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Nymphadora Tonks fidgeted in her seat as the line of first years trundled along to be sorted at the centre of the Great Hall. She picked at her nail beds. She let her finger grow and disappear a wart, grow and disappear hair, shift colour. Each change developed and receded fully under her control.

There, now her fingers were long and elegant, then stubby and warty, and then back again.

If her classmates noticed her actions or noticed her belated, disinterested clapping when Eleanor Clay sorted Hufflepuff and made her way to their table, they did not comment. Just Tonks being strange again, nothing worth distracting from the sorting and the new children joining their house.

Her abilities (or blessing or condition depending on who was speaking) had charmed her classmates first year, frightened them in second year, and bored them during third. Now, as they started fourth year, her abilities became a new way to tease her when she was too stupid to recognize it.

And she had been so stupid.

The skin of her finger darkened. She tried to match the colour to the wooden table, then she tried to match the wood grain, which took concentration. She did still clap on command for Peter Liu, who blushed horribly as he shuffled over to the Hufflepuff table.

Inanimate objects were tricky. Skin did not want to look like a table. Skin wanted to look like skin, any colour and any shade, but like skin.

No matter how she tried, she could not get close to the texture, and, no matter how she tried, she could not distract her brain fully from the events of the train.

Everyone knew about her abilities – the only one in England in two generations – and so when a trio of Gryffindor boys came to her compartment asking if they could see her change her appearance, she happily responded. She couldn’t get scolded for being a show-off if they asked.

She had changed her hair for them. They asked about size, and she grew tall and then short. They asked about shape, and she gave herself broad shoulders, pulling at the seams of her shirt, even with the charms her mother had added to give her freedom of movement after the sheer number of clothes she had torn apart as a child in playing with her physical form. They named body parts, and she adjusted them as they asked, all four of them laughing. She was having fun. It was a challenge! They were going so quickly.

When they said to make her breasts larger, she obeyed. She had played so little with her breasts, which had just started to grow, and flesh was so easy and fun to work with. They asked for bigger, and she threw her shoulders back and let them grow.

Her blouse button burst, nearly hitting the middle one in his open, laughing mouth.

He reached towards her, and she understood immediately she had done something wrong.

“Oi, leave her alone!” Charlie Weasley shouted as he burst into the compartment, drawn by their laughter. “Give it a rest.”

The boys had followed Charlie out of the compartment, and Tonks had curled in on herself, her arms covering her now flat chest and her hair gone a mousy brown.

She hadn’t quite figured out how to magic the button back on, and so, after a series of failed attempts, she just wore a jumper to hide the missing piece despite the warmth of early September. She would try again in her dormitory.

Charlie had returned to her compartment to ask if she were alright, and all she could do was reassure him she was fine until he left and allowed her the solitude she required.

In the Great Hall, she went to finger the space where the button should be, remembered her finger still looked like wood, and stuck her hands under the table quickly. Gabrielle Smith still stared at her with an expression of disgust. Tonks looked down.

She did not raise her eyes for the remainder of the sorting. She kept her gaze down as Dumbledore began speaking.

“As you may have gathered by taking a glance to the professor’s table, we have a new professor filling in for Professor Darkworth this year. He suffered an unfortunate cursed wardrobe related incident just a fortnight ago, but there is no need to fear, and he will return next year once he has healed and returned fully to human form. The fine healers of St. Mungo’s assure me his prognosis is excellent, though the process will be slow, and it may be months before he can speak again. As everyone who has experienced his instruction knows, he does not tolerate half-measures, and I expect to share a table with him at this time next year.”

He paused to allow for a few knowing chuckles before continuing, “Now, please give a warm welcome to Professor Bellatrix Lestrange.”

Tonks joined in on the polite clapping but kept her eye on the elusive grain of wood on the table in front of her.

Someone down the table whistled and muttered, “Merlin, she’s fit for a professor.”

At that, Tonks looked up.

The new professor had long, black hair which hung in wild yet elegant curls well past her shoulders. She smiled as she looked at the students watching her as if she was waiting to judge if they would please her. Her robes, which were such a deep black that they made Professor Sinistra’s look merely grey, contained subtle leather accents at the shoulders and bodice. The accents did not disguise the broadness of her shoulders; if anything, they emphasised her solid stature. Tonks had never seen robes quite like that before, and she watched as the dark fabric absorbed the candlelight as Professor Lestrange shifted forward in her seat.

“Never seen a professor like her,” another sixth-year boy said under his voice to the table, and Tonks did not disagree.

Gabrielle Smith looked at the professor and then back at Tonks with her eyes narrowed. “She looks like your mum,” she whispered.

Instinctively, Tonks hissed back, “My mum’s not fit.”

Gabrielle shrugged, and Tonks turned back to the professor’s table.

But, now that the thought was planted in her head, Tonks realised she did look like her mum. They shared the same hooded grey eyes, and her mum’s strong chin matched the professor’s. If her mother let her hair down and darkened it, darkened her eyebrows and extended her lashes, and put some colour on her lips, the two women might actually look alike, apart from the complete difference in their demeanour. Professor Lestrange appeared powerfully at ease with the whole hall staring at her and whispering, almost as if she expected them to whisper about her, and Tonks’s mum had never looked relaxed in her life. If an entire hall were staring at her and whispering, Tonks’s mum would probably just look at Tonks and ask what Tonks did to cause such a stir and to apologise immediately.

Could this woman be a relative of her mother’s?

Her mother’s maiden name was Black, and Tonks, like all wizarding children, had heard enough rumours of the Black family to inspire curiosity and awe. There were no Blacks at Hogwarts currently, though twice she had gone to the trophy room to look for the name and found Quidditch trophies and head girl and boy plaques going back generations.

Her mother refused to talk about her family, and Tonks never asked, but her mother would have told her if she had sisters, wouldn’t she? The wizarding world was much too small to keep them apart for long. Tonks herself was all of fourteen, not a child who needed protection from family secrets. She knew all of her dad’s family secrets (Uncle Frank had a son out of wedlock who looked just like him), but her mother was as obsessive about her secrecy as she was about cleanliness and her ability to find faults in her daughter’s behaviour.

For the remainder of the dinner, Tonks stole glances at the new professor, and she once even thought the new professor might have been looking at her too, but it must have been a trick of the candlelight or a trick of her own desire.

Tonks woke the next morning still thinking of the new professor. The Hufflepuff fourth years would have Defense Against the Dark Arts with the new Professor Lestrange that afternoon, and she only had to make it through breakfast, double Herbology, and lunch in order to make it there. Professor Darkworth had been at Hogwarts for ages, and they had never had a substitute professor for any subject in the previous years.

By lunch, Tonks could hardly eat. She could not decide if she desperately wanted time to move faster so that she could see Professor Lestrange up close to see if she could really be her relative or if she wanted time to move slower so she could avoid the potential confrontation. She wasn’t ready, but how could she ever be ready?

She was the first to arrive in the Defense classroom. The professor herself had not arrived, and she observed the classroom itself as her classmates trickled in.

Professor Darkworth decorated the classroom with skins and skulls of various dark creatures, creating a rich, haunting, and rather motivating atmosphere for instruction. Professor Lestrange, by contrast, had removed all decoration from the classroom. The room was completely empty of objects save for their desks and the torches along the walls.

Finally, after all of the students had joined her and as her nerves threatened to boil over, the new professor burst into the room.

She stood tensely at the front of the classroom, as if resisting the urge to pace. Her hair was still down, as it had been at the Welcome Feast, but today her robes were corseted with an attached capelet and left a strip of pale flesh over her chest plate bare.

She did not wait to capture the students’ attention. She knew she had it from the moment she stepped into the room.

“Now, to introduce myself, I am Bellatrix Black Lestrange, and, despite my earlier introduction as Professor Lestrange, you may refer to me as Professor Black. My speciality is duelling. My understanding is that you have a good grip of magical defensive theory, some preparation with creatures, and an introduction to the rather condescending and unproven branch of scholarship on the corrupting effects of dark magic. Am I correct?”

No one spoke.

She did not repeat her question and instead waited, staring with unnerving intensity at the students, perhaps at Tonks herself.

“Yes, professor,” Tonks answered, surprising herself.

Bellatrix smiled.

“Thank you, Miss Tonks.” Tonks felt herself warm at the moment of attention. “Now, let us not waste a single lesson. I only have you for the year, and I want you all to handle an attacker by May. Stand up!”

With two quick flicks of her wand, the desks flew to the sides of the classroom. Two of her classmates had not stood up in time and toppled to the ground as their chairs zoomed away. Bellatrix carried on with her instruction without reacting.

They practised stinging hexes and Protego in turns. Tonks felt Bellatrix’s eye on her, and the combination of the intimidation and her own lack of duelling skill had her failing to shield a single hex and only managing to land one of her own, though it was on Gabrielle, which gave her some satisfaction.

Finally, Bellatrix dismissed them. Tonks packed her bag up quickly, ready to leave her failures behind.

“Miss Tonks, could you stay behind for a moment?”

Oh no. Bellatrix had noticed.

Once the other students filtered out, Tonks rushed out an apology. “I’m sorry for earlier. I’ll be better next –”

“No, no,” Bellatrix interrupted her. “Today’s lesson was merely for me to gain a sense of the skill level of the class and understand where I ought to put my energies. No need to apologise for what you bring on the first day, only for how you respond to my instruction as the year goes on.”

She had barely finished talking when Tonks blurted out, “You’re my aunt, aren’t you?”

Professor Black’s mouth shifted into the warmest smile Tonks had ever seen. Bellatrix stayed tight lipped but the compassion near overwhelmed Tonks. Tonks glanced away before stealing up her courage to look back at the hungry smile.

Professor Black had waited for her to return her gaze before answering, “Yes, I am your aunt, and I am so very sorry we are only just now meeting. My absence from your life during your early years is one of the great regrets of my life.” Her voice went serious. “It is deeply unfortunate that our first meeting has taken this long and has required a post at Hogwarts.”

“My mum says…” Tonks trailed off. She could not think of any polite thing her mother had said about her family in the rare moments she spoke of them at all.

But her professor saved her, kindly interrupting, “I’m sure your mother has said many things. I love my sister, but she - ah - has some tendencies I cannot approve of and find difficult to tolerate.”

Tonks was not sure if it was appropriate for her to feel relieved that someone else thought her mother was difficult, and in fact she knew it was not, but she felt a sudden connection to her professor-aunt all the same.

“But of course I would never speak ill of your mother. She is family after all, at least in my heart, no matter what cruelty she has done to us.” Bellatrix clapped her hands together. Tonks jumped. Bellatrix continued, “Now, onwards. I understand you have some insecurities about your duelling performance.”

The change in subject was dizzying. “Yes, professor.”

“I would like to tutor you. Wednesday evenings, beginning two days hence.”

“Yes, professor.” Tonks bit her lip. Could she really have been that terrible in class? Richard Peters had surely been worse!

After a pause, she added, “But I’m sorry - why me?”

“Because you are my blood, and I would like to ensure your talents are as developed as possible in this brief opportunity I have as your professor.”

