44. Franfiction: Breaking Point
Title: Breaking Point
Author: Liliths_Requiem
Rating: R for violence, blood lust, and language
Characters: Bellatrix Black, Alice Longbottom, Molly Weasley, Frank Longbottom, assorted Death Eaters
Pairings: Molly Weasley/Bellatrix Black, allusion to Alice Prewett/Frank Longbottom, momentary Bellatrix Black/Alice Prewett
Era: November 1981
Word Count: 2153
Prompt: 100quills 25. Too Much
Lucius doesn’t look well that night. It’s been three days since the Dark Lord has disappeared, so none of them look well, but Lucius looks exceedingly unwell. Bella wonders, briefly, if he’s been sleeping, and then she decides she doesn’t care. If he doesn’t sleep now he’ll sleep later, when they’ve all been locked up in the filthy halls of Azkaban and sentenced to life in prison. She wonders if she’ll be able to deal with the Dementors, with having to relive every murder she’s performed and taste the bile in her throat over and over again as she peers into faces filled with fear. It’s a terrifying thought, but it’s one she’s trying to get used to. If the Dark Lord doesn’t return, she’s not going to demean herself to a life as a fugitive.
Narcissa made them tea, even though the tea stock was quickly running out and everyone was terrified of doing magic just in case it could lead to them being found. Lucius took a few sips before his body refused him more, and so the baby, Draco, was given a bit in hopes that it would keep him warm. It was turning out to be a very cold November, and everyone was afraid the children wouldn’t be able to weather the storm. Draco wasn’t allowed to do anything more than stay near the fire wrapped in blankets, and Bella hated watching her family disintegrate, like lowly street urchins, like criminals, like muggles.
They stay locked up in the old house for days. No one thinks about going back to Malfoy Manor, or Grimmauld Place, or anywhere they could feasibly be linked to. Every day, more Death Eaters arrive, some starving half to death after not having eaten anything more substantial than broth in the last week. Everyone was waiting for the revolution their Lord promised after he killed the Potter boy. Now, there seems to be nothing left.
The celebrations of the rest of the world permeate even their isolated corner, and with every cheer and every burst of happy laughter, Bella wonders how Molly is doing, if she’s had the baby yet, if it was a girl, like Molly had been hoping. She doubts she’ll ever see her lioness again, and that thought eats at her, even as she lies nestled in Rodolphus’s arms at night. He’s the best friend she’s ever had, and she’s grateful that he’s here to share this ordeal with her, but at the moment she wants nothing more than to crawl up into the arms of the woman she loves.
Another week passes without a change, and Bella’s gotten so used to not needing that right now she doesn’t understand the desperation of hunger. Her body feels restless from the magic bubbling up inside of her and she can’t seem to speak without screaming. Everything is closing in on her, because she knows this is the end. She knew it would come, someday, but she had wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, not dying of starvation in a muggle house far away from the comforts of her own home. She’s almost about to give up and surrender to the certainty of death when news arrives; real, concrete news from Rabastan, who arrived that morning.
“The Longbottoms,” he begins, once most of the Inner Circle is with him, “They have information on what happened to Him. They know where the Dark Lord is.” He sounds slightly hysterical, and that scares Bella because she isn’t sure if she should trust anyone that sounds insane anymore. She took that risk with Voldemort, and now she’s hiding in a dark basement somewhere no one can find her.
The moment her brother-in-law gets the word out, everyone else starts talking at once about planning and secrecy and waiting. She can’t handle those words, not after a week and a half of sitting here planning and waiting in secret. She needs action; she needs the danger, because this idleness is beginning to sap her forces and milk her dry. All of this waiting is getting to be too much, and if she doesn’t do something now, she isn’t sure she ever will.
“We’re going now,” she tells them, her quiet voice instantly shutting every mouth around the table. Even though their lord is dead, they respect the hierarchy he designed, and so Bella’s word is treated as law and most of the younger recruits make their way towards the back in order to fetch their robes, masks, and wands. Lucius, Rodolphus, and Rookwood remain where they are. The first two are too close to Bella to accept her word blindly, the last refuses to be ordered around by a woman half his age.
