Desecration

Desecration

Bellatrix Lestrange was desperate.

Desperation ate away at her very soul, pushing her to rush through her actions and driving her to commit awful mistakes that would undoubtedly haunt her later. She was no longer the languid, slow predator that had made her so useful. Now hurried, she acted with all the grace of a gazelle pursued by hungry lions.

The years in the hell called Azkaban had ruined her. She could try and pretend all she wanted, but deep inside she knew that she was not the same woman who had sneered, laughed, and treated the entire concept of imprisonment with a detached facade.

What a fool she had been. A prideful, arrogant, fool at that. She had thought that by staunchly supporting her Master, her Lord, she would rise even higher within the dog-eat-dog ranks of the Death Eaters. She had thought that it would earn her a place of honor when He returned.

She had been right.

But the cost, the cost had been too much. Night after night of her imprisonment had been spent crying and screaming at an uncaring world. Bleakness and depression had marked her days, huddling in the icy chill of the Dementors' presence had become her home.

Through all this, she had remained true, pious, reverent to her Lord. The thought of brighter days had lifted her soul. Thoughts of the day that she escaped that hell and returned to the world of the living at the side of her Master buoyed her spirit above the dreary muck that her existence had become.

But her hope had been misplaced.

She realized that the second that her dream came true and she had been released from her cell. She'd stood there, in the cold stony hall, shivering and shuddering from the freedom that had suddenly been opened to her. She'd smiled at the cloaked figures who had become her saviors, and stumbled after them as they swept through the halls on strong legs and with no hesitation. They were the complete antithesis to her own weakened form and stumbling, halting walk.

It had been then that she had realized how far she had fallen. None of the eyes she could see through the masks showed any flicker of the desire she had come to expect from others, only disgust or impassivity. She was no longer the beautiful woman she had been, and the realization hurt.

Later, alone in the room she had been put in, she looked in the mirror and realized why desire was no longer sparked in those who saw her. She was gaunt, faded, a mere shadow of the woman she had been. She didn't know if she would ever be mended, restored to her original state. That left her feeling more hollow than the years pining away in Azkaban had.

She could never recall how long she spent that night, staring into the mirror, learning the new curves and angles of her face, the new tangle that was her hair, the new look that haunted her eyes. All she remembered was the next morning she felt as though she had not slept a wink and that she looked worse than ever.

She saw Rodolphus that day. Azkaban had not been any kinder to him, and she mourned for the loss of the wicked glint in his eyes and the years they'd spent apart. She had tried to approach him but he turned away and simply said, "It's over, Bella. Everything is gone."

She wanted to tell him that she was not gone, that she was right there, but could not because that would sound like she cared. Though her soul was fractured into a thousand glittering, sharp pieces, she still had to maintain her facade of cold indifference. It was who she was, who she had always been.

She walked away from her despairing husband, and went straight into the arms of someone who cared even less.

She found her Lord to be an attentive lover, the knowledge that she alone shared his bed to be gratifying. He was the most feared wizard to ever live, and in that small way she was his alone as He was hers. It returned her some of the power that she had lost in her long years in Azkaban, making some of the sting of losing her beauty fade.

Months of freedom passed quickly, much too quickly. She felt at times as though she was still imprisoned, however, now in a gilded cage rather than in that cold, dank cell. Other times she felt as though there was never anyone in the history of wizardry to feel as free and joyous at the mere lack of the icy presence of guards as she.

Then came the fateful day, the day that she fought with the other Death Eaters, the day she killed her cousin. The day she watched the last son of the Noble House of Black fall back through the veil, pushed by his own kin. The day that she felt as though she had committed the gravest desecration of her own pureblooded family possible.

Not a single one of the other Death Eaters seemed to realize what had happened.

She had destroyed her family, the Blacks. Never would another child bear the name. They would fade into the endless chasm that was history, and she was solely responsible. She had murdered her family with a thoughtless curse, had destroyed an ancient tradition. The worst was, she had done it in the name of purity.

She continued to act exactly as she had over these long months since her rescue from Azkaban. She was cold, impassive, and maniac. She fought fiercely for the Cause, condemned others, and laughed at the memory of tortured children, broken adults, and freshly dead bodies.

But deep in within, she was desperate for an escape. She did not want to right her wrongs or condemn what family she had left. She wanted to be free of the lies and the hypocrisy and the twisted, faded face she saw in the mirror.

She would die, that was all the hope she had left. She would die, either at her hand, an Auror's, or at her lover's, and then she would no longer be desperate or have to recall her sins and the desecration of what she held dear. So she acted, waiting for the moment when she would finally pay her dues.

fin.