Family Album: The North Wind Doth Blow

The North Wind Doth Blow

Andromeda had never believed that the Dark Lord was dead. There was no body, and without a body, there was no death. Habeas Corpus, and where was the corpse?

She lost her job at the Ministry. She had known it was coming. They called it a re-focus on research priorities in the changed climate, but she knew they meant to kick her out. Crouch was in the ascendant, and she had been too vocally opposed to him to survive. The Aurors had used the Unforgiveable Curses on suspects; stupid of them, to expect Andromeda to approve when she knew what the Unforgiveables could do. She had been casting and receiving them since she was sixteen years old (the dissertation for her N.E.W.T. in Independent Study: Dark Arts, An investigation into the affect of the Cruciatus Curse on learning ability in rats had indeed made the Natural Philosophy pages of the Daily Prophet and provoked a pleasant storm of correspondence about the suitability of this as a subject for a Hogwarts pupil) and refused point-blank to join the civilian emergency response squad with all the charm, tact, and absolute self-assurance of a daughter of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.

The loss of her security clearance ought to have been unsurprising: the cousin of the man who had betrayed the Potters. Narcissa alone she might have borne - everyone agreed that the Malfoys had obviously been under Imperius - but Sirius was too much. She arrived for work one morning and the door would not open for her. Later, after she had been shown white-faced and furious from Umbridge's office, someone escorted her down to collect her things. She didn't even try to take her notes; the Ministry's intellectual property code was vicious. She could hear a goat bleating in the recovery room. When she arrived home, the library floor was covered with boxes of files and a grinning Crux Croaker, who said, I believe these are yours. A small pile of post included a hand-delivered note from one of the research assistants rather touchingly hoping to be allowed to accompany her to wherever she might end up, and a Ministry-stamped missive from Alice Longbottom expressing fulsome sorrow at her departure, which despite the woman's being on maternity leave was clearly posted before Andromeda herself had known she was going.

The next day, she paid an astronomical sum to take a Portkey to the college at Wittenberg that afternoon. The Council had been after her for years. Professor Cornelius showed her a gleaming wood and stone laboratory, just refurbished, modern husbandry facilities and adjacent operating theatre, an office with a view of trees, an astonishing budget; they wanted to expand, needed a new star. They wined her and dined her, there would be rooms in the college should she wish them, and a permanent Floo link established to her own house into the bargain. They did not realize that her acceptance was a foregone conclusion; the thought of dealing with Russian bureaucracy was chilling, and for all her loyalty to the college of her youth, the asceticism of the Scholomance didn't leave much opportunity for family life. She would have to brush up her German.

Her mother asked whether she couldn't have a laboratory at home as her great-grandfather had done. Andromeda supposed that Druella wanted another grandchild, and Narcissa had had such a hard time with Draco that nothing was likely from that direction for another year at least, and that assuming good news on the legal front. As for Bellatrix, she would probably die of embarrassment at announcing a pregnancy, let alone carrying it. Poor Bella - Andromeda remembered her sister's wedding, the eldest daughter marrying last. How beautiful, how charming and happy she had seemed, her wonderful low voice laughing, the joyful bride, until suddenly the crowd moved and they were face to face, and then Bella's hooded eyes had widened and her hands were at her mouth, and fear and horror and pity, such dreadful pity, seemed to bloom around her in a cloud, and there was nothing Andromeda could say but I didn't mean - and that had never worked before. And then, thank God, their mother was there, and Andromeda, darling, have you seen Regulus? He was desperate to find you, and they were calm again. There were speeches, and Rodolphus kissed his wife's hands, and Bellatrix could not possibly love him, not possibly, but perhaps she didn't need to.

And now it was years later and Andromeda looked up from dreaming into the dark eyes of a witch walking towards her, pushing a perambulator. It was Bellatrix, standing in the middle of Diagon Alley, and Andromeda looking at the baby felt a sudden fit of astonishment at the fact, and rage that they hadn't told her. But Bella hadn't blushed, hadn't moved, and the curls peeping under a knitted cap were blond; Draco Malfoy, she had seen a photograph.

"Hello, Andromeda."

The familiar voice. Andromeda gazes into heavy-lidded eyes, but there is nothing to be seen. Her sister has perfected Occlumency since last they met. Of course she has.

"Hello."

It is years later, and finally Bellatrix has quite grown up, grown into herself. Thick dark hair lies over the shoulders of her winter cloak, the pale face is strong and sure. She looks like Andromeda, but more beautiful. Is Bellatrix a Death Eater? Surely she must be, and yet there has never been one word of public rumour. Never one word, but someone taught Bellatrix the Dark Arts, and it was not anyone Andromeda knows. They stand, stupidly, in the street; they have noticed one another, even if accidentally, and cannot turn around and walk away. Once Bellatrix would have run, but not now. This is a different world.

There is a roar of voices and suddenly a crowd of Quidditch fans boils out of the Leaky Cauldron and down the street. Bellatrix wheels the pram round and the sisters find themselves hurried aside behind the iron railings of the old war memorial onto cobbles that are identical to yet somehow quieter than the ones on the street.

"How are you?"

"Oh, coping. At least he sleeps through the night these days." Of course. Bella is looking after Draco whilst his parents await the outcome of their case. Apparently there is a fear that the Dark Lord's disappointed followers not yet rounded up will go after the families of his erstwhile servants to prevent them testifying.

"Well, that's something." Andromeda has never seen Draco, only a photograph. She remembers that Bellatrix has never seen Nymphadora.

"I've been in Madam Malkin's," Bella says. "Alice Longbottom was there. I hadn't seen her for years - not since that carol concert the year before I started Hogwarts - do you remember?"

"Of course. You sang the Coventry Carol, and Rabastan Lestrange was sick in a tuba."

"Euphonium."

"Euphonium. Wasn't it Phronsie Hallow's? Alice was just married."

"She had her baby with her in the shop."

"Oh God! What did it look like?"

"Like a pudding with eyes. It's called Neville."

"Poor kid."

The Cannons fans have moved down the street, and it is cold in the north wind that gusts between the buildings. Draco whimpers, and Bellatrix adjusts a scarf around his neck.

"I must get him home."

"Yes. Well, goodbye then."

"Goodbye."

They pass out on to the street again, each to face their separate ways. Bellatrix halts suddenly.

"Alice Longbottom always was an utter cow, wasn't she?"

"She was. Absolutely," Andromeda answers, and for a moment they laugh together, and then it really is goodbye.

Andromeda didn't believe for a second that the Dark Lord was dead. There wasn't a body. Even Avada Kedavra left a body, and Andromeda had cast it enough times herself - under experimental conditions, of course - to know. Nonetheless, she and Ted had celebrated with the rest, standing cold in the November night watching red and white chrysanthemums flowering in the sky. It was a new world. She wasn't sure that she was going to like it.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

A further account of Bellatrix's meeting with Alice Longbottom and its consequences can be read in my fics "Family Album: Babes in Arms," "The Faithful" and "The Night Before" all at The Dark Arts.

This story first appeared on my Livejournal in response to the Omniocular March challenge.