She doesn’t bother glancing at any of them. She simply calls for her robe and her mask before donning them with forced nonchalance. Tonight, she is going to live again. She is going to crawl out from underneath the dark tunnels she has been forced into and she is going to touch the sunlight and see the stars. After too many nights of living like a rat, Bellatrix Lestrange will once again be the cat.
It’s simple to apparate to the Longbottom house. They’ve known where it was for months, as Peter was good friends with them as well and was easily able to weasel the address out of Benjy, after torturing him to the brink of death first. It was the smallest Marauder’s first murder, and Bella didn’t mind holding him as he shook uncontrollably. She remembers the way Molly held her the night she spilt her first blood. The memory shakes her slightly and she’s forced to remember that Alice Prewett Longbottom is Molly’s cousin. She’s forced to remember that the blood she will spill tonight belongs to the woman who holds her heart.
She forces that thought from her head because she knows she doesn’t have a choice. In this moment of desperation, it is either kill or be killed, and Bella knows she cannot go down without a fight. Molly knows this as well, and for a moment the Slytherin can trick herself into believing that this is enough to justify her actions, that Molly will forgive her for torturing her own flesh and blood. She knows it’s insanity but she can’t bring herself to care. Right now, she just needs hope.
They enter the house easily. She can see Alice in the window long before the Auror has a chance to react. Too much celebrating, most likely. Without even sparing the other woman a glance, Bella has her tied up to a table leg and wandless. Unfortunately, she’s not quick enough with her wand to gag the witch before a scream rips from the blonde’s throat, and Frank comes bounding down the stairs, wand drawn and jaw set into a thin line. He starts throwing hexes wildly and Bella wonders if all Aurors forget their training when their loved ones are the ones at stake. Rabastan takes the larger man down easily. There is crying hard from up stairs, but the Death Eaters ignore it. If Bella wanted baby Neville dead, she’d kill him. Tonight wasn’t about spilling innocent blood, it was about sacrifice.
“What do you know about the Dark Lord?” Bella asks, her wand pointed at Alice’s head. Legilimency has never really been her strongest point, but she knows enough to break through most people’s defenses. Unfortunately, Alice is well versed in Occulemency, and Bella assumes it’s a subject thoroughly taught in their training. Pulling her wand from the blonde’s head, she instead aims it at her right shoulder blade and, with a few choice Latin words, begins carving the dark mark into Alice’s skin.
She doesn’t scream. Bella’s almost disappointed at the lack of reaction, but she likes the way the blood runs along Alice’s white flesh so much that she doesn’t stop. Some nights, when Molly was in a particularly bad mood, Bella was allowed to tears her nails into her lover’s back and draw blood. She loved to watch the crimson pool at the spot of her mark and drip along Molly’s pale back. It was intoxicating and alluring and right now, staring at Alice’s arm, Bella suddenly has the need to lick it.
Instead, she finishes the crude design before asking again. “Where is the Dark Lord, blood traitor? We know you know where he is, so tell us.” She finds it sickening, how lifeless her voice sounds right now. She cannot find it inside of her to fake enthusiasm for the hunt and the kill. As turned on as she may be, there’s nothing more inside of her but anger, heat, and a thirst for freedom she’s only ever tasted in Molly’s kisses. Maybe if she can revive Voldemort, they can win and she can save her beloved. For a moment, she entertains the possibility. Then she chides herself for being unstable enough to believe in such things.
Alice refuses to answer, even though they can both hear Frank’s screams from the other room. Bella wonders what it is the boys are doing to him. Whatever it is, it must be much less humane than her efforts of swindling information from her victim. Frank will lose his mind long before Alice even begins to break, but for some reason Bella believes the woman in front of her knows more than that man ever will. She’s tempted to go after the child, but instead she throws a “Crucio” towards his mother, focusing the anger, loneliness, and pain of the last ten days into the curse.
She waits for a scream that doesn’t come, and they both hang in some sort of suspended reality, where Alice stares at her through the pain, biting her lip until more blood trickles from the corners and Bella stares back with something akin to awe and bordering on admiration. Then, Bella screams the words again, “Crucio” echoing off of every wall and echoing in both of their ears. There is silence again, for a moment, followed by the unmistakable sound of someone in excruciating pain. Alice arches upwards, thrusting her body off the ground and away from her capture in hopes of escaping the curse. Bella’s too fast, too sure of her movements for Alice to stand a chance, however, and so she surrenders to the pain.