“Thank you,” Tonks replied genuinely. “I’d really like that.”

“Now, you can give your next professor my apologies for holding you.”

“McGonagall –”

“Oh better be off then!”

Bellatrix dismissed her with a small wave of her hand. The casualness of the gesture contradicted the unceasing intensity of her gaze. Tonks felt her eyes on her as she exited the room, her own heart pounding.

Gossip about the beautiful new professor echoed through the castle halls. She even thought she heard the frighteningly strict Professor McGonagall whispering about it to the school nurse, Poppy Pomfrey. They fell silent as soon as Tonks walked by, though she was confident she had heard the name Bellatrix hissed by the nurse. Whatever they had said, it had not been complimentary. She supposed the new professor would inspire jealousy from some of the older female professors.

However, her classmates had no such compunctions about gossiping in her presence.

“I heard her parents are cousins.”

“No, that’s her cousin.”

“It’s her cousins’s parents who are cousins.”

“I heard she put down a rebellion in the continent single-handedly. Papers said it was her husband and brother-in-law, but it was really her.”

“I heard she’s a blood supremacist who is here to murder muggleborns. That’s what this duelling focus is all about – a cover for cursing muggleborn students so that she can place slow acting curses on all of them.”

“Oh, there are hardly any deadly curses slow-acting enough – if that were her plan, she would be teaching Potions instead.”

And, of course, the rumour that she murdered her husband. Of that, nearly everyone could agree. Though each student, professor, staff, and ghost had a different theory of method and motivation. Was she an abused woman using poison in his tea to escape the terror of his fists? A power-hungry vixen who sent a curse straight at his chest, laughing all the while? A family woman, loyal to the house of her birth, acting on the orders of her uncle in order to solidify their family’s position?

The other point on which everyone could agree was that all Blacks go mad in the end – even if some are charmingly eccentric in their madness, like the one with the motorbike and the werewolf husband in Marrakesh.

It took a day or so for her classmates to remember that Tonks, too, was a Black, in a way. A Parkinson with a memory for the scandals of previous generations whispered it to a Greengrass, and then the whole school remembered.

Tonks repeated to the inquiring students and to the nosy Gryffindor ghost: “My mother is estranged from her family. I do not know her. And no, I have no idea if she murdered her husband!”

But, if she were being honest with herself, all the gossip only added to the anticipation of her lesson. She didn’t believe the rumours – most of them. Her aunt was… what were words for her? Captivating. Dark. Intriguing.

As much as Tonks resented the attention from her classmates, she privately revelled in her connection. Professor Black had selected her for private lessons. She was special.

By the time Wednesday dinner rolled around, the anticipation had curdled into anxiety. Tonks felt sick with worry as she poked at her meal. What if Tonks disappointed her? What if she proved to her aunt that she didn’t have the magical talent expected of her?

But, from the moment Tonks entered the classroom, Professor Black was gentle and supportive. She did not snap at her when she made a mistake like her mother would. She did not offer bland platitudes like her father would. She neither accepted mediocrity nor punished her failed attempts and instead offered her clear instruction for improvement.

“Now, the proper components of spellwork, especially duelling, are pronunciation, wandwork, posture, breathing, and intent.”

She emphasised the last word.

“Hogwarts has an overemphasis on pronunciation and wandwork and so little respect for the actual physical embodiment necessary to be an excellent duellist. Now, some spells, of course, require only one or two factors to be performed well enough. With Cruciatus, you would wave your wand however you want, breathe or not breathe, be curled up or fully erect, but as long as you have the intent, the intent to cause real pain, the spell will follow your command.”

“You’re not going to have me try to perform Cruciatus, are you?”

Bellatrix laughed, and Tonks worried she was laughing at her.

“Oh no, I won’t have you practise Cruciatus on me. We'll be working on the same Stinging Hex from yesterday’s class. People underestimate the value of intent in favour of aim with this one, and aim is important here. Just a little light pain, a little annoyance, but you must have a reason. You must always have a reason for powerful magic, and I want all of your magic to be powerful.”

A reason? What could be her reason?

They practised again.

She did not want to cause Bellatrix pain. She certainly did not want to annoy her.

“Better. Again.”

Tonks held tight to the compliment.

She had her reason.

Notice me, notice me, notice me.

With that motivation, the spell flowed through her with shocking intensity and collided with Bellatrix’s shield with a cascade of sparks.

Bellatrix grinned in satisfaction with her pupil. “Again.”

They practised again and again. Finally, in a series of attempts, panting with effort, Tonks landed the spell.

Bellatrix pushed up her sleeve to reveal a red mark on her arm.

“Did you let me hit you?”

Bellatrix winked at her before clarifying, “But your improvement is real, and you would have landed it on anyone else, even on some of your other professors.” She pressed her wand into the mark on her arm, and Tonks thought she was healing it, but instead she just pressed hard and let out a gasp of pleasure-pain. “No one hits me unless I want them to.”

Finally Bellatrix brought up the lateness of the hour and dismissed her for the night. Tonks left with the strangest sensation of pride in her chest.

Her lessons continued in the classroom each Wednesday, and, each week, Tonks’s spellwork improved and her craving for Bellatrix’s approval increased to match.

“Nymphadora,

I hope your lessons are going well and that your potions work is improving. I know you can do better than last year’s marks. Horace’s retirement was unfortunate, but you are still my daughter, and the new subpar professor is little excuse. I’m always happy to give you specific tips if you have questions.

But I am delaying the real purpose of my letter, and I should not delay any longer.

I heard from Anne MacMillan that you have a temporary Defence Against the Dark Arts professor. As you have not mentioned her to me, I surmise that you may not know who she is – or you are attempting to avoid talking to me about her, both of which I completely understand. Talking about her is difficult for me too, but I need to ensure your safety, and her appointment has reduced much of my faith in Albus’s Hogwarts.

I have already written to Albus informing him of his error in not informing parents of the sudden naming of a new professor, and I have Anne raising the issue at the next board meeting.

Professor Lestrange was my sister. [Here, the parchment was thickened, as if more had been written and then crossed out, then magicked away.]

She is brilliant, charming, and deeply manipulative. She has never forgiven me for marrying your father. In addition to the blood supremacy she and the rest of my family support in private, she considered me hers, and I believe she took my marriage to your father as a personal affront. People are not people to her, but property and playthings. If she attempts to hurt you, please go to Albus or Sprout right away. I cannot imagine she’d be so bold as to act under Albus’s leadership but I worry.

We can discuss this more at the Christmas holiday – it may be time to discuss your maternal line.”

Here, Bellatrix’s tone turned cloying, as she concluded, “With love, Mother.”

Tonks had taken the letter to Bellatrix. After a month of lessons and kindness, she thought that Bellatrix deserved to know what her mother said, but Tonks now wondered if she had made the right choice.

“Your mother and Cissy both always shared a flair for the dramatic,” Bellatrix said in a normal tone as she lowered the parchment and slipped it into her pocket. “She doesn’t hold much faith in your abilities, does she? ‘Run straight to the headmaster if your mean teacher bullies you,’” she mocked.

Tonks picked at her nails, letting them grow and change colour, a childish habit she intended to stop.

Noticing her discomfort, Bellatrix softened her demeanour. “It must be hard for you to have your mother criticise you and treat you like a small child at your age.”

Tonks nodded. She wanted to defend her mother, because she wanted to be the type of daughter who did that, but what Bellatrix said was true.

“I’ve been watching you, you know. Not just in our lessons, where you’ve been improving so rapidly, but across the grounds, in the corridors. Perhaps it’s your blood or perhaps it’s your abilities, but you have a maturity that your classmates do not.”

“You’ve been watching me?” Perhaps she should have said it as if she were concerned because being watched had always meant being in trouble, but she could not help the thrill in her voice.

You consider me worth watching?

The spark of that thought burned away all of her previous guilt.

“Of course.” Bellatrix looked her up and down. “You fascinate me.”

Tonks stood frozen in the moment, completely exposed to Bellatrix’s gaze despite her layers of uniform. She felt almost indecent despite her high buttoned collar and tight Hufflepuff tie.

But, still, despite the gratitude and warmth she felt for her aunt-professor and the pleasure she took at the attention, she was her father’s daughter, and she had her concerns, and she had to ask.

“She wrote,” Tonks started before pausing and reconsidering her words. “And there are rumours, and many of the other old pureblood families are, and I don’t mean to be rude, but I feel like I ought to ask – do you believe muggleborns are inferior?”

The hurt was evident across Bellatrix’s face. Her smile had disappeared into an almost childlike frown.

“Do I treat the muggleborn students any differently?” Bellatrix asked. “Your classmate, the muggleborn Richard Peters, do I treat him any differently than the Parkinson in your class?”

Tonks immediately regretted asking.

“No, of course you don’t. I just – because of what my mum said and what people say about your family –”

Bellatrix sighed loudly. “I’m disappointed. I would have hoped in our time together you’d have learnt to trust what you can see in front of you, not gossip.”

Tonks would have given anything for a Time-Turner to return to the moment, just a minute before, when Bellatrix had looked at her and said you fascinate me.

“I’m sorry, Professor.”

“Goodnight, Miss Tonks.”

Bellatrix’s posture had changed completely, and she was nothing more than a professor disappointed in a once-promising pupil. Tonks slunk out of the classroom and carefully closed the door shut behind her.

Tonks spent the evening replaying the moment in her mind with her unread potions textbook in front of her in the Hufflepuff common room. Why had she asked? But hadn’t she always heard that the Black family were obsessed with blood purity? Hadn’t that been the entire reason for her mother’s exile from her family? Andromeda Black married the muggleborn Ted Tonks and so was blasted off the family tree – literally and figuratively. Tonks had learned very little of her mother’s childhood and family, but she knew that. Everyone knew that.

Or did she know that? Could her mother have lied?

Why would she trust this aunt she had only known for a month over her own mother?

The burning truth of it lay within Tonks, and she refused to examine the question further. She flipped to the next page of the book as if that would shut the thought out of her mind.

That night, Tonks ruminated on the hurt in Professor Black’s face as she fell asleep, determined to make it right in the morning.

Tonks woke with the perfect apology on her mind.

For all her professed desire to adhere to common muggle customs and for all of her utter dismissal of pureblood society, Andromeda Tonks followed English wizarding etiquette as best she could, even in the muggle world. She always announced herself before entering a new home, even if she had to whisper it to the door frame if the home were muggle and she would receive stares if anyone heard her. She kept a garden of all the key flowers for communication – for apologies, well-wishes, gratitude, love, even if the people with whom she kept company did not know the high regard of a yellow daffodil from a disdainful yellow carnation.

From her mother’s instruction, Tonks knew the language of flowers well. Or, at least, she knew how to use the language of flowers for an apology as it was, generally, the only flowers her mother requested of her. She had plucked purple hyacinth enough times to present to her mother for offences ranging from breaking dishes, staying out past curfew, and talking back – to which her mother would offer her acceptance and admonishment to do better, Nymphadora.

