All the Night in Woe

"Ginerva, come out and play..." the voice sang out. That voice, it always sang, it always purred, it was never normal. Never. It was a voice that its owner used to grate upon, to distract, to unhinge and to unnerve. It did its job well; she would often feel a shiver run down her spine when she heard it.

The shadows are beginning to surround us now, good. The darkness is enveloping us, even better. Let the wretchedness draw closer and wrap itself around us. That is who we are, that is who we have always been, and it is who we shall always be. We were surprised to find ourselves here with her, but it is no matter. She has taken to the hunt like a gazelle, swift and nimble. The days are best when she runs free, she seems to come alive. Then we envelop her with darkness and we drain the life out of her. Sometimes we go too far, sometimes not far enough, but never does she forget her place. She is our prey, and nothing else matters except to catch her.

"Ginerva, come out and play..." the voice sings out again. We smile, because we know it will unhinge her, and it does. We catch a flurry of activity out of the corner of our eye. A long mane of crimson hair trailing a lithe body as it dove through the door behind her. We turn and gave chase.

"Ginerva, you naughty girl you. Why are you playing with me? You know that I will find you in the end," the voice cooed. "You know that we always do."

"Bitch!" a voice calls out from somewhere.

She sounds worn down and tired. Good, that means we should find her soon.

"You know why I'm running from you. If you want to find me, you're damn well going to have to work for it."

A salacious smile. She's tired, but still has spirit. Obviously we didn't hurt her enough before. Oh no my sweet, we obviously didn't. Who knew she could run so fast after feeling so much pain? Oh she surprised us with that, oh yes she did. Cruciatus is too good for her it seems. Oh yes it does.

Moving into the hallway, we hear sound emanating from the floor above us. Good, we have her trapped this time, the foolish girl, trapped like a wild animal, with nowhere to run.

Strange that she should flee upwards, that she should want to be on top. She knows her position is below us.

As we meander up the staircase, we find nothing but silence greeting us.

"Ginerva, you can come out now. Do so and we may be merciful with you," the voice sings. Never a normal tone of voice. Never let them hear you speak, never let them think of you as an equal. Always prove you are superior. Always remind them that they are inferior.

Moving down the hall, the silence still remains.

Pain suddenly shoots through our leg. We feel something solid collide with it. She's fighting back. She thinks she's injured us. She's wrong. Pain is nothing, victory is everything. We will remind her of this.

We spin around on our uninjured leg. We cry out, "Stupefy!"

Our prey flies across the room and collapses in a heap as it collides with the wall. We think we heard several bones break that time. It pleases us and we allow ourselves to lick our lips in delight. We were victorious today, we put our prey in her place and we know she will remember her lesson well.

We check ourselves to make sure we are uninjured. When our health is assured, we are allowed a moment of respite.

We then walk over to our prey and check for signs of life. We then levitate her body and take her home with us.

She gave a good chase today, she managed to strike back. She managed to strike us. We are impressed.

We put her into bed; we minister to her wounds and allow her to recover. She is our prey, but she is also our precious. We would die of heartache if she were not with us.

After several hours, she begins to stir. Her eyes open and then focus as she sees us.

"Bellatrix! I almost had you that time, you malicious bitch!" she snarls with pride before her voice begins to waiver with uncertainty. "How long was I out for?"

We lean down and kiss her, silencing her questions.

"Hush, my love," we tell her, "hush. You slept for several hours, we hurt you rather badly today and you needed time to heal."

She runs her hands along the length of her body and winces as she passes over a bruise. She still hurts some. Good. She should remember the pain, it is an unforgiving teacher.

"You did well today, we tell her. "You managed to hurt us and we are proud of you for it." A hungry smile flickers across our face. We desire this one, and we are happy to have her.

Ginny Weasley looks up into the eyes of her lover and feels pride at doing well, and anticipation at taking up the game again tomorrow. It's a sadistic game they play, and they both enjoy it. They'll play it again tomorrow, and maybe, just maybe, she'll manage to hurt Bellatrix some more. That is, before Bellatrix finds her, and hurts her in return.

That's her role here in her own personal purgatory. Or is it their purgatory? Yes, it's their purgatory, the two of them together for who knows how long, perhaps for all eternity. Ginny relishes that thought, an eternity with Bellatrix, it's nourishing on so many levels that it becomes a sort of bliss. It's the rapture of her existence and the damnation of her soul, all combined in one bundle.

She remembers her life before. She remembers growing up, she remembers Hogwarts. She remembers being sorted, she remembers the basilisk and she remembers being killed. Wait, that came later.

