was surprisingly quiet. The afternoon air was hot and still, without the faintest breeze to flutter the pale, peach-coloured drapes of the Sunrise Room, so named both for its colour scheme and for the fact that it faced east over an expansive landscape unobscured by other buildings or structures, large picture windows allowing for quite a display at dawn. The hour was wrong for the room to showcase its proper glory, but Andromeda Black didn't mind. The Sunset Room, on the other side of the manor, would no doubt have a spectacular view for the next few hours - and would also be more than slightly overwarm, with the sun bearing down through the fine glass window. Andromeda could have summoned a house-elf to perform a cooling charm, but it seemed foolish to trouble one of the servants of the house for something so insignificant, when there were perfectly good rooms in the east wing that were naturally shaded at this time of day.

With only a few weeks left before the beginning of her fifth year at Hogwarts, Andromeda had chosen to work on her summer Defence Against the Dark Arts homework amid the serenity of the Sunrise Room, and had nearly finished an essay on the difference between defensive and protective properties of different varieties of quartz, when a slight creaking alerted her to another's presence in the room. It could only be Bellatrix, of course, but Andromeda pretended not to notice. Bella liked to surprise, sneaking up on her quarry in what she obviously presumed to be a stealthy manner. Andromeda had to admit, though, that Bella's methods were improving. A few years ago, every step would echo through the room, but now nine-year old Bellatrix could slip along and attract much less attention. In fact, if Andromeda hadn't learned long ago always to be on alert in her own home, she might not have noticed the slight noise at all, or at least might have attribute it to the house settling, as houses were wont to do. For some reason, Bella's increased proficiency at this skill unnerved Andromeda on some level.

She didn't have any longer to consider the matter, though. With a cry resembling that of a wildcat, Bellatrix flung herself from beneath the table she'd crept under and onto her older sister's lap. Andromeda just barely had time to lift her book up to prevent Bella crashing into it, and the young girl giggled wildly as she took the book from Andromeda's hands and tossed it onto the table. "You work too much, Andi," she said, black eyes sparkling mischievously.

"Which entrance did you use this time, Bella?" Andromeda countered, tweaking her younger sibling's nose. "I'm quite sure I didn't hear the door open."

"The one that's underneath the table with that ridiculous-looking vase with those gazelles or antelopes or whatever they are painted onto it," Bella replied, looping her arms about her sister's neck.

Andromeda scowled slightly. "Isn't the other end of that one in the potions closet?" When Bellatrix made no reply, but instead shifted her gaze towards the ceiling, Andi continued more sternly, "Bellatrix, you know you're not supposed to go in there alone. You could get hurt."

"You're not going to tell Papa, though, are you, Andi?" Bellatrix wheedled, turning her face back towards Andromeda.

Her lips twisted for a brief moment, but Andromeda sighed and shook her head. "No, Bella, I won't tell Father. Just... don't do it again, will you?"

"Of course not, Andi," Bellatrix said, though the grin pushing at her cheeks made her statement utterly unconvincing. Andromeda frowned, worrying a bit about what was going to happen when this little girl grew up, if no one could control her when she was just eight years old. But somehow she had the ability to win her way, by one method or another, and at the moment she was achieving this goal by curling her small, curly head into the crook of her sister's shoulder and neck. Andromeda recognised the ploy, but sighed, and stroked the midnight-black tendrils. "You're shameless, you know that?" she murmured, before kissing the top of her sister's dark head. When Bella made no reply but to giggle, Andromeda asked, "Why aren't you out playing with Sirius and Regulus?"

Bellatrix shrugged. "They were being boring. I wanted to come see what you were doing."

A soft snort escaped Andromeda. "I'm afraid I'm not being terribly interesting, either. I've been doing homework." Bella raised her head, turning those disturbingly black eyes up to Andromeda. 'From what ancestor did she inherit those?' Andromeda wondered. Both their parents were grey-eyed, as was Uncle Procyon. Regulus's eyes were blue like his mother's, and so were Uncle Alphard's. Only Bellatrix had irises the colour of a starless sky, and sometimes it made her look a bit haunted.

"Will you teach me something, Andi?" Bella asked, a touch of wheedling in her voice.

Andromeda's lips pursed slightly. "You know I can't, Bella. You're not allowed to do magic until you're in school."