Outside the castle on the cool late September day, Tonks sat in the courtyard, plucking stands of ivy. Theoretically, transfiguration of one plant to another should not be too difficult, as long as she did not try to use that plant in a potion, in which it would operate as either the one or the other or a strange, impossible mix of the two.

However, she did not need a purple hyacinth for a potion. (What potion even used that ingredient? She had no idea.) She needed one for an apology, the very best apology she could muster for a beautiful woman from an old house she had offended with her carelessness and poor judgement, which might not be exactly what her mother had intended in her etiquette instruction.

Tonks ripped the ivy with her hands. Should she have brought a tool to clip them? Tearing would have to do, and ivy had a reputation for tolerating rudeness better than other plants.

She lay the ivy on the stone beneath her feet and pointed her wand. She repeated the incantation over and over.

On the second, the ivy turned lavender in hue, and, on the third, the leaves shrunk. The fourth through tenth incantations did nothing. She tucked the purple ivy back in with the rest, covering it up as best she could to erase any evidence of her failure. She then attempted conjuring them, but the misshapen string of plant matter she managed was worse than the purple ivy.

Smarting, she returned to the castle. She caught Professor Sprout before she entered the Great Hall – she couldn’t possibly approach her at the professor’s table where Professor Black would be watching her – and asked her if any grew in the greenhouses. Her head of house told her no and inquired if she required the flowers for a potions project.

She stammered out a lie about curiosity, which she could not imagine Professor Sprout believed.

She had no flowers.

After dinner, she returned to her dormitory and rummaged through her trunk for the stationary her mother had bought for her, the embossed cards, not the common parchment she used for class and for letters home. Tonks had never thought to use them before, because who at Hogwarts could possibly require the formality of a notice card? It was the 1980s, not 1880s, as she had repeatedly tried to remind her mother, to no avail.

Still, she had no flowers. Finally after spilling the contents of her trunk across the floor and still finding nothing other than a jumper, a hair ribbon, and an acid pop all of which she had forgotten about, she drew her wand.

“Accio cards,” she said with her wand outstretched. The small box, tied with an ivory ribbon, zoomed into her open hand.

She wrote quickly, accepting that no words would be right and that if she tried too long she would drive herself mad. She wrote a simple apology full of generic regretful sentiments she could imagine her mother forcing her to say and then tapped the card with her wand to erase the message until it was tapped again by the recipient.

Nothing happened.

She groaned and tried again. There was a privacy incantation too? Was that it? She vaguely remembered her mother mentioning an incantation. It just hadn’t seemed very important before, and now apologising to Professor Black felt like the most important thing in the world.

It would have to do.

She left her dormitory, leaving the spilled contents of her trunk as a problem she would sort out later, and hurried down to make it to Professor Black’s office before curfew.

Once she reached the door, she took a deep breath to disappear her worry of her own inadequacy – could she have tried harder for purple hyacinth? – and slipped the card under the door.

She hurried back along the corridor, before she lost her courage and tried to Summon the card back out from under the door, as if she could outrun the impulse.

Would Professor Black think it was strange that she apologised? Would she even know the writer was Tonks? She hadn’t signed her name because she had assumed her professor would immediately know the apology came from her but, of course, the arrogance of that was now clear to Tonks. Many students and professors might want to apologise to the captivating and enigmatic new Professor Black.

Tonks turned back around to Summon the note and froze.

Standing at the entryway, Professor Black held the note between two of her fingers like a muggle cigarette, a sardonic smile on her face. Panther-like, she leaned against the door frame, a body at rest and yet still full of claws and teeth.

“This yours?” Bellatrix asked, her voice a low hum.

Tonks nodded. She felt her face blush and then paled her skin again intentionally to disguise her embarrassment.

Hells, now she must look pale as a ghost.

She shifted her weight in the corridor, waiting to be dismissed and trying to reset her skin, certain her divided focus was making it worse.

Bellatrix gestured with her head to come inside. She turned without waiting for Tonks to begin moving.

Tonks hurried to follow her into the richly decorated office. Tapestries of starry skies hung on the walls, and books sat in shelves and in neat stacks on the carpet next to plush armchairs. Near everything was deep green or black, except the deep brown of the walnut desk and shelves.

Tonks had only ever previously visited Professor Sprout’s office, which was warm, open, and, characteristically, full of plants. By contrast, the only plants in Bellatrix’s office were a vase of deep purple rhododendrons, bright spikes of matching Gladiolus and deep blue primroses woven throughout. Tonks remembered both had meanings to her mother and so possibly for Bellatrix too, but she could not remember what they were. Gladiolus was victory, perhaps? Primroses were either everlasting love or everlasting youth, and rhododendrons were… Something bad. A warning? But that couldn’t be right.

“Professor, I’m so sorry about yesterday,” Tonks said as soon as she shut the door behind her. “I wanted to apologise.”

Professor Black had not lost her smile from the entryway; if anything, it had grown broader and more satisfied. “You’ve had quite the adventure today for purple hyacinths, haven’t you.”

“You were watching!”

“I’m always watching.” Her voice was serious, but she winked, and Tonks could not determine if she were merely playing with her or being genuine. She did have the distinct feeling of being a mouse being batted by a cat, unsure if she were a playmate or a meal. All she knew was that she did not want to leave this room. She would much prefer to be eaten than ignored.

“Here.” Bellatrix flicked her wand and, out from the end, from the aether, erupted purple hyacinths, so deep in colour and thick in their blooms they could only have been produced by magic.

Bellatrix handed them to Tonks before commanding, “Now, present them to me.”

Hesitantly, Tonks held out the flowers.

Bellatrix tutted. Tonks flushed and withdrew the flowers.

Had her mother taught her anything about presentation? She had always simply accepted them by hand and had never implied there was some sort of presentation involved.

“No one taught you how the hyacinths are to be presented. No matter. Your education has been limited through no fault of your own, and I know you’re a quick learner for me.”

She smiled at Tonks, who had to stop herself from nodding in delight. Yes, let me be a quick learner for you! Her reaction must have been obvious, because Bellatrix grinned wider in satisfaction, finally showing her teeth.

“Kneel,” Bellatrix said, her voice warm, soft, and accustomed to being obeyed.

Tonks dropped to her knees without question, careful with the delicate, plum-coloured flowers in her hand but careless with her body. The thick carpet softened the force of her impact.

“Stretch out your arms.”

Tonks used her core to keep herself balanced and raised both of her arms with the hyacinth balanced horizontally. She gazed up at Bellatrix expectantly.

“Good, now lower your gaze to the ground.”

Tonks looked down at the carpet. Just in front of her, woven flowers and leaves of the darkest green bloomed and retreated among the black threads of the carpet. She hadn’t noticed the design at all, let alone that it moved. Each shift came so slowly one wouldn’t notice from glancing, and, when Bellatrix was in a room, Tonks rarely noticed anything else until she was forced to look away.

Tonks felt Bellatrix receive the flowers from her hands and resisted the urge to look up for the confirmation that she had finally completed the task correctly.

“And that is how one presents purple hyacinths when one must apologise,” Bellatrix said in her professional voice, each consonant sharp. “You did well. Rise up.”

The thrill of the action of rising from her knees at her professor’s command overcame her; Tonks hoped for more.

More what? She could not name.

Bellatrix held the flowers to her cheek and closed her eyes. Tonks watched her graze the petals down her cheek and over her lips.

After a long moment, Bellatrix opened her eyes and placed the flowers on her desk.

“Would you like to stay for a moment? I know it’s not your tutoring night, but I don’t think we should waste this unexpected opportunity for additional instruction.”

Tonks nodded, grateful she was not being sent away, relieved that her apology worked, completely disinterested in curfew or in anything at all that was not Bellatrix Black.

“You’ve been doing so well that I want to teach you a new spell, and I’d rather not be the one experiencing it as the result would certainly require healing beyond your level. You can practise with the wall for now. Hogwarts stone can take a curse or two.”

With her wand, Bellatrix sent the three chairs zooming to the corner, stacking up improbably, while the large oak desk pressed itself against the wall. Tonks could only imagine the chairs tumbling down, but she trusted Bellatrix’s magic. With another flick, the night sky tapestry which hung over the stone wall rolled up. The twinkling stars depicted gave no protest.

Bellatrix continued, “The incantation is Fulgurio, the motion is a curve, like half an infinity or a sideways ‘S’, then a sharp point, and the feeling is like –” Bellatrix slowed, speaking reverently, “The rumble of thunder with anticipation of further lightning.”

Tonks waited for further instruction or perhaps a demonstration, but Bellatrix had stopped speaking and instead gestured for Tonks to begin.

With the minimal guidance, Tonks walked to the centre of the room and faced the stone wall. She raised her wand and made her first attempt. A violet spark erupted from her wand and then floated slowly to the ground.

She tried again and more sparks erupted but none reached the wall. She was beginning to get a feel for the magic. This would definitely hurt if it hit you, but she couldn’t quite understand how just from casting it. She did not want to cast the curse on Bellatrix. Still, the third attempt had fewer sparks than the second.

“I’m sorry – I’m rubbish at Defence.” Tonks continued, despite her best efforts at quiet, “Or, at these sorts of offensive Defence spells.”

Stupid. Stupid. Offensive Defence spells.

“Hush, girl,” Bellatrix said as she moved behind Tonks, so close that Tonks could feel her breath on her ear. “You have the motion. You need the breath. Let me show you.”

And then Bellatrix was flush against her, holding her upright, her hand gripping the wrist of Tonks’s wand arm and her other – oh Helga – snaking its way to Tonks’s stomach where it came to rest. The touch so sure, so confident, Tonks stood a little straighter for its presence.

“Good girl,” Bellatrix said in her low voice casually as if she had no idea of the effect of those words. Instead of melting, Tonks stood straighter, waiting for the next instruction. “Breathe now, into your stomach; I’ll feel it with my hand if you do it right.”

Tonks’s breaths came more shallowly. She could feel her chest rise-and-fall, rise-and-fall, but she wanted to do it correctly for Professor Black. She willed herself calm, willed herself to be an accessory of Professor Bellatrix because Tonks could not manage calm on her own but she could be at her professor’s direction, as her professor’s extension

She took the deepest breath she could imagine, letting it fill her belly and press up against Bellatrix’s sure hand.

“Good, now the motion is half an infinity before the jab. People try with just the diagonal and get a result but to get the power, here, half an infinity.”

Bellatrix gripped her wrist and moved her hand in a gentle swoop.

“A gentle motion for a harsh spell,” Bellatrix continued, the smile in her voice now evident.

A smile at the magic? At Tonks herself?

Before Tonks could ponder the meaning, Bellatrix let go of her wrist and removed the hand from her stomach, but she maintained the presence flush against her back. Tonks could feel the swell of Bellatrix’s breasts against her shoulders as Bellatrix’s chest rose and fell.

“Thunder,” Bellatrix commanded softly.

Tonks breathed deep, feeling the swell in her belly, and, on the exhale, hissed, “Fulgurio,” as she moved her arm just as Bellatrix had instructed.

