Night has taken

Chapter 2

Bellatrix lay awake, staring at the wall as the sun came up. She couldn't sleep, not with her mind painting a gruesome portrait of what it must have been like for poor Malika Shacklebolt to bleed to death in hospital. She had her Occlumency shields up so the Dark Lord could stay asleep. She didn't want to bother him with these thoughts, this troubling obsession, this perseveration.

Today was the day of the funeral, though, and Bellatrix couldn't stop thinking about the macabre details. Would they bury the baby with Malika, after all? Or would there be a separate, tiny coffin?

The medical report had come back saying that Malika's uterus hadn't been contracting properly during labour, which had triggered bleeding. The Healers had rushed to deliver the baby with surgical means, but it had been too late for both of them. It didn't seem as though anyone treating Malika had had ill intent. Voldemort had even had all the Healers and Mediwitches interrogated. By all accounts, it was as Healer Crabbe had said. This had been an accident of nature.

But as she stared out the window at the orange-purple glow of the dawning day, all Bellatrix could do was think of Malika screaming in pain, in fear. She could hear those screams going quiet as Malika faded from the world. Bellatrix could picture the way the baby must have come out unmoving and silent, its lips just a little bit violet in death. She could practically hear Rabastan Lestrange's shrieks of agonised grief, could see the way Malika's parents must have collapsed to their knees upon hearing of the loss of their daughter and grandchild.

"Bellatrix."

She rolled over quietly, letting down her Occlumency shields and feeling the process of her husband waking. Their breathing matched up, along with their hearts, and she whispered,

"I'm sorry, My Lord. I didn't mean to wake you."

"You didn't," he insisted. "I woke on my own, but I couldn't feel you, so I knew you were lying there shielding me out. That means you've been up for some time. You're troubled."

"Yes. I am." Bellatrix nodded and admitted, "I have never been so affected by a death before, Master. Ordinarily, death is nothing to me. If I am not causing it, I am witnessing it, and it never matters. Lives are snuffed out all the time, often by my own wand. But there is something in all of this that disturbs me, and I an unused to the sensation."

Voldemort looked tired in the light of the early morning, and he rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling as he noted,

"There is only one death that has ever brought me any sort of real... sorrow. Even that's probably an exaggeration, but..."

"Who was it?" Bellatrix asked, and suddenly a memory played inside of Voldemort's mind. There was a woman, a plump woman with gaudy lipstick. Hepzibah Smith, Bellatrix could feel. Young Tom Riddle had gone to her house many times for tea, for talks, to ogle her family artefacts. One, the cup of Helga Hufflepuff, he used for a Horcrux after killing Hepzibah. He framed the woman's House-Elf for the murder.

"You felt a little regret when she was dead," Bellatrix noted, and Voldemort said nothing. He blinked up at the ceiling, and Bellatrix felt his mind pulse with an idea.

She was the first human being to ever treat me like family, and I killed her for a cup.

"Do you still regret it?" Bellatrix asked plainly, and Voldemort shook his head.

Regret accomplishes nothing. Regret holds you back. I look forward.

"I don't feel guilt or regret about Malika," Bellatrix noted. "It's more like... like a helpless sort of feeling that she simply ought not be dead."

"A damnable shame," Voldemort said, nodding. "Sometimes, when people die, we feel glee. Sometimes shock. But very often, a death is simply..."

"A damnable shame," Bellatrix repeated. "Yes. That sums it up, I suppose. We ought to get up, I think. Have some breakfast? Coopy should have it ready soon."