Bouncing a little in Andromeda's lap, Bellatrix coaxed further. "Please, Andi? It doesn't have to be anything I need a wand for. Just... just something."

Supposing she ought to be glad that Bellatrix was showing an interest in learning magic rather than simply using it to torment Cissy, Andromeda sighed resignedly. She reached over Bella to pick one of her books off of the table. "I suppose reading you a little bit about divination couldn't do any harm..."

"Why are you still studying divination?" Bellatrix asked. "Papa says it's a ridiculous subject you shouldn't have taken in the first place, and there's no reason for you to continue now in N.E.W.T. level." She said all of this very quickly, a perfect parroting of her father's words.

With a fleeting smile, Andromeda opened the book to the last chapter she had left off on. "Father can be a bit... short-sighted at times, Bella." Bellatrix's little mouth turned into a hard frown, causing Andromeda to roll her eyes. "His concerns are always on the immediate. Don't you think it would be fun," she continued, bouncing Bellatrix on her lap a little bit and nuzzling her dark curls, "to peer into the future? To have some indication of what's going to happen, not just to you, but to the whole world?"

Disloyalty to her father combated Bellatrix's natural curiosity. "I suppose... but how does it work?"

Andromeda flipped another page, and adjusted Bellatrix in her lap so that they could both see the book in the sunlight still pouring in the window. "Well, there are lots of different ways. I'm reading now about Tarot cards, and in the past few years, we've covered dream interpretation, astrology, reading tea leaves..."

"Tea leaves?" Bella exclaimed, looking up at Andromeda with a crinkled nose. "That sounds ridiculous."

Andromeda gave a low laugh. Her laughter always had a somewhat musical quality that Bellatrix found soothing, and she leaned her head into Andi's neck again. "Well, I must admit, I was a bit skeptical of that particular discipline as well. But most of it has a very old tradition and is very well thought of. Here--" She pointed to a paragraph at the beginning of the chapter on Tarot. "Do you want to read it, or would you like me to read it to you?"

"I'll read it!" Bellatrix exclaimed eagerly, taking the book in her own small hands. After clearing her throat self-importantly, she tossed her curls, and began, "'The practise of Tarot is thought to have originated with witches in ancient Egypt--' My, that is quite old, isn't it?" Andromeda nodded noncommittally. "'In ancient Egypt, where cards were used to divine problems that arose in life, from the mundane - such as the birth of a child or the sale of a crop - to the divine - the favour of a god or the offspring of a ph--a ph--'"

"Pharaoh," Andromeda supplied.

"I can read it!" Bellatrix snapped indignantly, the colour rising in her cheeks. She hated to be helped with anything intellectual. "'The offspring of a pharaoh. It is believed that their descendants, the gypsies, or Roma, brought the tradition to Europe.'" Bellatrix paused a moment. "Oh! Egyptians, gypsies. I see. That's clever." Andromeda laughed again, causing Bellatrix to beam. It was quite something to her, to make her older sister laugh. Bella's black eyes skimmed the page and then, finding nothing of supreme interest there, started flipping through the rest of the chapter. "The Major Arcana... those are the important cards?"

"Yes, see?" Andromeda pointed a finger, nail clipped sensibly short, to a sentence halfway down the illuminated page. "They're the fate cards. They represent forces out of our control influencing our lives."

The round little lips turned downwards slightly. "I'm not sure I like the sound of that," Bella said, a touch of petulance in her voice. "How do they influence us, then?"

"That, my dear, is a mystery of life that much older witches than yourself have spent many years pondering," Andromeda said, a touch of dryness in her voice.

"Are you pondering it, Andi?" Bellatrix asked sweetly, batting her eyelashes to cover her sarcasm.

"Maybe a little," Andromeda replied, poking her sister in the side, causing her to squeal and wriggle indignantly. "But not all that deeply."

Bellatrix tapped the page with her own fingernail, round and buffed even at her young age. "So which card is influencing me, then?" she demanded.

