La Belle Dame Sans Merci

You walk upon the dead with scornful glances, / Among your gems Horror is not least fair; / Murder, the dearest of your baubles, dances / Upon your haughty breast with amorous air.

Alice's face is sweet, open and honest. Bellatrix's face is guarded, hateful and insincere. No one suspects anything. Alice is older, married and respected. Bellatrix knows she is headed for infamy and greater things than even the name Black can offer her. She will also marry soon.

Rodolphus Lestrange is a good match. They share beliefs, few bloodlines and a Master. Her Lord was pleased with the engagement, and she knows that attaching herself to someone held highly in her Lord's esteem will allow her to do more good for the cause. She will have justification if she is bound by the hand and heart to Rodolphus. She will have respect. She commands it.

Alice, though, offers her something Rodolphus never will. Rodolphus understands her too well. Alice does not understand her. Alice is too pure to understand Bellatrix. Bellatrix does not need to be understood. Bellatrix prefers to be a mystery.

To Alice, Bellatrix is an enigma, and Bellatrix covets this.

*

Alice is not Bellatrix's life. Alice is incidental, most days.

Today Bellatrix is coveting her sister's husband. She knows he will give in, he will accept her fully and she will discard him. No one turns down Bellatrix Black. Her will is wrought in iron, and iron breaks the strongest magical bond between others. She has never been wrong. She is confident she never will be.

She laughs, telling of a pitiful, filthy Muggle creature she had destroyed. Her sister's husband's smile is lazy and appreciative and cold, and his hand finds its way onto her thigh. His fingers seek shelter, but she does not grant it. There are witnesses, and Bellatrix Black is not crass.

Regulus's eyes burn as he keeps his eyes on the hand on her leg. Regulus never understood the politics of things, feels passion for moral outrages that Bellatrix can barely comprehend. Bellatrix sought his secrets one languid, oscitant afternoon and was rewarded with naught. He is as Black as she, and revealed nothing that he did not want to. Regulus is a challenge, one she will overcome.

*

It is odd to Bellatrix that Alice's body feels so familiar while Alice is so foreign. Alice is heavier than Bellatrix, less firm and less supple. Her cheeks are prone to be chubby while Bellatrix's are smooth, but they are the same sex. Bellatrix understands the softness of femininity better than the hardness of masculinity.

Bellatrix finds a measure of comfort in being wrapped by Alice's soft legs while kissing soft lips and touching soft curves. Bellatrix does not know what Alice finds in her; Bellatrix feels she shouldn't care. Alice calls her Mrs. Lestrange when their bodies are entwined, but Bellatrix has never uttered the words Mrs. Longbottom.

Bellatrix does not hide behind lies.

*

The other Death Eaters do not meet the eyes of their Lord.

In the darkness, they bow their heads respectfully (fearfully) in His presence. They are the same, powerless and weak, in Bellatrix's eyes. She is their Amazon queen and she chooses to be loyal to her warlord. She watches her Lord and does not fear his wrath. She is strong and pure and holy to his cause.

Bellatrix does not bow her head, for she does not fear the Basilisk. She meets reptilian, alien eyes with her own, and parts her lips invitingly. She lives to serve her Lord.

When He sends the useless away, she stands tall and proud. She ignores the brush of her husband's hand, ignores the jealous eyes of those she has permitted in her body as they leave the Sanctuary and return to their grey lives.

Her Lord's skin is alabaster in the darkness, and draws her like a beacon.

For Him, she submits willingly.

*

Bellatrix noticed Alice in a lingerie shop.

Their hands brushed as they reached on the same rack, both drawn to inky black lace and screaming scarlet satin. Bellatrix looked at the pleasant, plump woman who was her elder but none the wiser, and wondered what she hid beneath her demure robes.

She offered her lunch, and was pleasantly surprised when it was accepted.

Alice was wearing Slytherin green beneath her robes that day.

*

Once, the Auror married to her lover interrupted them. Bellatrix was in the bath, surrounded by bubbles and luxurious scents wafting from flickering candles. Alice wore a pink robe that did not hide the gradual swell of the parasite inside her womb. Bellatrix had not approved of her lover's pregnancy, but Alice beamed with joy every time she uttered the word baby. The Auror babbled in shock at the sight of such a beauty in his sanctum.

Alice offered Bellatrix a towel and the Auror an explanation that did not mention slick wetness, sweat and saliva.

Bellatrix is impressed by Alice's subterfuge. Alice is less honest and open with every visit she makes.

She does not think to mourn the change.