Red-purple light exploded from her wand. With no target, human or creature, it burst against the stone wall, shooting sparks back. One nearly caught Tonks’s robe, but she had no room to feel fear because Bellatrix was laughing with glee, and it was the greatest sound Tonks had ever heard.

“Oh you brilliant, brilliant girl!” Bellatrix wrapped her arms around Tonks, sending warmth throughout her body, combining with the praise and the success of the spell for a heady cocktail of delight. She could barely comprehend the rest of her words. “And now we have to find you a real target – might be a bit difficult in the castle, but perhaps the village? Ah! No matter. Those sparks! You have real power. I knew you were more ours than theirs.”

Her professor, her aunt, her mentor, whoever Bellatrix Black really was to Tonks, held her tight from behind, and Tonks wished she would never let go.

From that violet-spelled night, Tonks progressed even more quickly. She soon began to best her peers regularly in practice duelling sessions. Once, Samantha Song even flinched in anticipation when he was paired with her, and another classmate sighed in relief when partnered with Richard Peters instead. Tonks was certain she had not imagined Bellatrix’s smile at their nervousness. Plus, Bellatrix always healed injured students quickly, and the one time a student came to injuries requiring time in the Hospital Wing it had not been Tonks’s fault.

With Bellatrix guiding Tonks’s breath and spellwork, magic came to her more naturally than it ever had with any craft beyond her metamorphmagus abilities. Each spell existed not solely as an extension of Tonks but as an extension of the secret relationship the two shared, taking power from the intensity of her adoration.

Her classmates might gossip about the two of them, but they did not know the intimacy of their spellwork. While Tonks barely kept on with her other schoolwork, each essay rushed and full of errors which her professors did not hesitate to highlight, she made progress in her wand-work in Transfiguration and Charms, if only because she imagined Bellatrix performing them with her. Her mother might fret about Bellatrix’s presence in the castle, but, with Bellatrix’s help, Tonks lied easily in her letters, and the act of defying her mother with Bellatrix was its own thrill.

Tonks spent the first snowy evening in November in Bellatrix’s office, as she had spent almost all of the previous blustering November evenings. Twice a week instruction had grown to three days, then four, then five. The days Bellatrix was occupied with other matters were torturous, and Tonks struggled to focus on any schoolwork assigned for another class. More than once, she realised she was doodling lines and swirls which looked suspiciously like Bellatrix’s dark curly hair in the margins of her books.

As snow fell softly outside the castle, Bellatrix sent curses and hexes at Tonks in quick succession as Tonks deflected one after another with a shield charm. Tonks’s reflexes had improved dramatically from her first attempts in September. Tonks managed to block them all except two stinging hexes, whose fierce bite only motivated her to try harder and focus more intently on the small tells of an incoming spell, a shift in weight or an intake of air.

When Bellatrix finally announced that they were finished, Tonks was panting and even Bellatrix was breathing heavily. The corseted robes Bellatrix favoured showed the force of each breath, and Tonks found herself staring at the strip of pale skin visible between her cloak and her corset.

Forcing herself to avert her eyes, Tonks went to wipe her forehead with the back of her robe, only to find her sweat had gone. Bellatrix had already spelled her clean.

Tonks made to thank her, but Bellatrix had turned away from her and gone behind her desk, and so Tonks stayed silent, unsure if she should draw attention to the intimate gesture.

“I have a gift for you,” Bellatrix said as she lifted a book from her desk and held the tome out for Tonks just out of her reach.

From the distance and the angle, Tonks could not quite read the cover. The book was a soothing green, hardcover, and distinctly still. She scrambled forward to take it from Bellatrix.

“A Muggle book?”

Bellatrix laughed, throwing her whole head back. A few months ago, Tonks would have flinched at the sound, certain she must be the butt of the joke. Now she trusted Bellatrix would not mock her, and she craved Bellatrix’s laughter even in her sleep.

Bellatrix teased, “Do you really still believe all that nonsense your mother says about our family? That I wouldn’t even be able to read a Muggle book?”

Tonks went stiff at the allusion to their first and only fight, but Bellatrix stayed relaxed. All forgiven, apparently.

She handed the slim volume to Tonks, and the electric brush of Bellatrix’s hands on hers as they made the exchange couldn’t have been accidental.

Could it?

The title was blazed across the cover in capital letters: LOLITA

“What’s it about?” Tonks asked.

Why are you giving this to me? Tonks wanted to ask instead. What does this mean for the two of us?

“It’s a love story.”

Tonks rubbed her fingers up and down the fabric of the spine, hoping that the right questions to ask would come to her from its tight weave. Her desperation to impress her professor nearly burst out of her like an erupting phoenix. The reason must have to do with Tonks or, no, with Bellatrix herself.

“Like you and your late husband?”

Bellatrix laughed again. Her curls shook with the force of her laughter. “Not that kind of love story – a book about Rodolphus, may he rest in peace, and me would be a dull one indeed. Many more paragraphs about land holdings and estate valuations and legal differences between British, Belgian, and French inheritance laws than paragraphs about romance and desire. Plus, there would be a long, rambling aside about magical mining practices and muggle interference, a bit like Anna Karenina and the farming, though this novel one would be tedious and open-ended at the conclusion rather than glamorously tragic. No.” At this, her voice dropped conspiratorially. “This is a forbidden love story.”

“Like my parents?”

As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Tonks knew she was wrong.

Bellatrix’s storm-grey eyes flashed, and Tonks took a step back involuntarily. She nearly tripped over her own feet but Bellatrix reached out and caught her arm, keeping her upright with a grip that squeezed painfully around her bicep.

Then the flash of fury disappeared, and Tonks wondered if she had invented it.

Bellatrix smiled but kept her hold on Tonks for another moment. When Bellatrix finally released her, Tonks realised she had hoped her professor would never let go, even if her grip might bruise.

Calmly, Bellatrix said, “It’s reasonable that your mind would go to them. You are, after all, their child.”

Tonks did not want to be a child who got things wrong. She made to speak, but Bellatrix cut her off.

“It’s late. You ought to return to your dormitory.”

Bellatrix turned to return behind her desk. Tonks did not move, hoping that Bellatrix would change her mind if she just waited another moment.

“I’m sorry for bringing up my mother,” Tonks said before adding after a brief pause, “Professor.”

Bellatrix did not look up from her desk where she had begun marking essays with her quill scraping across the parchment, marking failures and missteps with no patience for Tonks’s own.

Resigned, Tonks left. Tears pricked her eyes as she trudged up the stairs to the Hufflepuff dormitory.

Stupid, stupid. Why was she even crying? Why had she brought up her mother?

She resolved to finish the book that night in order to prove herself to Bellatrix. She had practised the spell for purple hyacinths, and she would be ready to kneel for her with a flood of them in her arms and every word of the book memorised and ready to be recited.

That night, Tonks tore through the novel with her bed curtains pulled tight and her roommates asleep. She read until the early hours of the morning, and so the novel’s conclusion sat fuzzily in her mind as she fought sleep to complete the final, disappointing chapters. Lolita and Humbert Humbert might not end up together, but the love story shone through.

She understood why Bellatrix had given this book to her, and she doubted her understanding, because the possibility was more than she could hope for, and her hope felt dangerous. Other classmates had crushes and boyfriends. Gabrielle Smith had a boyfriend in Ravenclaw, but Tonks had never imagined such a possibility for herself at Hogwarts, anywhere.

What she had with Bellatrix existed so far beyond those petty, childish romances.

But could it be her own arrogance?

Lolita was delicate where Tonks was clumsy and rough. Hadn’t she always modelled herself after her father and his family in order to be strong?

Hadn’t she always studiously avoided letting herself look too much like her mother for fear of her reaction?

But, of all the lyrical words in the novel, one echoed in her mind through sleep and through waking: Nymphet.

Nymphet.

Was this her namesake? Could her parents have anticipated her destiny through some confused birth blood magic?

Tonks had always known her name had not been planned. Her parents had considered “Rosie” after her maternal grandmother, or perhaps “Simon” if she had been a boy, but her mother had come out of the Muggle hospital saying “Nymphadora,” and a name was given.

The thought beyond any dark corner of her mind, daring to come forward: Could she be Bellatrix’s nymphet?

Could she make herself pretty enough?

Of course she could.

She could make herself into anything Bellatrix wanted.

Bellatrix, who saw her as a witch of prodigious skill. Bellatrix, who recognized what others did not. Bellatrix, who knew she was special. Bellatrix, who was the most powerful, kindest, greatest teacher.

She could be Bellatrix’s nymphet.

But Bellatrix did not say anything the next day or the one after that. Tonks became sure she had imagined the connection, a coincidence, nothing more. She felt silly for even believing it possible. Bellatrix did not see her like that, not with the worshipful devotion of Humbert Humbert. Tonks was too bulky, silly, imperfect to be Lolita.

Still, despite her disappointment, seeing Bellatrix remained the highlight of her day. She might not be Bellatrix’s nymphet, but she could be Bellatrix’s best student. That would have to be enough.

For the first time, Tonks dreaded the Christmas holiday. She could not bear the thought of a week without Bellatrix. Andromeda had promised to tell Tonks about her “maternal line,” and she could not survive sitting through her mother’s lies about Bellatrix. She loved her mother, but that was just too much.

At one of their now nearly-daily lessons, Tonks confessed her Christmas fear to Bellatrix, who only smiled coyly and told her to get a quill and ink. They wrote her letter to her parents together, both sitting on the carpet, robes splayed out among piles of books from an abandoned lesson. Bellatrix drafted out loud while Tonks scribbled her words.

“You have a muggleborn friend – what is a typical muggleborn name for your age?” Bellatrix did not wait for Tonks to answer. “Jane, then. Perhaps you met in Transfiguration together, any class but mine. She’s staying at Hogwarts over the holiday because her muggle parents would rather their magical daughter not return for Christmas and see her extended family, very prejudiced and small-minded creatures. You simply must stay with her. She will be so lonely without you here, and you know your parents will understand, but you do miss them terribly and are so very apologetic.”

Tonks dutifully copied her words, adjusting as needed for realistic language.

As she went to sign it, she paused. “But do you think my mum will worry if I’m staying here with you?”

“Oh, I already wrote the MacMillan woman who still talks to your mother asking her for guidance on intercontinental holiday travel for a witch travelling alone.” Bellatrix leaned back, pleased with herself. “She loves gossip and giving advice. I’m sure it will have gotten back to Andromeda by now.”

“You think of everything.” Tonks hadn’t meant to speak so reverently, but Bellatrix only grinned wider.

“I wanted to make sure we would not have any familial interruptions.”

Tonks sent her owl home that day and received the reply within a week.

At breakfast, she tore open the letter, ignoring the bits of envelope which got in the butter. Her parents had agreed she could stay at Hogwarts! All she wanted to do was to share the news with Bellatrix, and she managed to catch Bellatrix’s eye from across the hall. She waved the letter. Bellatrix smiled at her and then turned to Professor Sinistra and continued her conversation.