After a good twenty minutes pass, Bella lowers her wand and allows Alice the chance to breath. A concussion is evident by the dilation of the Auror’s eyes, and Bella’s arm is sore with the effort of concentrating the spell. She watches, mesmerized, as the blood trickles from Alice’s lips to her hair, making the red and gold bleed together and create something so painfully Gryffindor it overwhelms Bella and she smacks her victim with her bare hands. It’s crass and it’s muggle but she couldn’t control herself that time. Without waiting for her voice to settle she says, “So, Prewett,” and she never thought she could say that name like that. She’s destroyed other names without the letters stabbing into her heart like knives, but this time she almost doubles over in self-disgust. “Where’s my Lord?”
Alice only shakes her head, refusing to speak. They can both hear her husband crying from the other room, refusing to say anything but letting out thick sobs of “Alice,” and “Forgive me.” It’s moments like this that prove men are truly the weaker sex; when push comes to shove, women have a habit of remaining stronger longer. The silence permeates the room for a second, and then Bella kicks her again. Alice lets out something that sounds like a whimper but is almost a moan. It sounds like Molly that night before Halloween last year, and it cuts the Slytherin to the bone.
“Bitch,” she whispers, kicking Alice again. “Bitch,” she screams, waving her wand frantically as words pour from her mouth, thick, Latin words that most Gryffindors couldn’t understand if they tried. She watches as fire starts to burn at Alice’s hair, catching quickly and soon enveloping her entire face, almost like a halo but more fatal than such. It’s beautiful, in a twisted, disturbing way. And as Bella watches the awareness leave Alice’s eyes, she feels her own sanity begin to slip. This is one of those images that will haunt her forever, not because it is the most torturous spell she’s ever performed. No, this moment will never leave her because as Alice surrenders to the pain with a final groan, Bella is reminded of Molly’s face just before she orgasms.
The Aurors arrive before any of the Death Eaters can hear them. They surround the house and Bella finds herself bound and wandless within moments. She wonders, for a second if they will make her bleed. Somehow, she knows, they will deny her even that simple pleasure.
Author: Liliths_Requiem
Rating: R for violence, blood lust, and language
Characters: Bellatrix Black, Alice Longbottom, Molly Weasley, Frank Longbottom, assorted Death Eaters
Pairings: Molly Weasley/Bellatrix Black, allusion to Alice Prewett/Frank Longbottom, momentary Bellatrix Black/Alice Prewett
Era: November 1981
Word Count: 2153
Prompt: 100quills 25. Too Much
Lucius doesn’t look well that night. It’s been three days since the Dark Lord has disappeared, so none of them look well, but Lucius looks exceedingly unwell. Bella wonders, briefly, if he’s been sleeping, and then she decides she doesn’t care. If he doesn’t sleep now he’ll sleep later, when they’ve all been locked up in the filthy halls of Azkaban and sentenced to life in prison. She wonders if she’ll be able to deal with the Dementors, with having to relive every murder she’s performed and taste the bile in her throat over and over again as she peers into faces filled with fear. It’s a terrifying thought, but it’s one she’s trying to get used to. If the Dark Lord doesn’t return, she’s not going to demean herself to a life as a fugitive.
Narcissa made them tea, even though the tea stock was quickly running out and everyone was terrified of doing magic just in case it could lead to them being found. Lucius took a few sips before his body refused him more, and so the baby, Draco, was given a bit in hopes that it would keep him warm. It was turning out to be a very cold November, and everyone was afraid the children wouldn’t be able to weather the storm. Draco wasn’t allowed to do anything more than stay near the fire wrapped in blankets, and Bella hated watching her family disintegrate, like lowly street urchins, like criminals, like muggles.
They stay locked up in the old house for days. No one thinks about going back to Malfoy Manor, or Grimmauld Place, or anywhere they could feasibly be linked to. Every day, more Death Eaters arrive, some starving half to death after not having eaten anything more substantial than broth in the last week. Everyone was waiting for the revolution their Lord promised after he killed the Potter boy. Now, there seems to be nothing left.
