Why Did It All Change?

Why Did It All Change?

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You don't really expect things to change. Obviously, when I was a little girl, I knew I'd grow up, learn magic and so on, but I didn't expect the basics to change. I thought I'd always be close to both my sisters, and that Sirius, Regulus and the Lestrange boys would be my friends, forever.

I'd heard of Azkaban, but I never expected to see it. I certainly never expected to be locked up there, to have to live there for thirteen years. The brats nearly caught me, like they did the others. I might have been locked up again by now, instead of sitting here, waiting while the Dark Lord plans what to do now that the prophecy has been destroyed.

I've just remembered: when we were little, I liked Rabastan better than Rodolphus. Even that's changed. I wonder when it did? Was it when -- no, I remember: once when Narcissa did that accidental magic that pushed me into the wall, Rodolphus was the one who came to see if I was all right, and try to stop me crying. I kissed him. I was only eight, and he was nine, and he ran away rubbing his face ... and now we've been married for seventeen years. Though it hardly counts as a married life, living in adjacent cells in a prison patrolled by Dementors. What does the Dark Lord want to keep them around him now for? How does he think we feel, knowing our former guards are close enough for him to call them, though far enough away that they don't affect us? I remember them draining my love for Rodolphus, every happy feeling I ever had. Doesn't he know the way we all hate them?

It's a silly question. Of course he knows. That's why they're there, isn't it? He doesn't fear or hate them, he commands them and they do his bidding. If any of us betrayed him to the Aurors, we know that the Dementors would Kiss us all. So they keep a safe distance while we watch each other, we make sure the Dark Lord is safe, we allow him to relax.

I wish I could relax. Maybe if I think about my childhood. Like when we were at Malfoy Manor one Hallowe'en, and Regulus was crying because dear Andromeda the Mudblood-lover had taken his last Chocolate Frog. Who would have thought they'd turn out the way they did? Sirius was laughing at Regulus for being so bothered about a sweet. He was always so happy, always laughing. Sirius was even laughing when I killed him. I suppose he liked it. He would. If I'd known that, I wouldn't have killed him, I would've killed the brats instead. I could've put their heads on the wall, like Aunt Elladora with the house-elves. That'd be nice. The Dark Lord would probably want Potter's head, though. Well, I could kill someone else to fill the gap he left.

Silly old Regulus. He cared about the silliest things, like the last Chocolate Frog, or not killing Mudbloods and half-bloods. He was surprised to see me when I went to see him that day ten -- no, fifteen -- years ago; so surprised, he told me that he was thinking of leaving the Death Eaters so that he wouldn't have to go and kill the Prewetts. Silly boy. Who wouldn't want to kill the Prewetts? Who'd tell me that they wanted to leave? Of course, he didn't know the Dark Lord already knew about that, and had sent me to stop him. I did try to persuade him not to leave. I could just imagine him as that little boy, not wanting to let Andri have the last of the chocolate Prewetts. But he didn't want to listen. So I stopped him leaving. I stopped him listening. I stopped him living.

I should have told his mother, my aunt. She'd have liked to have known his killer was family. It was so important to keep things in the family.

Andri had gone by then. Stupid girl. Who'd want to marry a Mudblood? She still managed to get a kid, that half-blood Auror bitch. For a long time, I hoped she was someone else's daughter, but I saw her at the Ministry, and she does look a bit like Andri's Mudblood. So I suppose that hope has gone now. I should have killed her, too, but I was busy, too busy to do more than stun her and deal with Sirius.

Narcissa's the big success story, of course, not Andri. She got herself Lucius; not just a Death Eater, but foremost among the Death Eaters, the one who the Dark Lord trusts to lead us when he is busy elsewhere. And there's Draco, the only pure-blood son born in this generation to any of the Blacks. He'll be a Death Eater soon; I hear he's in Potter's year. I wonder if he'll kill or capture him for the Dark Lord?

I wonder why the Dark Lord cares so much about the Potter boy? He's not much use. Even filled with anger when I killed Sirius, he couldn't really hurt me. All he managed to do was smash a glass ball. Anyone could do that. I goaded him so easily -- all I had to do was ask if he loved my cousin, and little baby Potter tried to use the Cruciatus Curse on me. That's so sweet. I should have got that Lupin, too. At least Sirius took a half-blood lover -- and a male, so he wouldn't infest the world with half-blood offspring. Unlike Andri and her stupid daughter, and her stupid husband!

Why does she have a kid? I don't have one. Rodolphus and I would have nice, pure-blood children, and no Squibs. Children who would grow up to be people who would be good for the future, not scum like Andri's daughter. Not scum like Potter. But we didn't get round to it before we went to Azkaban, and we couldn't do anything there, in different cells. And now ... now I don't think we'd want to, even if Rodolphus were still here with me. But he's not. He's going back to Azkaban. That Potter brat and his friends trapped him at the Ministry. That wasn't supposed to happen.

I'd look at Rodolphus, and I'd remember I loved him. I remember our wedding, and I remember us talking about children.

I just don't remember what it means to love. It's gone. The Dementors took it from us both. What use was it to them? They don't even breed -- the Dark Lord told us, they just fester and grow in dark, contaminated places, like the Muggles in their overcrowded cities. It was our love, and I want it back.

Or do I want it back? Love is weakness. It brought Potter to the Ministry at the Dark Lord's desire. It brought Sirius there to save Potter, and die himself. It led Andri to her Mudblood.

I don't want love. I don't need love. I'm strong, and I won't be weak. Rodolphus doesn't matter. He got captured, and I didn't. He's weak. I'm not.

The Dark Lord knows what's best for us all, and there's no room for weak love in his world.

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