The dismissal crushed Tonks for a moment, but she managed to recover, recognizing that they were in public, and some things, like their special relationship, even if it was not inappropriate, ought to be kept private.

“What are you so excited about?” Samantha Song asked.

“Er, I’m staying here for Christmas.”

Gabrielle let out a snort and raised her eyebrows. “With Professor Black?”

Tonks replied defensively, “She is my aunt.”

She watched Samantha and Gabrielle make eye contact across the table, but the conversation at the table turned to Quidditch, which roped Quidditch Keeper Samantha in, and nothing more on the subject was said.

Tonks strode through the corridors to Transfiguration that morning flushed with a joy which lasted throughout the day and into the next. A week with Bellatrix! No classes, no obligations. Other professors and a few students might haunt the halls and meals, but otherwise they would have weeks together with no one wondering why Tonks spent so much time in Professor Black’s office or making snide comments about Black family madness or unusual predilections.

She could tell Bellatrix buzzed with anticipation as well. She had grown attuned to Bellatrix’s emotions, almost attuned as she was to her own and sometimes more so. During a lesson, Richard Peters would fail at a basic spell for the seventh time, Bellatrix’s nostrils would flare, and Tonks would be overcome with frustration to the point of wanting to curse him, and whether it was her own or Bellatrix’s own suppressed emotion she did not know.

Bellatrix did have her moods, and navigating them was a high stakes game where the prize was attention and praise, and Tonks was determined to win.

Tonks had learned how to navigate around conversations about her mother and father, unwilling to bear the pain of Bellatrix’s disappointment in her. She also avoided anything to do with muggles. Despite her close attention to Bellatrix’s patterns, she could not tell exactly what would set her off and remind her of Tonks’s earlier failure to separate facts (Bellatrix treated all students equally regardless of blood status) from gossip. Nabokov and novels were fine. References to technology, Tonks’s neighbourhood, and Ted’s side of her family could set off a cold spell from Bellatrix, which would have Tonks laying awake in bed and poring over her words to find exactly where she had failed. However, as Bellatrix had told her, Tonks was a quick learner, and she was surely able to navigate this one too.

Finally, after weeks of anticipation, the Christmas holiday arrived. Tonks waved her classmates goodbye with barely concealed glee and ran to Bellatrix’s office as soon as the castle emptied of other students.

Together, they spent hours in the room, playing Exploding Snap and reading muggle poetry, which Bellatrix showed great fondness for, though Tonks learned to avoid the topic of modern muggle music and instead basked in Bellatrix’s deep knowledge of English and Greek verse.

(Perhaps it wasn’t that muggle art was acceptable. Perhaps it was only muggle art of a certain age? But Lolita had only been published thirty years ago. Tonks would figure it out.)

On Christmas Day itself, they returned from the Christmas feast and the torture of other people, the professors and the few students who stayed at teh castle, to the comfort of Bellatrix’s office.

Tonks kicked her shoes off and sprawled out on the carpet. She traced her hands down the surface. The woven vines had begun to respond to her, and they moved to follow the path her hand made.

“Mulled wine, for Christmas,” Bellatrix announced as she extended a steaming mug to Tonks.

Tonks accepted it tentatively.

Bellatrix tilted her head and offered a cheeky grin. She sipped her mug, not flinching at the heat, and Tonks felt herself warm under her gaze and with the warmth of the mug.

Tonks shifted in her seat but did not set down her mug. “Is it… alcoholic?”

“Only a little – it’s just wine with some spices and sugars. Have you not had any before?”

Tonks wanted to be mature and pretend she had (she knew others her year had snuck firewhiskey into a party in the common room but she had not been invited to partake), but Bellatrix’s grey eyes never seemed to accept a lie from her.

“Er – no,” Tonks started, trying to figure out how to bring up her mother without setting Bellatrix off and without hiding the truth, something else Bellatrix could not stand. “Mum doesn’t keep alcohol in the house. She doesn’t drink at all.”

“Anymore,” Bellatrix clarified.

“Anymore, right.”

There had been a brief period when Tonks was very young and another briefer one when she had been a bit older, but her memories of both were vague and mostly consisted of her mother being a bit too honest and a bit too cruel in the evening and appearing ill in the morning, and neither of her parents liked to speak of it, and so sometimes she doubted if her recollections were even real.

“I’m not too surprised.” Bellatrix sighed. “Your mother did have a bit of weakness with drink, which I am grateful you do not share.”

Tonks waited for the flash of fury which usually accompanied any mention of her mother, but it never came. Buoyed by that, she tried a sip of her drink and did her best not to wrinkle her nose at the taste. She must have done a good job because Bellatrix did not smile at her or call her a child and instead continued talking.

“I remember one Christmas she and I absconded with a dusty bottle into the greenhouse in France. Poor Cissy – she was so cross at being left out. We must have been fifteen and sixteen, and she had the most beautiful wine-stained lips, nearly matching the zinnias.”

Tonks drank as she spoke, and every sip was easier.

“Sirius did catch us one night, perhaps it was the following year,” Bellatrix continued wistfully. “Oh, he was a darling then. Full of cheek. Andy must have sent a thousand pillows at him – her Gemino charm was overzealous, and we were almost completely buried under goose down.” The darkness flashed over Bellatrix’s face again. “That was when she still loved me.”

Tonks drained the rest of her mug for something to do. She could feel the flush of warmth in her chest, nearly blocking out Bellatrix’s cold fury.

“Can you tell me about your experience with my mum?” Tonks was not sure where her boldness came from.

Bellatrix refilled Tonks’s mug from a steaming cauldron in the fireplace in silence. The only noise came from the crack of the fire in the fireplace. Tonks was about to apologise for asking and attempt a change in the subject when Bellatrix finally spoke. “No, I don’t want to turn you against her.”

“No!” Tonks insisted, more petulantly than she had intended. She took a breath and, with an attempt at maturity, added, “I can handle it.”

Bellatrix must have been hoping for this response, because she did not hesitate. “Well, she can be a bit tempestuous and particular. Exacting in her standards for others. Quick to point out their faults but slow to recognize her own. Always convinced she is the smartest in the room and annoyed when the evidence proves the contrary.”

Tonks nodded. She did know. She sipped her mulled wine, and the second mug went down smoother than the first, warming her from the inside and adding to a feeling of safety as she navigated this treacherous conversation.

“I did my best to protect her,” Bellatrix said, her voice soft. “I was the eldest, after all, and I managed her a match who I knew would treat her well. I would never let a man hurt her again.”

Tonks was very warm now. She sat attentively, waiting through the long pause.

“Then she ran away. It was such a shock to me, to all of us. I could hardly eat or sleep for a month. I tried to follow up in a letter, but her response was –” She paused, and Tonks watched the rise and fall of her chest as if she had just finished a Quidditch match. The cut of her holiday robes offered a view of the swell of her breasts, and Tonks listened to her words – she was listening! – but she watched the rise and fall of her décolletage more closely. “Her response was personally insulting. She knew how best to hurt me. I had hoped – well. No use for hope now.”

Tonks could not bear Bellatrix’s sadness. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea – I had always heard her version.”

“Where we are all dangerous, licentious monsters?”

Tonks nodded, though her mother had always said very little, and she did not know what licentious meant. It sounded right.

“Our family has unique traditions that others may not understand, and we carry some darkness. I cannot deny that, and I wish I had been better able to protect her, but I was a child too.”

The slightest tremor echoed in Bellatrix’s voice before she shook her head as if to reset herself. “No need to get maudlin. Here, let me refill your drink,” Bellatrix said, though Tonks had not managed to empty it yet. She stood up.

But Tonks stood too, and, before she could consider otherwise, she wrapped her arms around her aunt for a hug. She buried her face into Bellatrix’s soft chest.

Bellatrix relaxed into her arms. “Oh you sweet, sweet thing.” She kissed the top of Tonks’s head and rubbed her hand against the small of Tonks’s back. “Oh my little nymphet.”

Tonks stood up on the tips of her toes and kissed Bellatrix on the mouth.

Bellatrix kissed back, the sweetest moment, and Tonks felt a flush of more than the wine. She leaned in more –

And Bellatrix stepped back.

“No, no, we cannot.”

Tonks stammed, “I’m so sorry – I thought, I thought with the nymphet and our family and the book and what you said and I just thought –”

“We must not,” Bellatrix said but her eyes never left Tonks’s, and she could feel the desire in the gaze contradicting her words.

“I won’t tell anyone!” Tonks exclaimed. Then, more softly, “I promise.”

She would never, ever tell. No one else could possibly understand. She had never imagined she could want to be with her aunt, but now all she could imagine for herself was Bellatrix, if she would have her.

Bellatrix extended her arm and took Tonks’s chin her hands before rubbing her thumb over her lips. The gesture felt more intimate than the kiss.

“If you start this with me, I am not sure I’ll be able to let it end.”

Tonks raised her chin, leaning as far as possible into Bellatrix’s touch, waiting, hoping, consumed by desperation. Bellatrix’s eyes did not leave hers, and Tonks knew her own were the same grey to match.

“Oh, nymphet,” Bellatrix breathed out. “You’ll be the death of me.”

Tonks stood, waiting, hoping, lips parted just in case.

Bellatrix continued, “I’ve tried to be so good with you, but –”

Bellatrix crashed her mouth against Tonks’s, and Tonks let herself be consumed. Bellatrix wound one hand in Tonks’s hair and pressed the other against the small of her back. Bellatrix pushed her back into the wall, her hand between Tonks’s head and the hard stone and her hips grinding into Tonks’s.

Each sensation was too much, even over her robes, and all Tonks could do was receive and let Bellatrix caress her however she liked.

Soon, too soon, Bellatrix pulled back. She grabbed Tonks’s hands and held them between them.

Looking straight into Tonks’s eyes, she said, “You now hold my life in your hands. Be careful with it.”

Tonks nodded. She understood that Bellatrix was putting herself in danger by kissing her. She knew Bellatrix was braver than she was.

Then Bellatrix whispered “My precious nymphet” in her ear before kissing her again, and Tonks lost all thoughts of risk.

Tonks woke up the next morning, rolling over and reaching out her hand to the part of the bed where Bellatrix had slept. She was in Bellatrix’s chambers. It had been real.

She was Bellatrix’s nymphet.

Nymphet!

When Bellatrix had called her Nymphet – she had never heard her name like that before. The hum of the “Nymph,” the crisp certainty of “phet,” each part in Bellatrix’s mouth a kind of magic, some new divine enchantment.

She had always hated her name, gone by “Tonks” every opportunity she could.

Nymphadora. Nymph-ah-DOR-ah.

The repetition of the “ah” sounded mocking, a school yard tease, the same one she heard in her muggle primary school the brief time she attended.

The length of “dor,” especially in her father’s northern accent, even when said with love, sounded too loud, too big, too clumsy. The name was a long, mocking mouthful.