The celebrations of the rest of the world permeate even their isolated corner, and with every cheer and every burst of happy laughter, Bella wonders how Molly is doing, if she’s had the baby yet, if it was a girl, like Molly had been hoping. She doubts she’ll ever see her lioness again, and that thought eats at her, even as she lies nestled in Rodolphus’s arms at night. He’s the best friend she’s ever had, and she’s grateful that he’s here to share this ordeal with her, but at the moment she wants nothing more than to crawl up into the arms of the woman she loves.
Another week passes without a change, and Bella’s gotten so used to not needing that right now she doesn’t understand the desperation of hunger. Her body feels restless from the magic bubbling up inside of her and she can’t seem to speak without screaming. Everything is closing in on her, because she knows this is the end. She knew it would come, someday, but she had wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, not dying of starvation in a muggle house far away from the comforts of her own home. She’s almost about to give up and surrender to the certainty of death when news arrives; real, concrete news from Rabastan, who arrived that morning.
“The Longbottoms,” he begins, once most of the Inner Circle is with him, “They have information on what happened to Him. They know where the Dark Lord is.” He sounds slightly hysterical, and that scares Bella because she isn’t sure if she should trust anyone that sounds insane anymore. She took that risk with Voldemort, and now she’s hiding in a dark basement somewhere no one can find her.
The moment her brother-in-law gets the word out, everyone else starts talking at once about planning and secrecy and waiting. She can’t handle those words, not after a week and a half of sitting here planning and waiting in secret. She needs action; she needs the danger, because this idleness is beginning to sap her forces and milk her dry. All of this waiting is getting to be too much, and if she doesn’t do something now, she isn’t sure she ever will.
“We’re going now,” she tells them, her quiet voice instantly shutting every mouth around the table. Even though their lord is dead, they respect the hierarchy he designed, and so Bella’s word is treated as law and most of the younger recruits make their way towards the back in order to fetch their robes, masks, and wands. Lucius, Rodolphus, and Rookwood remain where they are. The first two are too close to Bella to accept her word blindly, the last refuses to be ordered around by a woman half his age.
She doesn’t bother glancing at any of them. She simply calls for her robe and her mask before donning them with forced nonchalance. Tonight, she is going to live again. She is going to crawl out from underneath the dark tunnels she has been forced into and she is going to touch the sunlight and see the stars. After too many nights of living like a rat, Bellatrix Lestrange will once again be the cat.
It’s simple to apparate to the Longbottom house. They’ve known where it was for months, as Peter was good friends with them as well and was easily able to weasel the address out of Benjy, after torturing him to the brink of death first. It was the smallest Marauder’s first murder, and Bella didn’t mind holding him as he shook uncontrollably. She remembers the way Molly held her the night she spilt her first blood. The memory shakes her slightly and she’s forced to remember that Alice Prewett Longbottom is Molly’s cousin. She’s forced to remember that the blood she will spill tonight belongs to the woman who holds her heart.
She forces that thought from her head because she knows she doesn’t have a choice. In this moment of desperation, it is either kill or be killed, and Bella knows she cannot go down without a fight. Molly knows this as well, and for a moment the Slytherin can trick herself into believing that this is enough to justify her actions, that Molly will forgive her for torturing her own flesh and blood. She knows it’s insanity but she can’t bring herself to care. Right now, she just needs hope.
They enter the house easily. She can see Alice in the window long before the Auror has a chance to react. Too much celebrating, most likely. Without even sparing the other woman a glance, Bella has her tied up to a table leg and wandless. Unfortunately, she’s not quick enough with her wand to gag the witch before a scream rips from the blonde’s throat, and Frank comes bounding down the stairs, wand drawn and jaw set into a thin line. He starts throwing hexes wildly and Bella wonders if all Aurors forget their training when their loved ones are the ones at stake. Rabastan takes the larger man down easily. There is crying hard from up stairs, but the Death Eaters ignore it. If Bella wanted baby Neville dead, she’d kill him. Tonight wasn’t about spilling innocent blood, it was about sacrifice.
“What do you know about the Dark Lord?” Bella asks, her wand pointed at Alice’s head. Legilimency has never really been her strongest point, but she knows enough to break through most people’s defenses. Unfortunately, Alice is well versed in Occulemency, and Bella assumes it’s a subject thoroughly taught in their training. Pulling her wand from the blonde’s head, she instead aims it at her right shoulder blade and, with a few choice Latin words, begins carving the dark mark into Alice’s skin.
