Bejeweled

Monday morning Remus was heading to Defense with his friends, curious to how this would turn out. Sirius was dragging his feet. He hadn’t seen Snape since The Incident and still didn’t know how to feel about any of it, so he wasn’t exactly excited to see him in class. 

Remus didn’t really think anything would come of it. It sounded like it was some fluke, emotions running high and wires getting crossed for a second, nothing more. He figured Sirius and Snape would simply ignore each other’s existence. That would be rather nice, actually. They could just ignore each other completely through graduation and Remus would never have to hear them bickering ever again. Or maybe their rivalry would return after an awkward pause even more heated than before with no one else being the wiser to the source of the stronger hatred. 

The Marauders made it through the door and into their seats just in time to not be tardy. They sat in the back, like usual, to the far right of the room. On the far left and one row up sat Snape, his usual seat. Remus could tell Sirius was actively trying not to look at the other boy. To ignore him completely, like he didn’t exist. 

Remus was counting the seconds before his friend lost that fight. It wasn’t a high number. 

Remus knew his friend well. Could practically read his mind from his expressions, at least most of them. He watched as a million things ran through Sirius’s mind, likely his entire history with Snape, landing on the kiss. If he knew his friend, and he did, this was the moment where the future would be decided. Horror, disgust, anger, affection, desire, wherever the bottle landed would dictate Sirius’s next move. 

Sirius bit his lower lip slightly as his eyes softened. Crush. 

Well, that wasn’t where Remus’s money would have been, but it was better than Sirius hopping up and hexing the guy in the middle of class. He wondered if disgust would come after crush, because of crush, but as the seconds ticked by it didn’t seem like it. Maybe Sirius had been expecting this more than he’d let on. 

Well, it wasn’t like Remus would judge him. Even if he hadn’t been dating a Slytherin himself, a former member of the Future Death Eaters, he still would have supported his friend in whatever choice he made. Even an odd one. Though maybe he would have had more questions, but with his current entanglement he thought he understood. 

Apparently Sirius planned to dive into this with the same head-first recklessness he usually did with romantic pursuits. He got out a piece of parchment and a quill and began scribbling. Of course it looked like he was taking diligent notes, much to the Professor’s amazement, but without even looking Remus knew it was a letter to Snape. At least Padfoot was taking his advice? 

~ 

Bella didn’t want to deal with the Future Death Eaters. She would have been perfectly happy to never say another word to them in her entire life. Unfortunately, revenge just had to come first. Cutting off as many resources from the Dark Lord as possible was the priority. Which meant she continued to study in the Slytherin Common Room instead of going to the library, awaiting the perfect opportunity. 

Honestly, had her ex-friends always been this dense? She had picked out a spot on the opposite end of the room from where they usually sat and got herself comfortable, spreading her books and parchment over a table. Then, just like she expected them to since Cissy wasn’t there, they’d come over and commandeered the nearby group of couches in order to loudly discuss the downfall of the Black family. Just to torment her. 

They were making it too easy. 

She rolled her eyes dramatically. “As if your families aren’t next.” 

“What are you yammering about, blood traitor?” Avery glared at her. 

“Do you really think this was a coincidence? My family was the biggest financial supporter of the Dark Lord, and then suddenly the Ministry has all this evidence against them? This was targeted.” 

She could see the gears turning in their heads. Putting two and two together unbearably slowly. Except for Snape, he was always quicker on the uptake. 

“Targeted by who?” Snape wondered. 

“Oh come on, are you all really thicker than a bunch of Gryffindors? They figured it out days ago. Dumbledore of course,” she scoffed. It was risky, she had been seen talking to the man the evening before the arrests. It could lead back to her. But she was betting on two things: 1. They hadn’t been in the room when she’d spoken to him and 2. They wouldn’t talk to anyone from another house about the subject to find out. 

And also 3. Most of them were too stupid to realize even if they had known. But mainly the first two. 

Bellatrix turned back to her studies. The seed was planted, she had no other reason to talk to these people. She simply ignored them as they chatted, clearly uncomfortable as they processed the danger their families were now in. They had no idea how to goad her, if they even wanted to attempt it again. Eventually they found excuses to head off to different places, leaving her blissfully alone. 

The Common Room had changed since the Muggle Studies Dance. Nothing was actually different, the same chairs and tables and couches in the same places. The same fires roaring to keep them warm. The same creatures floating past the windows. The same people, in the same groups, doing the same things. Except it was different. Bellatrix no longer had her place as leader of the Future Death Eaters. She couldn’t sit in the same spots, talk with those she’d once called friends. Not that she wanted to of course, but the new politics made the usual terrain into an unknown entity. 

So far she’d coped by spending as little time as possible in the space. It had become transitory, a place she had to walk through to get from her dorm out into the school and vice versa. But now that she’d forced herself to stay for a while, she found herself displeased that it had been taken from her. 

The Slytherin Common Room had been one of her favorite places since she’d first arrived at Hogwarts. There was something so wonderful about the large windows that peaked into the mysterious world of the black lake. There was something comforting about the emerald upholstery and dark wood that had shaped Slytherin tastes for generations. There was something so intriguing about the political games that had started here, branching out to shape Ministry intrigue over the decades. This was her space as much as any other Slytherin, and yet she’d allowed it to be taken from her. 

Not anymore. Even if she was alone, Bella decided that she would stake her claim here once again. This table, in a corner by the windows, would be her own. Even if she was a blood traitor, she could still demand the fear it would take to shoo anyone else away should they take it in her absence. It would be a good place to study in her final months at Hogwarts—Well, when she didn’t want to be distracted by Remus in the library. That was fun too, but sometimes she did need to genuinely focus. 

It was probably around an hour later, having gotten lost in her studies, that Bella’s attention was brought back to the space as someone pulled the other chair out from under the table. 

”Mind if I join you?” Andy asked cheerfully, with just a hint of anxiety tinting her smile. 

Bella smiled warmly. “Please do.”