I was not the first to arrive in the darkened hall, but I was the first to notice her. She stood at the far end, Hermione Granger, the girl who had once trembled when my voice turned to a blade, who had once looked up at me with terror so bright it almost blinded me. She was not trembling now. She stood tall, her spine straight as iron, her eyes steady.
The air was thick, clinging, bitter with the tang of spells and scorched walls. The war roared somewhere beyond us, its echoes faint and distant, as though this place had slipped out of time. The weight of it pressed against my skin, heavy and damp, but there was nothing heavier than the silence between us. I had been waiting for this moment, a moment that would force us both to look at the truth of what we were.
She was there, her hair catching the dim light like a flame about to devour. Her face was pale but strong, and her eyes—they pierced. My fingers tightened on my wand, not to strike but to hold myself steady.
“Bellatrix,” she said, as though my name were something she could taste.
I smiled, slow and venomous. “Granger.”
The silence between us was charged with the weight of everything that had come before. My years spent rotting in Azkaban. Her years spent rising to glory. The battles that had marked us both. The deaths we had witnessed. The lives we had shattered, some with wands, some with words. Memories sliced through me like broken glass, each one cutting deeper than the last. I saw them in her eyes too—sharp and relentless. And then, there was that moment.
I remembered the first time I saw her in the Department of Mysteries. I told myself she was no one, nothing, a face among faces. I tried to not think much of her. But the truth gripped me like a hand around my throat—I couldn’t think of anything else. Seeing her was like stepping out of a burning house and breathing air untainted by smoke, like opening my eyes after years being blindfolded. The pieces of the prophecy clicked into place, their meaning clear and inescapable. This prophecy was about her. And me.
She didn’t know, of course. She might never know. The prophecy was my burden to bear, carved into me since childhood like lines on my palms. But if it was about her, it meant one thing: I had to keep her safe. Whatever it took, Hermione Granger must be protected.
So I stayed in the shadows. Watching her. Guiding her, though she would never notice it. A flick of a wand here, a whispered suggestion there. I smoothed the path she walked on, though she thought it was her own steps carving the way. She was brilliant, fearless, stronger than anyone I had ever known. But brilliance cannot stop a blade aimed for the heart. Strength cannot catch a spell cast from behind. So I did what she could not: I stood where she couldn’t see me, ensuring she reached the future she was meant for.
The future came faster than I wanted. Too fast.
They brought her to me, the Snatchers. Hermione Granger, her golden friends flanking her, but her light brighter than theirs. My heart twisted when I saw her; she was so much more than the girl I met at the Ministry of Magic. She had grown tall and sharp, her eyes fierce, her hair wild as a storm. She was everything the prophecy demanded she be. She was everything I had hoped she would become.
But danger swirled around her like a tide. It was in the way the Snatchers jostled her, the cruel laughter as they spoke of their spoils. And then there was the stinking dog, his thoughts loud enough to pierce through the thick walls of the Manor. What he wanted to do to her... I couldn’t bear to finish the thought.
I had to separate them, had to draw her away. My steps were quick but deliberate, my voice steady though my heart quaked. The others thought I wanted to interrogate her, break her, revel in her pain. They thought they knew me. Let them think it. I would wear that mask if it meant saving her.
I led her to another room, closed the door behind us. She turned to face me, her shoulders square, her eyes unflinching, ready to fight me. She didn’t know I was fighting for her.
To save us both, I had to make her scream. The thought was bitter, clinging to the back of my throat like ash. My wand hovered above her, shaking though I willed it to be still. Her silence cut deeper than any spell. I leaned closer, close enough that my breath stirred the curls near her temple.
“Scream, little witch,” I murmured, low and urgent. A plea dressed as a taunt. She didn’t move, didn’t blink. Perhaps she hadn’t heard me. Perhaps she wouldn’t give me the satisfaction.
Her body trembled beneath my shadow, not in rebellion, not in defiance, but in fear. It chilled me in a way that the Dark Lord’s fury never had. I wanted her to fight, to struggle, to push me away. But she stayed as she was—still, shivering, frozen like a bird in the claws of a predator.
I couldn’t make her understand. Couldn’t tell her this was for her sake, for mine, for us. That the silence between us would doom her. I pressed down harder, my voice a sharp blade in the stillness. "Do it," I hissed. "Scream."
I had no spells left, no words sharp enough to cut through her fear. My hand found the dagger—a choice I had not wanted, the last choice. Its weight was cold, heavy, as if it knew what I meant to do…
Her scream tore through my heart. The job was done. We would survive. I held her close, too close, my arms locked around her when Potter and Weasley emerged, their faces pale, their eyes wide. Her heart pounded fast against my chest—or was it mine? The rhythms blurred together, one frantic beat between us, and I couldn’t tell where I ended and she began.