"Well, I'd have to do a reading to tell you that." Andromeda took the book out of Bellatrix's hands and started browsing through a few pages. "And I haven't really learned how... though I do have the cards up in my room... but just from what I've been reading... I would guess..." Her grey eyes narrowed slightly as she thumbed the edges of the book, looking for a particular page number. "Ah! There." The entry she opened to and displayed to Bellatrix showed an enlarged picture of a card, with the Roman numeral VIII in gilded script at the bottom, and the words La Force inscribed at the top. The daintily illustrated picture was of a witch in embroidered scarlet robes, her golden ringlets of hair cascading nearly to her feet. She sat on a stone bench, with a manticore sprawled out, his tremendous head resting placidly in her lap. The woman's hands, unnaturally fair, were holding the manticore's ferocious jaws shut, and the manticore, for his part, did not seem to mind this in the least. All his three parts relaxed, the tail drooping to the ground, the claws hanging threatless from the edge of the bench. On the woman's face, Bellatrix noticed as she squinted her eyes to see better, was the smallest of smiles. It might have been meant to be benelovent and kind, but due to a printer's error or perhaps an artist's sense of humour, it looked more like a smirk, an expression of vindication.

Bellatrix's small fingers traced over the image, as though by doing so she might actually be able to touch the beings within. "What's that one?" she asked.

"Strength," Andromeda replied. "If you have anything in you, it's Strength, my little Bella." She sounded neither proud nor exactly displeased at this surety, but spoke with a faint sense of resignation.

Bella's eyes roamed the page for another moment, scanning a few of the lines of description, resting on the woman's barely twisted lips. "What's yours, then, Andi?"

Though Bellatrix did not see it, something darkened Andromeda's eyes the faintest bit, like a wispy cloud dreaming its way over a winter sky. Silently, she turned a few more pages, to an illustration that bore the number XVI and the inscription La Tour. This picture spoke of destruction and turmoil, not of unerring strength, the image one of an enormous tower, struck by lightning at its pinnacle, crumbling at the foundation. On one side of the eroding bastion, a day shone bright and sunny, while on the other side, a furious hurricane roared in the dead of night.

Bellatrix's pretty little nose wrinkled. "I don't like that one much," she said with childish disdain. "Mine's prettier. Why's that one yours?"

"I'll explain when you're older," Andromeda murmured, closing the book.

This put Bellatrix's mood off a bit, sparking a bit of impetuosity in her heart. Unsatisfied with that answer but unwilling to fight to drag it from her sister, she wriggled out of Andromeda's lap. "I'm going to go play outside with Sirius." The little talk about strength had given Bellatrix the courage to put into action an idea she'd had some weeks earlier.

"Bella!" Andromeda protested. "It's almost dark!"

The little girl gave her charming grin. "We're not afraid." Something in the twist at the corner of the dark eyes worried Andromeda profoundly; it was the look Bellatrix always took on when she was about to do something she knew she shouldn't, and the fact that she would be teaming up with Sirius assuaged Andromeda's fears in no way.

~~*~~

"Which one, d'you think?"

"The biggest," Sirius said decisively. "Of course the biggest."

Bellatrix shook her head. "No, that's Astor. He's not the fastest by a long shot."

"So what? He's the biggest."

"He's just an Abraxan! I want to ride a fast one."

The two children had crept into Ebony Manor's extensive stables, stalls full of winged horses of the finest breeding. Orion's father, Perseus Black, had been fond of the creatures, and Orion kept up the stables more in his memory than out of any true affection for the beasts. As they were all large and strong, to say nothing of magically enhanced, the children had, of course, been forbidden to approach any of the pegasi until they were of an age to learn to control the powerful creatures. Even Andromeda had only ridden a few times, on a tame Aethonan mare named Cerridwen.

The temptation finally proved too much, and as neither of their fathers were at the Manor this afternoon, Bellatrix had decided the timing ideal. Elaine and Procyon were back at their home in London, Orion was visiting Uncle Alphard in Wales, and Clytemnestra, though nearby, was not likely to venture outside in the fading sunlight. The only possible worry would be a tattling house elf, but most were too afraid of Bellatrix to dare so much.

Bellatrix's eyes lit suddenly on a sleek grey Granian, with a brass nameplate adoring his door that named him Octavian. She grinned broadly. "That one. I'm going to ride him."

Not to be outdone, Sirius chose the Abraxan he'd first seen, who was indeed the largest creature in the stable. "What do we have to do?" he asked.

"They've each got a saddle. Just... just put it on top, and it should make itself all ready..." Bellatrix, ever thorough, had been spying upon the elves and stable-lads who worked with the magical horses for the past week. It seemed that the equipment essentially took care of itself, for if any incantations were needed, she had never witnessed them being used.