Up until now, up until Bellatrix, she had thought “Tonks” suited her. Short. To the point. Solid and full of consonants, though with a hint of flexibility from the “s” at the end. Tonks was a name for a capable, unfussy witch, an achievable measure she had aspired to all her life. No one expected great things from a Tonks, but no one mocked or feared them either.

But Nymphet. Nymphet!

Even repeating the word in her head made her sing.

Nymphet – like cigarette, silhouette, brunette, duet, coquette.

Delicate, French, precious.

Nymph!

Hearing the syllable “nymph” in Bellatrix’s lips, Tonks wondered how she could not have noticed its beauty before.

Nymph!

Playful, young, otherworldly. Untouched by man, tethered to the trees, just beyond the reach of ordinary wand magic.

Her abilities made her otherworldly, precious, coveted. She was not meant to be sullied by her classmates, by her teachers, by anyone who could not understand.

Bellatrix’s love and attention made her realise who she was.

Only with Bellatrix could she discover herself.

In Bellatrix’s arms, she was her nymphet.

What she loved most about herself, the parts she loved about herself, the part of herself that was love itself, was created within Bellatrix’s chambers, forged against her breast. She was as drunk on Bellatrix as she was on the wine, and she planned to drink until she drowned.

After that night, Tonks stayed over with Bellatrix. Sometimes Bellatrix’s hands roamed up her robes and up her skirt, and up under her skirt, and Tonks would stiffen automatically. It was too soon. She had just kissed Bellatrix days ago. She was not sure she was allowed to say no to Bellatrix, but Bellatrix let her, calling her my shy little girl, my timid nymphet. She knew she wanted all of Bellatrix; she knew she wanted Bellatrix to have all of her, but it was just very soon.

They drank mulled wine, and Tonks began to love the taste, associating it with kissing Bellatrix. And how she loved to kiss her! So many kisses interspersed with praise and sips of wine, so many caresses, so many gentle touches on her waist and her arms.

Spring term raced cruelly towards them.

Eventually, the final night of the holiday arrived, their last night together before the castle would fill with the distractions of students and classes.

Tonight, Bellatrix read her poetry, in Greek and English while running her fingers through Tonks’s hair. Tonks let her hair grow long and thick and dark for her, only a slight wave and not nearly the black or length of Bellatrix’s hair, but all the better for Bellatrix to comb and pull and play with. Tonks could not understand a word of the Greek, just loving the round syllables in Bellatrix’s mouth.

Tonks had grown used to the mulled wine and then regular wine. Bellatrix told her she had a sophisticated pallet. Tonks just thought she would drink anything Bellatrix served her, especially if it eased any concerns about Bellatrix getting in trouble for her. Or about how her parents might react. She happily drank the red wine, learning that it stopped tasting bad halfway through the second glass.

They each sat in a plush armchair by the fire while Bellatrix read Sappho. Finally, Bellatrix shut the book decisively. “Let’s see how well you can do, little nymphet.” She tapped her hand against the arm of her chair. “Sit with me.”

Tonks rose and perched lightly on the arm when Bellatrix pulled her by the waist into her lap and then set the book of poetry on Tonks.

Without a word, Bellatrix flicked her wand and a bottle of amber liquid and an oddly round glass zoomed to the side table by the chair. “For the final evening of our holiday, I propose a game.”

Tonks could hardly process her words at the sensation of sitting on her lap and at the buzz of the wine they had shared. Was she too heavy? Would she hurt Bellatrix? That was absurd.

“Recite the poem back for me – translated into English, of course. We’ll work on your Greek later.”

Tonks leaned back to manage a glance at Bellatrix’s wicked grin as Bellatrix continued, “And then you drink if I find a mistake.”

Bellatrix pulled her hand across Tonks’s stomach over her robes, and Tonks shifted in towards her.

Without waiting for Tonks to agree, Bellatrix began reciting. Without opening the book, she announced from memory, “Immortal Aphrodite, throned in splendour! Wile-weaving daughter of Zeus, enchantress, and beguiler!” Here, her voice dropped low, and she whispered in Tonks’s ear, all the while letting her other hand explore Tonks’s body, “I implore you, dread mistress, discipline me no longer with love's anguish.”

Her tone shifted again to her professorial voice, and she instructed, “Now you.”

Tonks let out a giggle. It was a game – she was allowed to giggle?

“I’m not sure –”

“Just try,” Bellatrix said as her hand made its way to Tonks’s thigh.

“Um… Immortal Aphrodite, on your throne, er, wily weaver beguiler, please stop, I can’t.”

The last words were for herself, but they might have been from the poem.

Bellatrix waved her wand, and the bottle floated into the air and began to pour into the glass.

“Drink it – all of it.”

Tonks took a sniff and immediately wrinkled her nose. It was not wine. She shot it back and coughed.

Bellatrix laughed, and, after a moment of coughing, Tonks did too.

“Let me try again!”

“Of course, of course.”

Bellatrix’s hand wove its way up her side and Bellatrix’s fingertips rested on her neck. The skin-to-skin contact, even just the resting of finger tips, was too much. Tonks closed her eyes.

“Now, a fragment for you, my pet.” With each word, Bellatrix began to pull up her robes so that they rested in a pile on her lap, leaving her legs bare and open for the touch. “Again love, the limb-loosener, rattles me… bittersweet… irresistible… a crawling beast.” Bellatrix put her hand on the inside of Tonks’s thigh. Tonks shivered.

“Again love rattles me, bittersweet, irresistible, a crawling beast.” The words came from outside of Tonks. Her own mind felt like it had evaporated at the sensation of Bellatrix’s hand on her thigh.

“Almost,” Bellatrix cooed as she refilled the glass with her wand.

Tonks knocked back the drink again. She noticed the sweetness now, and she did not cough.

She felt Bellatrix’s hands move towards her knee, tracing patterns on her lower thigh. Good, right. This was good. Bellatrix’s hands could go there.

“This one is one of my favourites. I do hope you get it.”

Tonks nodded. If Bellatrix wanted her to recite it perfectly, she would. She had thought Bellatrix might want her to lose and drink instead, Bellatrix had said she liked how happy Tonks was when she had some wine, but she would try harder if Bellatrix wanted her to.

“There was no dance–” Bellatrix’s hands moved up her thigh “ – no sacred dalliance –” She touched the soft flesh of her leg “ – from which we were absent.” She let the book fall to the ground with a soft thud and used her right arm to snake up Tonks’s chest, towards her neck, towards her chin, pulling it towards her face. The angle was awkward but Tonks let herself be moved.

Staring straight into Tonks’s eyes, Bellatrix said as if a command, “I will have every sacred dalliance with you.”

It was all Tonks could do but nod and repeat, “Every sacred dalliance. I will have every sacred dalliance with you.”

Bellatrix smiled and released her chin. “No, that was not the poem, those were my words, but here’s your reward.”

Tonks heard the splash of the brandy pouring and felt the glass press against her lips. She made herself sit up higher to drink it. Her reward? Her punishment?

This one had hardly any burn at all.

Bellatrix wiped her lips. She had spilled.

Tonks was very sleepy. She leaned back against Bellatrix loosely, letting her head fall back.

Bellatrix hit her lightly on the inside of the thigh, snapping Tonks to attention. “No, not quite yet. I’ll give you one more. A fragment.”

Tonks closed her eyes and let out a hum of acknowledgement. Her brain was fuzzy, and the vibration of the hum felt like it matched.

“I desire,” Bellatrix said as she moved her hand to the waistband of Tonks’s panties. “And I crave.”

Tonks tried to move Bellatrix’s hand away, but her arms were so heavy, and the effort seemed pointless. She forgot why she might ever want to keep herself from Bellatrix.

“Your turn,” Bellatrix prompted, ignoring Tonks’s effort.

“I desire, and I crave,” Tonks repeated back dutifully. She felt Bellatrix’s hand slip under the waistband.

“So wet for me,” Bellatrix whispered in her ear as the rim of the glass pressed into Tonks’s lips. “Your reward.”

Tonks drank, because she was told to.

“Stand for me.”

Tonks stood and stumbled. Bellatrix grabbed her before she could fall and she leaned into her.

“‘M sorry,” Tonks slurred.

“I’m afraid I have to put you to bed, little nymphet.”

Tonks nodded at the truth of it as Bellatrix helped her, step by careful step, out of her office and into her bedchamber.

She was so tired.

Finally, the release of the bed. Bellatrix had deposited her on top of the duvet.

She was drunk. She understood that.

Bellatrix crawled over Tonks and was carefully undressing her. “I love you like this,” Bellatrix whispered in her ear after pulling her robes off.

“How?” Tonks asked, the word barely escaping her throat. She let her head roll towards Bellatrix’s.

She felt so little control over her abilities. Her hair could be any shade, her nose any shape, but she felt sure her eyes were grey to match Bellatrix’s, if she could just get them to stay open.

“Little girl lost.”

She ran her hands down Tonks’s sides, waist, then to her skirt, which she pulled off more roughly.

“I’m not sure,” Tonks murmured. She couldn’t keep her eyes open. Tonks didn’t feel desire. She didn’t feel much of anything.

“Hush, my nymphet.” Bellatrix kissed the skin of her lower stomach.

“Wait,” Tonks breathed out. She raised her arms as if to push Bellatrix away, but Bellatrix grabbed her wrists and pushed them back down into the softness of the bed. Everything spun.

Tonks heard Bellatrix say reverently, “You’re so like her when you’re like this,” and then she remembered nothing else.

The other students returned to the castle the following day. Tonks had never felt so distant from them. She walked among them, wore the same uniform, sat at the same table, slept in the same dormitory, but she was not like them. She was a witch among muggles, except that they were witches too, and so what did that make her? No longer the ordinary Nymphadora Tonks.The events of the Christmas holiday formed her into a new creature, one who walked next to the other students in the corridors while simultaneously flying high above them, untouchable and dangerous.

Her classmates cared about petty things. Who was asking who out for the Hogsmeade Weekend. Hogsmeade Weekend!

Bellatrix had uncovered her, unearthed her from the ground, shaped her like clay into her nymphet and then let her soar.

Bellatrix’s selection of her made her special, but Bellatrix reminded her it was only Bellatrix who saw her, really saw her. Tonks was always special. She always had been a Black.

She spent her evenings, every evening now, with Bellatrix. Her classmates might talk, but let them talk! Some nights they practised duelling, proper duelling, well beyond what Bellatrix had them doing in class. She and Bellatrix would circle each other in the classroom, firing off spells and forming the other’s into counterattacks. One blue jet from Bellatrix would turn silver at Tonks’s intervention and then shoot back at Bellatrix. It would have turned her to ice if it had hit her, and Bellatrix laughed and laughed.

In addition to the spellwork, Bellatrix trained her in athletics and acrobatics. Some nights, always including Tuesday nights, she would sprint, dive, and roll across the stone repeatedly. She emerged with bruises, which didn’t ache as long as Bellatrix praised her for them. She even improved on her own basic healing skills, though she preferred to keep the marks. During the long days where they were separated or the difficult meals where they could not interact in the Great Hall, she would press her fingers into the bruises on her knees and elbows, and the pain made Bellatrix feel close.