I didn’t want to let her go. I loosened my grip, though my arms resisted. I knew this might be the last time. I didn’t know if I would ever see her again.
“I’m sorry,” I breathed into her ear, the words barely a whisper. Sorry for what I had done. Sorry for what I would do. I wanted her to know that, at least.
With a quick shove, I pushed her toward the Weasley boy. My hands lingered for just a second too long, as if my body couldn’t bear the separation. He caught her, pulling her into their world where I did not belong.
The dagger was in my hand before I even realized. Its weight was familiar, final. I flung it without hesitation, a sleek arc of steel cutting through the air. I didn’t watch it fly. I didn’t need to. I knew exactly where it would land, and who it would take.
Everything had to happen. Every choice, every crime, every lash of his rage. I told myself this as the years unraveled, one after another. I served the Dark Lord, spilled blood at his command, endured the agony of his punishments. It all had to mean something, I told myself, for there was a reason. A good reason.
“What was the reason?” she asked, her voice calm as the eye of a storm.
I hadn’t seen her move, but suddenly she was there, the distance between us gone. She stood close enough that I could feel the heat of her breath, close enough that her words struck like a spell meant only for me.
Behind her, the battle still raged, distant but unrelenting. Shouts and cries tangled with the thrum of curses tearing through stone. Soon, I would have to go. Soon, I would be back in the chaos, bound to fulfill what the prophecy had written for me. But for now, there was only her, standing in front of me, her question curling around us like smoke.
There was no point in hiding now. “To see you live,” I said, the words slipping from my mouth like a confession I couldn’t keep anymore. Her head tilted, her eyes narrowing, and I could almost hear the wheels of her mind turning. She had suspected something the last time we met—she wasn’t the sort to let things go—but now, perhaps, she had begun to piece it together.
“Why?” she asked, her voice steady, but the question trembled in the air between us.
“You might understand someday,” I said. The words tasted hollow, but they were the only truth I could offer her. I thought of the prophecy, the shape of it coiled around my life like a chain. I thought of the steps I had taken to bring us here, to this very moment. And I knew—it was time.
“I have to go now,” I murmured. My hand twitched at my side, the longing to touch her cheek nearly unbearable, but I did not dare.
I turned to leave, the weight of the moment pulling at me like a tether. But then her hand shot out, catching my arm, her grip firm and desperate.
“I want to understand now,” she said. Her voice cracked, but her resolve didn’t.
I turned back to her, slowly, letting her words settle. “There is a time for everything, little witch,” I said, my voice low and soft. “And now it’s my time.”
I lifted her hand—small, trembling, but strong—and pressed my lips to her bruised knuckles. It was the lightest of touches, a whisper of a kiss, but it felt like the heaviest thing I’d ever done. When I let her hand fall, she was staring at me. There was something in her eyes that I couldn’t name, something sharp and bright, as if the tears she refused to shed were burning there instead.
Then, as if in farewell, she leaned in and left the faintest kiss on my lips. It was nothing more than a breath against my skin, yet it struck me like a spell I hadn’t seen coming. I froze, startled, and for the first time in my life, I faltered. My resolve wavered, trembling under the weight of that touch.
The prophecy, I reminded myself.
I turned away, though it felt as if my legs had turned to stone, each step a trial. The room stretched endlessly as I forced myself to leave her behind, one slow step at a time. Each movement pulled me further from her, and yet I felt the imprint of her kiss, light and unyielding, as if it had become a part of me. Still, I walked on, leaving the hall and Hermione in it, though the weight of her stayed with me.
The next room was my end, I knew it before I stepped inside. There, standing before me, was my enemy. Molly’s gaze was sharp, her face twisted with anger, her belief that she had me cornered clear in the way her wand trembled in her hand. She thought she had won. She thought it was over.
It looked real. I could see how it would seem that way to anyone watching. But I had to make the Dark Lord believe I was dead. I had to vanish into the shadows, unseen, unheard. The spell was risky—more dangerous than anything I’d ever cast—but it was my only chance. And Molly, though fierce and resolute, was not the one who would defeat me. Not today.
It ended. The Dark Lord was gone. And with his fall, I was free. Free in a way I had not dared imagine for years, or perhaps never at all. What comes next? I don’t know. I couldn’t see that far. It was a future without certainty, without a map to follow. And yet, that made it all the more thrilling.
I think of her—how she might appear again, someday. Not today, perhaps not in a week, or even a year, but someday. Maybe, one day, she’ll wander through a forest, lost in thought, and there I’ll be. In my cottage, waiting. Waiting for her to stumble across the door I never thought would open again.
Bound by fate and bound by blade,
A love forbidden, a price once paid.
The stone must break, the flame must burn,
For shadows to fall and the tide to turn.
One shall give all, one must remain,
Through sacrifice forged in love and pain.
In grief and fire, the dark meets its end,
And freedom rises where hearts defend.
— Bellatrix Black