"The same for the bits?" Sirius asked.

Nodding, Bellatrix lifted the saddle for Octavian from its peg. The heavy leather and metal made her stumble at first, but with some difficulty, she managed to lift the contraption onto the grey pegasus's back. Bellatrix eyed the device warily for a moment, then gasped in awe as the loops and buckles slid themselves into place. "It works, Siri!" she cried excitedly, moving for the bit and reins.

Sirius scowled. He hadn't gotten his saddle on yet, and was in fact having to drag a stepladder over just to be able to reach high enough. In the meantime, Bellatrix had managed - with considerable magical assistance - to completely outfit Octavian. "Excellent!" she cried, starting to lead the Granian from his stall.

"Wait up!" yelled Sirius, still struggling with Astor. "I'll be ready in a minute!"

"No!" Bellatrix shouted. "I don't want to wait. You're taking too long."

Octavian more or less placidly allowed himself to be led from the stables. Only out in the late afternoon sunlight did Bellatrix truly appreciate his beauty: clearly a creature cut for speed, narrow of shoulders and hips but somewhat elongated, with lean muscles beneath his dappled grey hide. His wings shone nearly silver, tucked in at his sides at the moment, with feathers that looked metallic but were, Bellatrix was delighted to discover, quite soft to the touch. Bella stared in wonder at Octavian's large bluish eyes, then grinned. "We have an understanding, don't we?" she asked, patting the Granian's snout. She could hear Sirius in the stable, still struggling with Astor, and laughed, calling out, "I'm going now, Sirius!"

Taking hold of the pommel, Bellatrix hoisted herself upon onto the saddle. She sat sidesaddle at first, then tucked her skirts up above her knees and swung her left leg over the other side. Reins held in her small hands, Bellatrix grinned at Sirius, who had finally made it outside with a stubborn-looking Astor, and kicked her heels against the Granian's side.

Octavian responded magnificently, opening his wings to a broad span and taking off at a running start. When he left the ground, Bellatrix laughed wildly, gleeful as the wind stung her cheeks and tore the violet ribbons from her hair. It did not take her long to learn that Octavian obeyed commands quite readily, and that the simplest shift of the reins would cause him to change direction.

"Sirius! Get up here!" Bellatrix yelled as Octavian swooped near the ground. "You can't imagine what fun this is!"

"I can't get on the blasted thing!" came the petulant reply.

"Should've taken a Granian, like I said!" Bellatrix crowed victoriously, ascending into the sky again.

A rush of exhilaration coursed through Bella's nerves as Octavian soared high above the stables. She threw her head back, closing her eyes for a brief moment and letting the faint glow of the sunset warm her face. Then she looked about, and saw that Sirius had finally mounted Astor and gotten him off the ground, though he still couldn't seem to coax the beast more than a few feet into the air. Bellatrix laughed riotously. Oh, this was splendid fun! Now that she knew what to do, Bellatrix thought she would come ride as often as possible. She couldn't think of a glory greater than this, soaring so high above the earth, directing a winged horse to dance in the clouds. It seemed so much better than a broom; there was no element of power when you were only directing a piece of wood about. This - this was heady, this was rushing, this was such a great freedom -

But then, something went very wrong. Octavian gave a sudden jerk, his head rolling back as he shrieked in pain and indignation. Bellatrix jolted into action, grasping at the reins and trying to calm the beast, but the leather straps slipped from her hands, and with the animal bucking and twisting, her little body could not stay on a saddle meant for a full-grown adult.

Sirius had just gotten the hang of how to steer the Abraxan when he heard a piercing shriek from behind him. Whipping his head around, he saw an obviously agitated Octavian, flapping his wings and whinnying loudly, and Bellatrix on the ground, twenty feet below. "Bella!" he yelled in terror, and began frantically trying to get Astor back on the ground. As the beast was none too happy to be bearing Sirius to begin with, he obliged this command more readily than any other so far.

He'd expected her to be howling, but instead she was lying on the grass with an expression of purest shock. Water was pooling at the edges of her eyes, but no tears actually fell. "Bella, Bella, what happened, are you all right?" Sirius gasped, crashing to his knees beside her.

A faint whimper escaped Bellatrix's lips, tightly pursed against the pain, and she managed to murmur, "My... shoulder..."