She recovered from the basilisk and things got better for a time, then they went straight to hell, hand basket and all. Cedric was killed, Sirius was killed, Harry fell apart. Oh, did Harry fall apart.

Harry Potter sat on a wall,

Harry Potter took a great fall.

All the king's horses, all the king's men,

They didn't bother to put Harry back together again.

They just set him up to be squashed like a bug, and look where I wound up as a result.

I can just hear them now, Sorry, Ginny, but it's like this, Harry's going to kill Voldemort and then we're going to come in and kill his followers. But here's the catch, when we kill Bellatrix, we're going to blast you into oblivion right alongside her. How quaint. How completely and utterly quaint.

I call bullshit.

I don't know how long we've been here, but I know two things for certain. One, neither of us can die. Believe me, we've both tried on numerous occasions. The second thing is that I'm just as certifiably insane as Bellatrix is. You try playing sadistic games with a psychotic bitch for five hundred years and we'll see what your mental health is like.

Ginny looks up at the ceiling, reaches out and squeezes Bella's hand. The girl smiles because she knows she's not alone. Five hundred years old, her appearance still like that of a teenager and isolation is her biggest fear.

Talk about a quirk of fate. I'd call it an uneven exchange if you asked me. I get to be permanently youthful in return for my sanity and waking up every morning to be tortured by a sadist. Would you call that fair? Don't answer that, you're just a figment of my imagination.

Bellatrix smiles, then growls, and Ginny knows what's coming next.

Several hours later, as night falls, Ginny slips out of her lover's arms and glides out onto the patio of the villa they've taken up residence in. Or rather, the villa that has taken up residence around them, no matter where they go, or what they do, they always wake up there, alive and in one piece.

It may be a different kind of hell, but at least it can be a beautiful looking hell at times.

She hears Bellatrix murmur in her sleep, calling to her husband.

Nope, no Rodolphus here, Bellatrix, it's just me, Ginny Weasley. Oh mother, if you only could see your daughter now. Ginny Weasley, daughter, sister, friend, deranged lesbian psycho-bitch. Did I mention I'm deranged? Good, because I hate it when people get confused about that. Yes, yes, I also said I was a bitch, and a lesbian to boot, but what did you expect? Seriously, you try getting trapped in the same place for eternity with only one other person for company, see how you deal with your need to get laid. At least neither of us has to worry about that time of the month anymore. I'd hate to think of what that would be like.

Ginny glides across the marble terrace, the folds of her robe fluttering in her wake as a soft breeze wafts her, murmuring to herself, lecturing the voices she thinks are inside her head. They aren't there, they aren't anywhere and she knows it, but it's a pleasant distraction to the deranged and crowded solitude her life has become.

I wonder what happened to Snape. He probably got himself blasted into complete and total oblivion. Lucky bastard. At this point I'd actually enjoy even five minutes with the greasy git. I'd give anything for that, hell I'd even take a swan dive off the terrace if it would accomplish anything.

It won't though, and Ginny knows it. She's done it before and it changed nothing at all. The powers that be take great pleasure to ensure that no matter how painful her existence has become, it will never end. It's been twenty years since she took a dive. Bellatrix was not happy with her when she woke up in bed the next morning.

Stupid cow, what else was I suppose to do? Hang myself? It's overdone. Poison myself? With what, we were out of hemlock. Stab myself? Too messy, and there was that time you slipped on my blood and broke your neck in the process. At least with the dive, I feel like I'm flying again. I feel like I'm free, at least until my body hits the ground and splatters all over the place. I can't believe my head popping off that one time freaked her out so much. You'd think she has a stronger stomach then that, being a Death Eater, but no, she has to spend the next ten years fighting down the urge to vomit whenever I feel the need to get some action. I swear, 'give me head' indeed.

Ginny looks out across the moonlit landscape and then up at the stars. She takes it all in, the stars, the clouds, the night air, everything. She then shrugs off her robe and climbs up on the railing and lets out a yell before jumping over the side.

God I love flying. I love Bellatrix as well, so that's not saying all that much, but I do so love flying. I feel so free, I feel so alive. I don't care if I'm plummeting to my death...

I'm alive.

As she plummeted towards the ground, Ginny forced herself to exhale as she felt the wind whip past her body, the air parting as her flesh continued its downward spiral.

I do hope Bellatrix isn't too upset with me when she finds me in the morning. Of course she will be. She's Bellatrix.

But what do I care? I'm flying.