*

Bellatrix smirks as she caresses the swell of Alice's belly. Its movements against her stomach when she embraces Alice are sensual in a way Bellatrix feels is wicked. She has told Alice that now they are a threesome, and has asked her to tell the child about its earliest romps when it is older.

Alice, spread out and shockingly wanton, has lazily agreed.

*

Bellatrix is not made for quiet contemplation and reflection. Bellatrix is action and misbegotten deeds and desire.

Her husband understands this. They dance in the darkness under the flickering warmth of burning and illicit actions. They are sin and beauty and the world envies them but they give the world little mind.

Bellatrix feels content in the violence and blood and being bound by (to) a man whose eyes are mirrors of her own. She understands his every whim and some days this bores her and some days this comforts her.

She knows Rodolphus is never bored of her.

*

Bellatrix likes the way Alice worships her.

Bellatrix is beauty and midnight sin and languid elegance. Bellatrix is the antithesis of Alice's dull, drab normality. Bellatrix is wrought in the colors of the night, all black sky hair and white moonlight skin and star grey eyes. Alice is molded in the colors of the earth, with mud hair and dirt eyes and sand skin.

Alice kneels before her and does wicked prayer in her honor, and Bellatrix languishes in it.

Bellatrix does not worship Alice. She already has a god and she shall have no other god before Him. Alice does not understand, but Bellatrix is not bothered.

When Bellatrix kisses Alice, she digs her fingers into plump pale thighs and leaves sharp purple bruises and crescent-shaped scars. She has flaky red-black blood dried beneath her claw-like nails and she does not wash it away. In the morning, when the taste of sex has gone stale and fuzzy on her tongue, she licks at the foreign scabs.

They melt on her tongue.

*

Bellatrix wonders what giving birth is like. Her sisters have both crossed that final boundary into womanhood, and Alice nurtures an infant at the breast that used to belong to Bellatrix alone. (Bellatrix does not acknowledge that the Auror might also claim ownership on his wife. Bellatrix knows that Alice is hers alone.)

Bellatrix thinks that childbirth would be cleansing. Alice seems renewed.

Bellatrix thinks that childbirth would be hallowing. Narcissa seems empty, her vitality now focused on the mewling infant she made instead of the things that used to matter. Time passes and Narcissa regains herself and the circles under her eyes fade under beauty spells and Narcissa seems less hollow but more fake as though she gave her soul to her child.

Bellatrix does not want her soul to slip away from her, pushed out between her thighs while she screams and regrets, so Bellatrix does not want a child. It grates against the mantra instilled in her since birth, telling her that her blood is precious and she should pass it on. Bellatrix does not want to pass on her blood because she is selfish and wants to keep it to herself. The future does not matter for she will not always be part of it.

Bellatrix scorns the newly born and pities their mothers.

*

When Bellatrix enters the Alice's house tonight, she is accompanied by her husband. Her brother-in-law and the weak pale youth are with them, and they all wear cloaks of black. Bellatrix removes her mask as she enters the familiar home.

Alice is sitting on a sofa with her whimpering, selfish parasite sitting on her lap. Her Auror is sitting in a chair next to the fireplace though he jumps out of the chair and stands to protect her lover and his leech.

Bellatrix is the unspoken leader. She strides forward toward the quivering wandtip and its furious indignant bearer. "Don't!" comes Alice's voice, strong and shaky and protective. Mothering has honed Alice's sharper, fiercer instincts and Bellatrix is momentarily proud.

"Your master is gone," taunts the Auror.

Bellatrix does not shield her lover's lover from the flurry of movement. She focuses on Alice instead.

*

Alice is screaming and pleading. Her back arches, her toes curl and her eyes are scrunched closed. Bellatrix does not remove the curse. Alice has betrayed Bellatrix. Alice won't share her final secret with her, and Bellatrix does not accept this. Alice was jealous of Bellatrix's Lord, and now Alice won't help her get Him back.

Alice screams.

Bellatrix refuses to listen.

*

Bellatrix is proud.

Her sister said she was proud unto a fault when she pleaded for her to lie earlier, but Bellatrix does not bend to the whims of others. Bellatrix does not care that she will end in the chill of prison, for she is true to herself. Bellatrix knows that her Lord's message can only be as pure as its messengers, and she is willing to be an example (martyr) for the cause.

Her husband, his brother and the boy are with her. Their stance is not as bold as hers, and the boy puts on a pitiful display.

She wonders if Azkaban will tear their minds and leave them broken and ruined, like she left Alice.

She wonders what memories Azkaban will rape.

She does not want to care.

From heaven or the abyss? Let questioning be, / O artlesss monster wreaking endless pain, / So that your smile and glance throw wide to me / An infinite that I have loved in vain.