There was another, loud gasp from a clump of bushes nearby, and a dark-haired streak took off towards the house. Under his breath, Sirius said a word for which his mother had once given him a Tongue-Blistering Hex, and this made Bellatrix smile weakly. "Reggie," he muttered. "Figures he'd be spying on us. We're in for it now..."

Bellatrix tried to sit up, but yelped as a fresh shock of pain hit her, and lay back down. "Where's - Where's Octavian?" she asked through tightly clenched teeth, aware that no matter how much trouble she would be in as is, retribution would be far better if anything had happened to the Granian.

Sirius looked around. "He landed. He's over with Astor. Don't worry, they're too well trained to run off. Bella, what happened?"

"Threw me," Bellatrix said, and Sirius snorted impatiently. "Well!" she exclaimed. "I don't know more than that. Maybe something bit him." Her small hand found Sirius's, and she clenched it tightly. "It hurts, Siri."

"Well, you're not crying," Sirius said, admiration shining in his voice. "If it had been Cissy, she'd be shrieking like a banshee."

"Cissy's a baby," Bella muttered, and put on an even braver face, intent on showing that she was nothing of the sort.

After another moment, pounding footsteps echoed down the pathway leading to the stables, and then Clytemnestra emerged, with a wide-eyed Regulus in tow. "Bellatrix!" she shouted. "What on earth have you done now?"

Bellatrix did not reply, but only glared at her mother. Knowing she was in for a chastisement and desiring to postpone it a bit, she clasped her jaw defiantly shut. In his general blunt way, Sirius stated, "She hurt her shoulder."

Clytemnestra's face creased and strained, the competing emotions of concern, anger, and exasperation causing wrinkles like fault lines on her features. "How did she do that, Sirius?" she snapped. "Oh, never mind, it's perfectly obvious, and Regulus already told me anyway. Bellatrix, you know you're not supposed to--" Bella glowered, feeling rather that she ought to be receiving comfort, not discipline, right about now. "Well, I don't want to move you and risk hurting you more. I've summoned your father back from Wales. I suppose he'll be here in a--"

A faint popping sound behind the children alerted them that Orion Black had arrived at the scene, and was followed by a second sound, of another person Apparating in.

"Honestly, Clytemnestra," Orion growled, "what's the good leaving you to manage the house if you can't even take care of something so simple as--"

"She's hurt, Orion," Clytemnestra said, more annoyance than anxiety in her voice.

Without speaking to his daughter, Orion knelt on the grass and inspected her, touching her limbs lightly, making sure her breathing was not raspy or too shallow. He held a finger in front of her eyes, and she wordlessly followed its motion. "It's her shoulder, sir," Sirius said after a moment. "The left one."

Orion looked on the verge of barking at his nephew, but instead frowned slightly and said, "Her collarbone, actually. A nice clean split, I think, so it shouldn't be much trouble to mend." Had Orion Black ever needed a profession, he would have made quite a fine Healer; he'd always had a natural talent for it. He drew his wand out of the inside pocket of his robes and placed the tip of it at Bella's collarbone. "Resarcio," he said, without warning Bellatrix, who sucked in her breath sharply at the fiery sensation shearing through her shoulder as the bones knitted themselves back together. It was over in a moment, though, and she let her breath back out in a hiss. "She should rest," Orion said, straightening, and Bellatrix wondered why he was speaking of her as though she were not right in front of him. "I imagine she had quite a bit of a shock."

Clytemnestra nodded. Bellatrix, who had been expecting her usual amount of petting and coddling from her father, whined, "Papa..."

Orion fixed his middle daughter with a hard stare. "Bellatrix, as you are an intelligent child, you will understand that I am waiting to speak to you until I am no longer quite so angry." And he stalked off back towards the manor.

Bellatrix sat up and, for the first time, saw who had come with her father: Uncle Alphard. They did not see much of him; he generally kept to himself in Wales. Alphard did not cut quite so imposing a figure as either of his elder brothers; his form was more slender, his hair, like Regulus's, a touch more brown than black, and his eyes shone a calm and peaceful blue. Though Orion and Procyon were within three years of the same age, Alphard had been born considerably later, more than a dozen years after Orion. His birth had been the end of their mother, the famously beautiful Alcyone Black. Something about his youth had always made him a comfort on his infrequent visits, and he sighed as he knelt down beside Bellatrix. "Come on, my dear," he said, hoisting her up into his arms. Only when Bellatrix's fingers had to uncurl from around Sirius's did she realise he had been holding her hand the entire time. "Let's get you up to bed."