Bellatrix had Tonks push her metamorphmagus abilities beyond what she had thought was possible. She practised concealing herself against various surfaces. She practised disguising herself as classmates and professors, even practising their mannerisms until Bellatrix said they were perfect, and she was rewarded with a kiss.

Bellatrix brought her a Black family grimoire, one of the last grimoires in England, and they poured over the thick tome together. Tonks felt the impact of the magic soaked into the ink and woven into the parchment. Tonks knew the parchment was human skin, which was why it radiated power so intensely. She suspected Bellatrix was testing her ability to tolerate the forbidden, and she knew she passed.

Bellatrix gave her a silver locket with the family crest, charmed to allow Bellatrix to always find her location. She wore it every day.

(Sometimes Bellatrix became very scary and very angry, but those moments were few and far between. The day before she gifted her the locket was one of those days, but Tonks tried to only remember the locket, not the shouts of the preceding event.)

Over a bottle of wine on a Saturday night in February, Bellatrix showed her the family tree, and Tonks spent the next week memorising the branches. The family contained frightening greatness – Bellatrix spun tales of magical power and creation Tonks did not know existed in those other than Albus Dumbledore.

But not all stories were pleasant. Tonks’s grandmother was a Rosier, a French witch with her own winding tree who was frightened and jealous of the great power of her Black daughters. So many of Bellatrix’s tales involved Bellatrix and her sisters hiding away from her or away from their corrupted father, climbing trees, sneaking into the attic, unlocking charmed cellar doors, and creating their own private worlds full of magic far beyond the Hogwarts curriculum.

Bellatrix had been the protector of her sisters, the warrioress of her namesake, and she had loved them so.

And Tonks knew what it meant to be loved by Bellatrix.

She had been kindling all her life, and Bellatrix had lit her on fire.

Her mum was wrong. Her mum was so wrong. How could she run away from this? How could she break Bellatrix’s heart?

Because she had loved her father.

Her father – that was the one point where uncertainty infected her, threatening to poison all the other wonders of her life with Bellatrix. Whatever her mother had done might be unforgivable, but her father was innocent. And he was a good man and a good wizard, and he was muggleborn.

Black blood contained special property, endowing each member of the family with power – proved by Tonks’s metamorphmagus abilities and Bellatrix’s very existence – which other witches and wizards could not hope to achieve. They were a family which understood they had a responsibility to all beings in England. They were a family with a special relationship to one another – proof blooming from the pleasure Tonks took from Bellatrix’s mouth on her cunt – which others could not understand.

It was true that the Blacks were superior, but it could not be true that her dad was inferior.

The maths of it didn’t add up, but Tonks believed both. She could believe two and two was four and that two and two made five. She might not be able to believe both forever, but, throughout the spring term, she held fast to the two contradictory ideas and waited for some new information to help her understand why they weren’t actually contradictory at all.

Sitting on the dark rug in Bellatrix’s office, she wrote letters to her parents as Bellatrix proclaimed what she should say. They had to be careful, given her mother’s suspicions, given how dangerous Bellatrix’s situation was. She wrote letters of Quidditch scores and house points and nothing at all. Bellatrix read all of the letters she received from her parents together or from her mum. Tonks noticed she kept the ones written by Andromeda in her desk, but she never mentioned it.

Tonks wrote letters to her dad alone.

She told him she was reading muggle poetry and literature – Sappho, Shelley, Keats, Brontë – and that she was developing more advanced magic and that she excelled in duelling practice in Defence. (Bellatrix said not to mention her class, but she had to mention it to her dad simply as Defence, without the professor’s name attached. He wouldn’t think ill of Bellatrix the way her mum would.)

Her dad admitted Andromeda was very worried about the situation at Hogwarts, and he even used the word ‘paranoid’ once, but he told Tonks he trusted her, and she loved him for his faith in her. He told her of events at the herbology shop, funny tales of odd customers and happy tales of grateful customers. She kept the letters safe in her trunk.

In April, flowers bloomed, green returned to the grounds, and the fifth and seventh year students settled into a state of panicked studying. Tonks’s professors constantly reminded her class that they would face their OWLs next year and that they must prepare diligently, but Tonks found it difficult to remember to care about essays and exams, so secondary to the real magic she practised with Bellatrix in the evenings.

Still, Bellatrix took it upon herself to ensure Tonks kept up in her classes, and so Tonks sat on the carpet next to Bellatrix’s chair with her Transfiguration book opened and a blank piece of parchment next to it. Near blank, to be fair. She had written one sentence, and she only needed about fifty more until she had something she could turn in to Professor McGonagall. She wished they were duelling tonight instead.

Above her, Bellatrix read the letter she had received from her parents that morning. Bellatrix always asked to read those letters.

“What’s this?” Bellatrix asked so sharply that Tonks startled and knocked over the ink pot, leaking into the carpet.

She spelled the ink back into the pot and answered quickly, “I’m sorry – what did my parents say?” If she were careful, she could settle Bellatrix’s anger before it grew into fury.

“He said he saw a wizard in Diagon Alley reading a book of Romantic poetry and thought of you.” Tonks sat frozen as Bellatrix paused before asking, her voice low and dangerous, “Why would he associate Romantic poetry with you?”

It took Tonks a moment to understand. Her quill dripped ink on the parchment. On the second drop, understanding finally dawned on Tonks. Bellatrix knew she hadn’t read muggle poetry before this year. Bellatrix knew none of her letters to her parents they had written together included mentions of poetry.

Bellatrix now knew she had been writing to her dad alone.

Tonks stood up from her position at the foot of Bellatrix’s chair. She made to soothe Bellatrix but the glint of fury in Bellatrix’s eyes forced her to step back instead, and then back again, until she was nearly to the wall.

“You’ve been writing to your father?” Bellatrix shouted, stepping forward like a hurricane.

“He’s my dad!” Tonks said, half apology and half petulance.

Bellatrix swung her arm, and Tonks covered her face as glass shattered by her head and cascaded down the wall.

Bellatrix had been angry before, but never like this.

“What have you been telling him?” Bellatrix continued her march towards Tonks. “What are you trying to hide from me?”

“Nothing! Nothing! I was just writing to my dad!”

Bellatrix boxed her in against the wall. Tonks shrank back as much as she could, wishing she were a ghost and could pass through the stone.

“About us?”

“No – just Hogwarts and poems and spells and silly things.”

“Trying to raise Andromeda’s suspicions?”

“No!”

Bellatrix grabbed Tonks’s throat. It took Tonks a moment to realise what was happening, another moment for her to realise it was bad and another for her to scratch at Bellatrix’s arms, trying to make her let go, panic finally setting in.

“Please!” Tonks choked out, tugging at Bellatrix’s wrists. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t breathe!

“Why did you write him without me?”

Bellatrix released her throat enough for Tonks to cry, “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

Bellatrix squeezed again, cutting off her sobs.

“I will not lose you to him too,” she hissed.

Tonks tried to shake her head.

Suddenly, Bellatrix released her. Tonks collapsed to her knees, gasping. She slumped against the wall. She couldn’t look at Bellatrix.

She touched her fingers to her throat to remember that it had been real. She could not understand that it had been real. How could it possibly have been real?

As her breath slowed and her sobbing eased, Bellatrix’s actions seemed farther and farther away.

“I can’t lose you,” Bellatrix said from above her, the fury having leaked out of her voice, leaving only a deep note of despair.

Tonks shook her head, still unable to look directly at her. Had it been real?

“Come here,” Bellatrix continued softly.

Finally, Tonks looked up to find Bellatrix’s face above her, warm and open. Her eyes were rimmed with red. She had been crying too.

Tonks uncurled herself in order to stand and sink into Bellatrix’s outstretched arms. Tonks began crying again as Bellatrix ran her hand down her back.

“I’m sorry,” Tonks said through her tears on Bellatrix’s shoulder.

Bellatrx merely hushed her and continued petting her back.

“And I’m sorry for crying,” Tonks added.

“I suppose your mother would tell you off for crying?”

Tonks nodded.

“She doesn’t understand us,” Bellatrix’s voice whispered in her ear. “The two of us have a lineage – it’s why we can be held so captive by our emotions while she can act without considering feelings. I’ll always be here for you when you cry. I won’t ever let you go.”

Bellatrix led Tonks by the hand back to her chair and gestured for her to sit while Bellatrix Summoned her a bottle of wine and a glass.

Bellatrix handed Tonks the glass. “You’ll feel better.”

After Tonks took a long sip, Bellatrix wiped Tonks’s tears away with a finger before sticking it in her own mouth, smiling slightly as she did so. Tonks did not know how to respond, and so she drank more quickly, trying to finish the entirety of the glass.

That had been real. Bellatrix had shouted at her. Bellatrix had thrown a glass at her. Bellatrix had choked her.

Eyes downcast, Tonks murmured, “Bella, that was really scary.”

Bellatrix hummed in assent as she refilled Tonks’s glass. She sat on the arm of the chair and pulled Tonks close and, in being pulled, Tonks spilled the wine on her own chest. Bellatrix cleaned the spill with a wave of her hand and refilled the glass again. Tonks shivered.

Bellatrix gripped the back of Tonks’s head and turned it so she was looking Bellatrix in the eye. Tonks ensured her eyes match Bellatrix’s. She knew Bellatrix preferred them hooded and grey, and she had already made Bellatrix so angry tonight.

Bellatrix smiled slightly, and Tonks hoped she had done this right.

“Now do you see the kind of power you have over me?”

Tonks didn’t know if she understood, but she let Bellatrix kiss her anyway and let herself fade into the security of Bellatrix’s caress.

“I won’t write to my dad again without you.”

“I know you won’t,” Bellatrix said as she stroked her cheek. All the tears had dried, and Tonks leaned her head closer. “The thought of losing you is just too much for me.”

“I won’t,” Tonks repeated. “I promise.”

Tonks sat back and finished her second glass of wine, knowing it would help settle the last of her residual fear.

As the fear receded, she couldn’t help feeling a little pride – she had driven Bellatrix Black to such extremes? Bellatrix needed her so much, loved her so much that she would lose control like that? Who else could claim to be loved in that way? Who else could claim to survive being loved in that way?

Maybe she did understand what Bellatrix said when she announced Tonks was special, when she said Tonks had power over her.

Bellatrix existed as strength personified, a warrior goddess, but Tonks would be careful with her fragile heart. She alone could hold it.

“How do you want me tonight?” Tonks asked softly, looking under her eyelashes at Bellatrix in the way she imagined Lolita did. She wanted to make Bellatrix happy. She wanted to be careful with that heart, and she had already been so reckless tonight. If any part of her rebelled against the idea, it had been quieted with the second glass of wine.

She loved changing herself to meet Bellatrix’s desires. She could look older or younger, more buxom or more boyish, eyes and hair of any colour.

“Match my face but keep your age.” Sometimes Tonks felt the faintest tingling when changing but the wine smoothed out any discomfort, and all Tonks could feel was pleasure at a command well executed. “No, slightly younger. There, yes, such a good girl for me.”

