Liz has always refused to become like her family. Even though the blood of the Black family flows in her veins. Adopted by Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange after the death of her father Regulus - in hopes of "setting her on the right path" , she st...
A green flash sawed the tree trunk between them in two. They both jumped up just in time to avoid being whirled through the air with splinters and sawdust.
Instinctively, Mattheo had drawn his wand, but the shrill voice was already screeching another curse.
Liz stumbled backward, landing in the sand. The wand struck beside her like an arrow.
Bellatrix Lestrange stepped out of the shadows of the trees with branches and leaves in her hair. "Just as I knew," she laughed, wand still pointed at Mattheo. "The dark lord never mentioned you with so much as a breath. I should have known you were just a worthless sacrificial lamb." Her tongue flicked forward like a snake's as she licked her chapped lips. "I admit, it took me far too long to track you down here, but that's not your doing either, is it?" She laughed spitefully at the sight of the petrified.
Mattheo had raised his arms defensively, but what was he to do without his wand? Magic without a wand was dangerous enough, but an attack without a wand? That would be sheer madness.
Liz, on the other hand, was crouching half-hidden behind the tree trunk they had just been sitting on. For her, the wand was within reach, perhaps she could even move toward it unnoticed, but.... Her eyes wandered to the diary. In shock, she had dropped it and now it lay right at Mattheo's feet. What had happened to her magic that day? Frustration built up inside her the closer Bellatrix came. This woman had been trying to ruin her life from day one. She couldn't let her get away with it again.
"Give me the diary," Bellatrix urged Mattheo. "If you don't have the guts to do it, I will."
"It's just an old notebook," Mattheo tried to dissuade the woman from her plan. Liz almost laughed in sync with Bellatrix. He didn't know the youngest of the three Black sisters. "You won't find what you're looking for in there."
Bellatrix was now close enough to climb onto the other tree trunk. "What am I looking for?" Still she gestured for him to give her the diary.
"My father. Lord Voldemort." Mattheo slowly got to his knees. What choice did he have?
"And you mean to tell me that you, of all people, know where he is - or where he isn't?"
"I know this is nothing but old memories." Carefully, he shook the sand from the pages. "Only Tom Riddle, long before he became Lord Voldemort."
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Bellatrix wiggled her fingers. Her thread of patience was visibly thinning. "That's worth more than your pathetic existence."
Out of the corner of his eye, Mattheo glanced at Liz.
"She can't help you now, either. Don't make this complicated for us. I'll get what I want either way."
But Mattheo's eyes moved to the wand and back to Liz.
There was something he hadn't told her. Something that could now be the difference between life and death. But what?
Bellatrix had been watching the spectacle, clearly enjoying their helplessness. " Say it, Mattheo, say it, tell your beloved that you are sorry. That you're to blame for your tragic deaths because you couldn't make up your mind. Go ahead. If I like what I hear, maybe I won't torture you quite so long before I kill you."