After shooting Regulus a glare that promised retribution for his betrayal, Sirius followed Alphard up towards the house. Clytemnestra sighed, and summoned one of the stable-lads to see to Astor and Octavian, now munching placidly on some nearby ferns.

Bellatrix was put to bed, though with her shoulder mended, she felt as hale as ever, but for the gnawing at her heart that her father's retribution had caused. Still, though, there was something soothing about her room, far in the east wing of the third level of Ebony Manor. Sunset's waning light did not infiltrate here; only the muted blues and purples of the dying day bled their way between her heavy velvet curtains. The room harbored a strange blend of childish and adult elements. The furniture was all large and heavy, carved of ancient woods, and the fabrics held as much history in their folds, the walls hung with medieval tapestries. Strewn among these unlikely surfaces were any number of toys and dolls, and the books stacked deep on their shelves were venerable tomes and modern myths alike.

Kind Alphard had tucked Bellatrix in and fluffed her violet pillows, then told Sirius to go and let her nap. Sirius had obeyed for about a minute and a half before sneaking back into her room, and had used the interim time to fetch a chess board and pieces from a nearby study. Neither was very good at wizards' chess, as the game required far too much subtlety for either's personality, but they both liked the destructive element of it, and so were often as happy to lose as to win.

They played and giggled long into the evening, eventually moving on from chess to cards, and Bellatrix bullied one of the house-elves, a young and yellow-eyed creature called Galie, into bringing them dinner on a tray. Well past nine o'clock, halfway through a game of Dragon-Breath, the door to Bellatrix's room opened, not with a thunderous crash, but with a far more sinister slow creak. "Out." Only one word, but Sirius needed no further instruction. Orion Black was one of few people even he would not cross. With a sympathetic last glance to Bellatrix, Sirius gathered up their games and scurried from the room. Orion closed the door behind him with as much prolonged deliberation as he had opened it.

"Do you have any idea," he said, stalking towards her, "any idea how foolishly you behaved today?"

Bellatrix whimpered slightly. "Papa, I--"

"Any idea?" He strode into a shaft of torchlight, throwing his face into harsh relief, and to Bellatrix he seemed a god of vengeance, as unearthly as unyielding. She curled her knees to her chest and gathered the blankets up to her chin, as though they would protect her from her father's wrath. "I have told you, Bellatrix, the pegasi are powerful creatures, and not to be toyed with! I told you I would teach you to ride when you got older!"

"I could learn now!" Bella protested, her fierce pride not entirely dowsed by the weight of Orion's displeasure. "I'm big enough, I am!"

"And to take the fastest Granain! W ho were you trying to impress?"

"Papa, I--"

But the answer had come to him, of course. "You and Sirius, you'll be the death of each other someday!" Orion was roaring now, the famous Black temper unleashed. "I don't know which of you is worse!"

Now Bellatrix's lower lip was quivering threateningly, and the tears unshed by her injury trembled on her lashes. "Papa--"

"The pair of you, egging each other on until all good sense leaves your heads! You'd each wrestle a dragon bare-handed if the other dared you to do it!" Orion pointed a finger at Bellatrix. "Do you have any conception, any at all, of what danger you put yourselves in?" Under her father's glare, and so unused to being yelled at by him, Bellatrix burst into tears. Orion paid that no heed. "What did you think you were doing, Bellatrix? Was it worth it? Was riding that beast worth what it could have cost you? You could have died, Bellatrix!" he bellowed. "Suppose instead of your collarbone, it had been your little neck that had broken! You could have died!"

And then, like the air after a thunderstorm, Orion suddenly cleared, as though the shouting had purged a demon in him. Shoulders falling, he sat on Bellatrix's bed, passing a hand over his forehead. Bellatrix was still crying quietly, though out of fright far more than shame. Orion let her continue for a few more moments, allowing the weight of his censure to sink in, before turning his gaze to her and saying simply, "I was afraid, Bellatrix."

Orion knew better than to expect an apology from a girl who had never said "I'm sorry" in her life, but when she crawled from beneath her covers and threw her arms around his neck, he decided it was enough.