Love is weakness, but only if you let it be

31.

      When Severus and Lucius were in front of a small house in a muggle neighborhood, they both took a deep breath and looked at each other from the corner of their eyes. Together they walked in, and knocked on the door. Soon it was opened, by a woman in her fifties, who looked them from head to toe, before speaking with a harsh voice;
"You are those people, aren't you?"
"Could we get in, Mrs. Edingell?"
Snape spoke slowly, when Lucius stayed a little behind him. Next, they heard a drunk man's voice, while a glass was clacking to another;
"Who is it, Serina?"
When the woman didn't reply, the man came to look by himself.
"You came for the girl didn't you?"
Lucius spoke next, taking a step forward;
"Let us in, Mister Edingell!"
Joseph's eyes grew large, when he remembered what had happened a while ago, so he put his hand to the door to keep the men outside,
"The girl's fine! There's no need to worry!"
"Well, can we talk to her then?"
Next thing he said, shot Lucius's and Severus's alarms up;
"She's alright, she wants to be alone in her room, to practice schoolwork."
If he didn't even know about the underage magic law, something wasn't right. Severus shot a spell on the two muggles, and Lucius started going up the stairs, Snape quickly following behind him. There was only one door, which had all kinds of locks and bars in it. The two wizards were fast, and didn't have time to start dealing with the locks, instead they blew up the door, and what they saw next, made them both shiver. Victoria laid there, almost swimming in her own blood. Her eyes were blank, and if her chest wouldn't have rose every few seconds, they would have thought her to be dead. There was an unending list of all her injuries in the both mens heads. Her collarbone, the actual bone, stick out of her skin, her forearm and the back of her head were heavily bleeding, with the last drops of blood she had, messing blood with her dark hair, slightly curly hair, and robes. Severus got to his knees to test her pulse, which he didn't find at first. And when he did, it was very slow and weak, he barely felt it.
"Should we try to heal something on our own?"
Lucius broke the silence between the two choked men. Severus shook his head, realising that this was about the survival of the Dark Lord's daughter.
"There's no time."
Lucius fast, but carefully, and most of all, effortlesly picked up the light girl to his arms, making sure not to hurt her more.

     Bellatrix was nervously walking the hall from one end to another. Voldemort was watching the woman, never he had seen her with so mixed feelings. The door opened to reveal that Narcissa, her son, Blaise, and Pansy had finally the courage to come out. Bellatrix didn't take any notice on them, they stayed out of her way. Pansy made her worst mistake so far, when she quietly asked Narcissa;
"Why is a filthy, weak mudblood so important?"
Homewer, Bellatrix heard that. In a matter of seconds, Parkinson was already screaming in agony under Bellatrix's Cruciatus curse. She held the curse for good two minutes and everyone, excluding the Dark Lord, watched the young girl twitch in front of them, terrified, too afraid to say anything. When Bellatrix stopped and started walking down the  hall to calm herself, Narcissa got a potion, for the effects of the Cruciatus, from a cabinet close to them. She gave it to Draco and told the three teenagers to go. When they were out of the room, one glance from Narcissa towards the bottle with red smoke, was enough to realise where her husband was.
"Bella?"
She called to her sister, who didn't take any notice on her, and she gave up, like Voldemort already had. Then, they heard a voice, voice of Lucius Malfoy's, from the magical speakers;
"Open the gate, Narcissa. Fast."
Never she had heard her husband be so serious, than he was right now. Bellatrix turned towards the door, holding her breath, barely blinking. The Dark Lord was right in front of her, doing the same. Then, the door opened. Severus came in first. Then Lucius. And then, everyone's eyes turned to the unconscious girl in Lucius's arms, her curls falling towards the ground. She was probably the most beautiful girl they had ever seen, and almost as tall as her mother, but far too thin. And her injuries. Looked like there was barely any life left on her. Voldemort thought with sense. Bellatrix couldn't. Bellatrix gasped and let out a desperate sound, and turned to her sister, who was ready to hold her as she cried. It remembered Bellatrix from no one else, than herself, but the only thing, was, that Victoria looked worse. While Druella and Cygnus had used magic on her, and mostly healed her injuries by the next day and never starved her, this young child was beaten too close to death. By a muggle. Everyone of them had seen child abuse, but never this bad. Even the Dark Lord was frightened.

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