She shouldn’t be happy here. She should be with Ron and her children. She should have been making dinner, Hugo would be worried. He and Rose were home for Christmas holiday and she’d told him she’d be back with the vegetables an hour ago. She’d gotten as far as getting the vegetables and had been starting back when she’d shown up. She came out of a side alley, fast and drug Hermione into it. Her long curly black hair was still wild and her eyes shone with insanity. Hermione breathed her name. She wasn’t scared. They kissed, just once but long and deep before the filthy creature led her back through the maze of old London streets to a dilapidated boarding house.
The room she was lead into was filthy and it reeked, the bed was covered with musty blankets, the whole place was covered in a layer of carbon dust from the poorly ventilated stove. Despite her hatred for it, her clandestine lover was enchanted by the place. She’d lived here for years, since the year Hugo was born. Hermione had seen more of the place than she would admit even to herself. Her lover took her coat and placed her basket by the door. She was almost fidgety. Hermione kissed her again. “Not in the mood for that. Something a little more cozy, like.” She gestured to the fetid bed. The Law Enforcement Magister frowned at her, but got only a hard stare in return. Hermione felt herself go weak, she brushed her hand over the scar on her arm as she felt it flare with slight tingling pain. The word was still there, unable to be healed by conventional magic; it also still bore a faint enchantment.
The woman ran a hand through her oily hair and advanced on the bed. Hermione swallowed, feeling her mouth go dry. She was standing at the edge of the bed, so a quick shove put her onto its surface. The bed embraced her with its filthy coverings and she felt strong arms around her, hugging her tightly. The scar on her arm tingled and she relaxed back into the body behind her. All of the nervousness in her evaporated in this woman’s embrace, she could feel her shallow breathing, the heat where their bodies met. It was quite cozy.
She snuggled against the frail body behind her, she felt lips against her neck and she craned her head to give her better access. She eventually turned around and embraced her, burying her face in the bodice of a filthy dress. “I shouldn’t be here. I should go.” She murmured. She felt bony fingers take purchase in her hair, her scar throbbed.
“Just for a little while.” The tone was an icy whisper. The arms tightened around her aggressively.
“I have a family. I haven’t told them about us. I can’t handle it anymore; I can’t lie to Ron anymore. He has to know. This has to be the last time.”
“No, love.” Her scar burned. “It won’t be the last time.” The whisper was gone, now her voice was a growl. The fingers found her scalp, digging sharp dirty nails into her. She whimpered.
“Please, don’t make me come anymore. Please, I know that you’ve cursed me somehow to love you. You won’t tell me, but it’s some dark spell that you’ve put on me. And the scar, the name. That’s magic to control me. I’m not fooled B-“
“Don’t you dare say it!” The woman shrilled in her ear, she felt the talons digging into her left shoulder, and she felt warm blood trailing down her skin. “Don’t you dare say that name! She is dead, I am not that woman.”
“You are! You tortured my friend’s parents, you killed so many people! You tortured me for months in Malfoy Manor and in that time you managed somehow to make me fall in love with you. I know it was spite, for the things I said about Voldemort, about your love for him. You were going to make me fall in love with you out of some twisted scheme of revenge. You weren’t expecting to love me back; you weren’t expecting to lose the battle at Hogwarts. I wasn’t expecting you to come back. I saw Molly Weasley kill you. I saw it. You had a horcrux and you came back and then you came to me. At first, after I left that manor I couldn’t understand why I disarmed you instead of killing you. I hated you for all the things you’d done to me. In the months that followed I felt horrible, I felt like I was missing some part of my life. Then the battle happened and I was fighting you, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t kill you-“She broke off, the scar was searing hot, she could feel the flesh around it blistering. “When Molly did, I wanted to cry over your corpse. I kept your damned wand. I have it in a trunk in the house somewhere where Ron and my children will never find it. You resurfaced, after I had finally buried the possibility that I could have ever loved you, you came back and I felt it when I first looked at you across a street. I’ve been thinking about it. It has to be a curse. You engineered this! Why did you do it, you sick witch?”
She had ripped her way out of the other witch’s embrace and rolled off the bed. She was standing with her back to the wall, screaming at her. The mad woman was looking at her with a mixture of shock and anger, maybe a little hurt under the other two. She was sitting up on the bed now. “I did it to show you how it feels to be manipulated by your feelings, to delude yourself into thinking that you are loved. I knew Voldemort didn’t love me, but I convinced myself that I could make him love me as much as I loved him. I was a Black, I was a pure blood. I was beautiful, how could he not. I was dedicated; he could see how wonderful I was. He loved me. I told myself those lies to get through my miserable existence. I couldn’t bear some little know-it-all to come mouthing off the dark of things to me as if I hadn’t found them myself, so I made you fall in love with me. I let you deal with a little inconvenient emotion, and then I came back to you. I’ve been distracting you for years from your idiot husband and spoiled children, and you haven’t said a word. Your conscience tells you too, but there is some inhibition deep within you stops you every time. I wonder who put it there.” She stopped to cackle. “All the time, so ready for me. Inviting a hand up your robes almost as soon as I got you alone. Always so cozy with the crazy.” She said through the laughter.
Hermione felt her heart clench at the conformation. “Release it!” She shouted. “Release me from this curse! You’ve had your fun, you foul creature!” The other woman only laughed and gestured to the door.
“Get out.”
Enraged, with blisters forming on her forearm, but unable to do anything but obey. Hermione left, with her coat and basket in hand. When she found herself willing to stop, the scar was still bright white. She wiped the tears from her eyes and looked down at it. When the wound had first been inflicted, it had clearly said mudblood, but over the course of the following months, it had morphed itself slowly. Everyone else said it was a shame to have such a slur on her arm, so she imagined that they still saw mudblood. Ever since the battle of Hogwarts it had been a name. She clenched her jaws as she looked down on it now, whispering the name she saw. “Bellatrix.”