She doesn’t scream. Bella’s almost disappointed at the lack of reaction, but she likes the way the blood runs along Alice’s white flesh so much that she doesn’t stop. Some nights, when Molly was in a particularly bad mood, Bella was allowed to tears her nails into her lover’s back and draw blood. She loved to watch the crimson pool at the spot of her mark and drip along Molly’s pale back. It was intoxicating and alluring and right now, staring at Alice’s arm, Bella suddenly has the need to lick it.
Instead, she finishes the crude design before asking again. “Where is the Dark Lord, blood traitor? We know you know where he is, so tell us.” She finds it sickening, how lifeless her voice sounds right now. She cannot find it inside of her to fake enthusiasm for the hunt and the kill. As turned on as she may be, there’s nothing more inside of her but anger, heat, and a thirst for freedom she’s only ever tasted in Molly’s kisses. Maybe if she can revive Voldemort, they can win and she can save her beloved. For a moment, she entertains the possibility. Then she chides herself for being unstable enough to believe in such things.
Alice refuses to answer, even though they can both hear Frank’s screams from the other room. Bella wonders what it is the boys are doing to him. Whatever it is, it must be much less humane than her efforts of swindling information from her victim. Frank will lose his mind long before Alice even begins to break, but for some reason Bella believes the woman in front of her knows more than that man ever will. She’s tempted to go after the child, but instead she throws a “Crucio” towards his mother, focusing the anger, loneliness, and pain of the last ten days into the curse.
She waits for a scream that doesn’t come, and they both hang in some sort of suspended reality, where Alice stares at her through the pain, biting her lip until more blood trickles from the corners and Bella stares back with something akin to awe and bordering on admiration. Then, Bella screams the words again, “Crucio” echoing off of every wall and echoing in both of their ears. There is silence again, for a moment, followed by the unmistakable sound of someone in excruciating pain. Alice arches upwards, thrusting her body off the ground and away from her capture in hopes of escaping the curse. Bella’s too fast, too sure of her movements for Alice to stand a chance, however, and so she surrenders to the pain.
After a good twenty minutes pass, Bella lowers her wand and allows Alice the chance to breath. A concussion is evident by the dilation of the Auror’s eyes, and Bella’s arm is sore with the effort of concentrating the spell. She watches, mesmerized, as the blood trickles from Alice’s lips to her hair, making the red and gold bleed together and create something so painfully Gryffindor it overwhelms Bella and she smacks her victim with her bare hands. It’s crass and it’s muggle but she couldn’t control herself that time. Without waiting for her voice to settle she says, “So, Prewett,” and she never thought she could say that name like that. She’s destroyed other names without the letters stabbing into her heart like knives, but this time she almost doubles over in self-disgust. “Where’s my Lord?”
Alice only shakes her head, refusing to speak. They can both hear her husband crying from the other room, refusing to say anything but letting out thick sobs of “Alice,” and “Forgive me.” It’s moments like this that prove men are truly the weaker sex; when push comes to shove, women have a habit of remaining stronger longer. The silence permeates the room for a second, and then Bella kicks her again. Alice lets out something that sounds like a whimper but is almost a moan. It sounds like Molly that night before Halloween last year, and it cuts the Slytherin to the bone.
“Bitch,” she whispers, kicking Alice again. “Bitch,” she screams, waving her wand frantically as words pour from her mouth, thick, Latin words that most Gryffindors couldn’t understand if they tried. She watches as fire starts to burn at Alice’s hair, catching quickly and soon enveloping her entire face, almost like a halo but more fatal than such. It’s beautiful, in a twisted, disturbing way. And as Bella watches the awareness leave Alice’s eyes, she feels her own sanity begin to slip. This is one of those images that will haunt her forever, not because it is the most torturous spell she’s ever performed. No, this moment will never leave her because as Alice surrenders to the pain with a final groan, Bella is reminded of Molly’s face just before she orgasms.
The Aurors arrive before any of the Death Eaters can hear them. They surround the house and Bella finds herself bound and wandless within moments. She wonders, for a second if they will make her bleed. Somehow, she knows, they will deny her even that simple pleasure.