The Gifted Curse

Chapter 25 - Malfoy Manor

"Now...now..." came the silken voice, intimidatingly calm. His fingers were clasped so tightly round Geneva's arm, they were embedding red marks into her snowy skin. 

"Let me go!" she mouthed inaudibly, but it was no use. She was still silenced under his spell, but he had read her lips quite clearly.

Lucius Malfoy. His long icy hair and blue eyes were unmistakable.

"Now...you either stop your struggle, or..." he raised his snake cane to her throat. "I can do so in a way which would be rather unpleasant."

Geneva's now hauntingly grey eyes bore into his loathingly. She complied, riddled with hatred, doing her best to stand up straight, even though her chest was so tight as though iron bands were wrapped around it, making it difficult to breathe.

"Thaaaat's better," Lucius drawled, feeling her taught muscles relax. "I have some friends I'd like you to meet. Come..."

Geneva breathed hard through her nose, trying with all her might to stand tall as Lucius led her down the corridors of the large manor. Her head pounded desperate for a way out, looking around for a sign – anything – a door, a window, but the corridor in which they walked was long and endless without a window in sight. The only light came from high glass chandeliers up above.

"Herrre we are," Lucius smiled, pushing open the door with his snake headed cane.

Immediately Geneva's eyes set upon the three figures standing before her in a large, square room. Aside from the long dining table, velvet backed chairs, and the three candelabras on top of the table, the room was so bare that every step Lucius took forward echoed off the pillars and high ceiling. Geneva's eyes drew instantly to the person she knew well who was standing with his hands by his sides, wand in hand with an embedded sneer emitting the utmost hatred slapped across his face – Draco Malfoy. She knew it! He'd been in on things thing the whole time. She thought back to the horcrux and how he must have been in on the sick game of planting it. If he was involved, then Pansy had to be. Geneva worried at the fact Orah was now getting rather pally with her. It wasn't like her at all.

The other two people in the room Geneva did not know, but their expressions told her they knew of her. The woman who was stood next to Draco was practically salivating, her teeth flashed yellowy brown, ominously smiling against her pasty drawn face and sunken eyes. Her hair was wild, tumbling over her face. She whirled her crooked wand menacingly at shoulder height as Lucius gestured toward her gracefully as though he were introducing a woman of nobility.

"This...is Ms Bellatrix LeStrange."

Geneva recoiled, compressing a rising lump of vomit.

"Awww," Bellatrix teased, "She's just a bay-bee...Eh-low luv."

"And this," Lucius gestured to the man stood next to Bellatrix, "is Fenrir Greyback."

Greyback, who stood taller and broader than all of them, was quite clearly by appearance, a werewolf. The longest parts of his hair were greasily slicked back, the other parts scattered unruly over his forehead, around his ears and came underneath his chin to form a beard. His chest was as wild as his face. Heaving in excitement, his shirt was ripped apart, undoubtedly unable to contain his muscular physique. Utterly grotesque in appearance, Geneva, although afraid, was determined to look into his eyes. She wasn't going to let them intimidate her, even if she was terrified. If it wasn't for the silencio spell, she was sure her breath would be shaking like a leaf. She could feel the vibrations in her chest.

They were each standing a foot apart. Geneva, still in Lucius grasp, stood still but braced.

"Now," Lucius began, turning to her. Geneva was determined to keep her gaze. If she couldn't speak with her voice, she would allow her eyes to do the talking. She narrowed them scathingly.

"You must be wondering why I bought you here...or perhaps you already know since..." his voice trailed off, his eyes rolling slowly from Geneva's to the side of the room where there was a sudden click that sent an echo throughout. Geneva knew that sound – the sound of apparation. Severus. He stood still in the distance, dark and tall, his voluminous robes catching the last wind of his landing, his black wand by his side.

Geneva's chest busted free of the iron bars that felt as though they were clamped around it, beyond relieved to feel his presence, to see his face. Lucius grasp on her forearm was now so tight that her hand was beginning to feel numb and loose circulation.

Geneva's eyes attempted to desperately seek those of Severus, but his eyes never left Lucius. Lucius looked at Bellatrix, "Here," he spat, pushing Geneva hard into her arms, "Take her!"