Ferocity

In those long years after the Dark Lord died, Alecto suffered immensely.

Granted, she suffered from boredom, but it was as much a trial as Azkaban, in her eyes. She didn't dare show her face in proper society, not that she'd ever been welcome there, to tell the truth. There had always been an edge of hatred in the eyes of the people she met, hatred and contempt.

People hated what they feared, she would whisper to herself. They didn't hate her because of her lack of beauty or her blunt nature. They hated her because they were afraid of what she was capable of. Of who she was. Of who she had been.

She had wrought pain and glory for her Dark Lord, and she had not fallen into disgrace. Unlike the others, the beautiful, shining ones who had been fed with silver spoons and who had walked into the soul-sucking halls of Azkaban with haughty pride, she was still in the world, still able to perform her Lord's will, albeit a bit posthumously.

She didn't think the Dark Lord would have approved of rolling over and showing the soft underbelly of his followers so easily after his fall - it made them all look weak, much too weak and breakable. They were strong, and if she had her way the wizarding world would bow before them still.

Amycus, of course, told her she was foolish, but her brother had never been worth anything, truly. He was a follower, through and through, not anything like she was. She refused to believe otherwise. She loved her brother, of course, he was her family and, if she were honest with herself, her best friend. She just wished that there were others in her life, strong and fearless and uncowed by the events of years past.

Alecto missed blood-soaked nights and aching, languorous mornings. She craved the sounds of the inferior screaming at her mercy, and the rush of power that accompanied the flash of green. She missed nervous anticipation and gut-wrenching fear, the fervor of fucking while sticky with blood and sweaty from the fury of battle. Now she was living a life of mediocrity and apathy, and she missed the sensations that meant she was actually alive.

She even missed the other Death Eaters, the dark, anonymous shapes in the dark of night who reassured her by their presence. She wasn't alone, others felt like she did and she was part of something greater than herself.

But now she had none of that. Now she had a quiet job as a secretary in an office where nothing of interest happened. She spent her nights listening to the Wizarding Wireless and reading the newspaper with a soft blanket covering her legs to prevent a chill, hating every moment.

Until, one dark night in Knockturn Alley, she bumped into a man who growled at her in such a familiar way that for a split second she was in the past. The hood of her cloak was the hood of a set of robes that had been lain to rest beneath the floorboards of her shack, shrunk and transfigured into a smooth grey stone, and she frantically shoved at it before remembering when she was.

Her hood fell back and she met the fiercest eyes she had seen since the Dark Lord fell.

"Out of my way, witch," he snarled, revealing sharp, yellowed teeth. Like a dog's, she thought. No, like a wolf, she amended as he grabbed her arm and claw-like nails dug into her arm.

He began to shove her away, but she spoke quickly as his identity dawned on her. "Fenrir. I don't believe I've had the pleasure."

He narrowed his eyes. She could imagine fur bristling along his spine. His words, in sharp contrast, were polite. "I don't believe we have."

"Alecto," she said, holding out one hand. Fenrir picked it up and sniffed it before giving it a long lick that would have raised fur on her own spine. She took a chance, and murmured, "I heard rumor of your ferocity."

"Did you? Where might a soft woman like yourself hear rumors of that sort?" Fenrir asked. He still gripped her wrist, and when she darted her eyes down a thin trickle of blood welled up around one claw.

"I believe we were part of a now-defunct organization together," Alecto dared to venture.

A raspy laugh. "You?"

"I daresay this isn't a conversation to be held in the alley- even this one," Alecto said. "Would you accompany me somewhere more private?"

He released her arm, raising his hand up to lick her glistening blood from his nail, and gave a nod of assent.

They Apparated to a cemetery of Fenrir's choosing, and Alecto perched precariously on a gravestone as she watched Fenrir's smooth, predatory movements.

"So I'm to believe this little, round witch was a Death Eater?" he said. His voice was low and threatening, but Alecto stared him in the eye and nodded, reaching to pull up her sweater's sleeve to display her faded proof.

He grinned, displaying sharp teeth, and stopped her.

"I'm bored," she said, pulling up her sleeve anyway and showing the pale red mark on her arm. "I haven't felt alive since the last time this burned black."

"Oh?" Fenrir asked.

"And I think you still do the sort of things the Dark Lord commanded," Alecto said. "I think you have fun in the night, instead of wasting slowly away like I have been."

"Oh, I have more fun than you can handle, little girl," Fenrir said, ignoring her slight, angry motion at his dismissal of her.

She stood, trampling across the grave to stand inches away from a monster far removed from humanity, and then kissed him hard. He was still for a moment before returning her kiss, nipping at her with his sharp teeth in a painful way that wasn't in the least uncomfortable.

As she perceived him to be distracted, she pulled the small knife out of her pocket - the knife she never went anywhere without - and pressed it against Fenrir's thick neck.

He paused, looking at her in amusement.

She smiled, and pressed the knife into his skin. Not anywhere fatal, but wounds in the neck bled buckets. Blood welled up around her knife like blood had welled up around his nail and she licked the knife, smiling at him as the taste of his soul filled her mouth, salty and warm.

"I doubt it," she whispered.

"I can smell your fear," he said.

"I can smell your blood," she replied.

She reached up, tracing his lips, leaving a trail of his own blood, and said, "Will you make my life interesting?"

He didn't answer, only growled and laid her down on the grave, pressing a bloody kiss against her hungry lips.