Tonks flushed at her words.

Bellatrix cupped her blushing cheeks and continued her instruction. “Cheeks a bit fuller, yes, perfect.” She reached for Tonks’s hair, now long black curls and threaded her fingers through. “Loosen the curls and make your hair a little lighter, a little lighter still, that’s it.”

Tonks adjusted. She knew the colour well, a deep, complex chestnut-brown, shifting its shade depending on the light.

She knew who she must look like. If the thrill in her body was desire or shame, she could not tell, but she knew better than to say what she knew because Bellatrix’s hurt ran too deep, and their emotions had run too high already tonight. She had learned to always wait for Bellatrix to bring up her mother.

“My sweet,” Bellatrix breathed. She looked at Tonks with wonder, and Tonks glowed with pride at her adoration.

“Bella,” Tonks replied, because that was what Bellatrix’s sisters called her.

Bellatrix wasn’t moving, just staring, her grey eyes roaming over every inch of Tonks, hesitating to touch her further.

Tonks slipped off her robes, letting it fall to her feet before loosening her tie and undoing each button, one at a time. Without breaking her gaze from Bellatrix, she pulled off her shirt carefully. Bellatrix was breathing harder now, the tight bodice of her robes constraining her.

Tonks rarely took off her clothes on her own. She almost always waited for Bellatrix to undress her, and this moment felt special, fragile. She wanted to make herself vulnerable for Bellatrix, who had already made herself so vulnerable for Tonks.

Tonks slipped her skirt off and attempted to step through without breaking her eyes from Bellatrix. Her foot caught, and she stumbled towards Bellatrix, who, as always, caught her. Her clumsiness broke the spell.

“My nymphet.”

Tonks shivered, nearly naked in Bellatrix’s office.

“Come.”

Bellatrix reached out a hand, and Tonks took it. Together, they walked to the other side of the desk. Bellatrix pushed the chair out of the way and stared forward. Tonks stood, unsure of what to do. Did she want her on the desk? Bent over? She waited for Bellatrix to tell her, but Bellatrix continued silently staring underneath the desk.

Finally, Tonks dropped to her knees. That seemed to bring Bellatrix back, and she continued, voice far away, “Under the desk, yes. You remember when we found ourselves under Father’s desk?”

Tonks crawled under the desk as her answer. She kept herself hunched to avoid hitting the top. Bellatrix sat down just next to her. She was too big to fit under like she had in the memory. Tonks would play it for her anyway, the best she could.

“You were so terrified,” Bellatrix cooed, finally looking directly at her. “‘What if he comes back?’ But I told you not to be afraid. You were afraid anyway, but your fear brought colour to your cheeks and a nice, fast beat to your heart. I helped you sip whisky until you were loose and ready for me. You were the most beautiful girl. They always said Cissy was with her blonde hair and her little neck, but it was you. It is you.”

Tonks sat still. The rug scratched at her naked bottom, and her neck ached from hunching, but the discomforts existed far away from her core being. She kept her eyes on Bellatrix, whose mouth was blooming into a smile.

“Then you blushed as if you could not believe what I said. And you remember what I told you?”

Tonks sat enraptured, afraid to break the spell. She had never heard this lightness in Bellatrix’s voice before. Under the desk, they were in a fairytale, and Tonks was a long-lost princess, pure and innocent in her nudity.

Bellatrix leaned forward to kiss her slowly, soft lips to soft lips.

“You are the most beautiful girl because you are mine.”

Tonks nodded, her long dark hair brushing against her small budding breasts.

She surrendered into Bellatrix, who continued spinning fairy tales of noble sisters and evil mothers and ghoulish fathers and running away as her hands roamed over Tonks’s body. The words washed over Tonks as she laid back and let herself be caressed, claimed, and devoured.

Two weeks after the incident – that’s what Tonks preferred to call that night in her head, ‘the incident,’ – Tonks sat at breakfast, feeling confused as to how she still able to pretend to be another student just like those around her when she had been claimed by Bellatrix, when she had proven herself strong enough to survive Bellatrix’s love.

Since that night, Bellatrix had been even more loving, showering her with praise for her magic, giving her emerald elf-made earrings she had inherited from her grandmother. She had not gotten angry again.

She stopped writing to her dad without Bellatrix watching. She talked to her classmates only as much as necessary.

Tomorrow was a Hosmeade weekend, which meant the castle would be emptied, and she could spend more time with Bellatrix uninterrupted.

However, the letter in front of her, which she had just untied from the leg of her mother’s owl, was not on their usual correspondence schedule and was dangerously thin

She tore it open as the tawny owl watched her carefully from the table.

Nymphadora,

I will be coming to Hogsmeade on Saturday. I know it’s the Hogsmeade weekend. We will meet in the Three Broomsticks at noon. If you try to avoid me, I will break my way into the castle.

-Mum

Tonks tried to breathe slowly. She tried not to stare in desperation at the professor table. She failed at both.

Her mother was coming to Hogsmeade. She must suspect something.

Would Bellatrix be angry at her for letting something slip?

Her leg bounced under the table, fully outside of her control, and her hands shook as she gripped the short letter.

She couldn’t help herself. She looked again to the professor’s table, but Bellatrix sat turned towards Professor McGonagall, listening intently.

“Are you alright?” Richard’s voice broke through her panic. Her muggleborn classmate looked across the table at her.

“No, yes, my mum wants to meet me tomorrow,” Tonks stammered out.

Stupid. She should have lied. She owed it to Bellatrix to be better.

“And?” He hadn’t asked it cruelly, but Tonks felt the accusation in it.

“You wouldn’t understand,” she snapped. “It’s a wizarding family thing.”

His face fell. “Tonks –”

“I’m sorry.” Tonks gathered her bag and made to stand up, nearly tripping over the bench in the process. She shouldn’t have said that. She shouldn’t have said it that way. “I’m sorry,” she repeated, not looking him in the eye as she walked away.

She walked as quickly as she could without breaking into a run towards Bellatrix’s classroom. She paced outside of it as a long string of second year Gryffindors trailed in. Some looked at her in curiosity. She tried to smile back. She changed her hair pink to make one smile, and, if anything, her anxiety only made the colour all the brighter.

Finally, Bellatrix strode down the corridor. A look of worry crossed her face when she saw Tonks.

Bellatrix glanced back down the corridor to ensure they were alone before asking, “What’s wrong?”

Tonks showed her the note.

Bellatrix sucked in a breath before steeling her features again. “We’ll manage.”

“Are you angry?”

“No, not with you, never with you, and don’t worry – I won’t let her separate us.” She placed a hand on Tonks’ shoulder. “Now, go to class, and we’ll meet here at lunch to discuss.”

Tonks almost sighed in relief as she turned to jog towards the Potions dungeon in the hopes of making it there on time.

Bellatrix was not angry with her. Everything else was easy to solve.

Tonks hadn’t anticipated how crowded the Three Broomsticks would be, but Andromeda had managed them a table as students filled in around them. Tonks took a sip of her butterbeer and desperately wished it were wine instead. Her mother’s nonalcoholic misty pink water affair sat untouched next to her. Every few minutes, it would send up a soft pink cloud as if trying to apologise for its lack of spirits.

“I can’t express how relieved I am to see you.” Her mother scanned her head to toe, as if checking for magical enchantments or injuries. Of course, Tonks had none, and her mother would find none.

“Does Dad know you’re here?” Tonks asked sharply. They had already exchanged pleasantries. Bellatrix had told her to be pleasant and accommodating, but Tonks was finding it difficult considering her mother had essentially threatened her into this meeting.

“Your father does not know about this, and I’d rather he not.” She looked away towards the wooden wall before straightening up again. “From the very start, there are certain family affairs I’ve tried to protect him from.”

It was about Bellatrix. Of course it was about Bellatrix.

“Mum, what’s this about?” Tonks tried to scrunch her face into confusion. She would have to play this right. Bellatrix trusted her to play this right. It was her fault her mother was so suspicious, even if Bellatrix said she was not angry.

“I think you know what this is about.”

She wanted her mother to be cross, even angry, but Andromeda’s voice was so sad, and it made Tonks all the more frustrated with her.

“No I don’t – honestly!” Tonks said stubbornly. “Whatever it is, why are you keeping it from Dad?”

“Please be honest with me, Nymphadora,” Andromeda pleaded instead of answering. “I know how she is, but, please, trust that I know her better than you.”

“Is this about Professor Black? Mum, she’s just my professor. I know she’s your sister, but she’s just my professor!”

“In your last letter, you used the word ‘dalliance.’” Andromeda’s arm flinched, and Tonks knew she was gripping her hands into fists under the table. “That’s one of her words.”

“Mum, you sound mad. It’s just a word people use sometimes.”

Andromeda continued without acknowledging Tonks spoke, her voice tense. “You’ve been writing to your father separately, without wanting me to know.”

“You can’t be angry about that too!”

“I saw the letters – you told him you’ve been reading Sappho. ‘There was no dance, no sacred dalliance, from which we were absent,’” Andromeda quoted. Her voice took on a dreamy quality by the time she finished quoting before she hardened her voice again. “She wrote it in her final letter to me.”

“I want to talk to Dad about this.”

Andromeda’s whole body tensed, and even the muscles of her face seemed strained. Tonks had never seen her like this.

“There are some things we have to protect him from.”

“Things you want to protect him from or things you want to hide from him?” Tonks snapped. Andromeda flinched, and Tonks pressed on, “Maybe if you just be honest with any of us for once in your life! If you could just tell Dad or me what you did to Bellatrix!”

“What I did to Bella?” Andromeda hissed. “What I did!”

Suddenly, Andromeda turned away from their table. People, mostly other Hogwarts students on their Hogsmeade weekend, were staring at them. A group of sixth year Ravenclaws nearby surely were listening. Andromeda straightened her back and smoothed her hair down.

“We should continue this conversation elsewhere.”

Tonks nodded. She had told Bellatrix she would be polite. She was failing. They needed to reset so she could get back to the castle and back to Bellatrix as quickly as possible.

The mother-daughter pair navigated out of the crowded pub and exited into the somewhat less crowded street. Tonks was angry at the sunshine, angry at her mother, angry that she was spending Saturday here rather than in Bellatrix’s office.

“Here,” Andromeda said as she grabbed Tonks’s hand and pulled her into the alley next to the Three Broomsticks. Tonks would have laughed at the sight of her prim mother in an alley if the situation hadn’t been so serious.

Andromeda took a deep breath, having regained some of her composure. “I never wanted to have to tell you this. I wanted to leave everything about that damn family behind, but I need to keep you safe.”

Andromeda opened her mouth as if to speak further, but instead she cupped her hand over her face and squeezed her eyes shut.

“Mum?” Tonks asked softly, the kernel of love she had for her mother making itself known to her, cracking open painfully.

“I can’t even say it,” Andromeda choked out. “Please, Nymphadora, just believe me.”

Andromeda stood, shoulders hunched, body shaking, her hand over her mouth, not speaking; she was the very picture of distress.

Was she even crying? Or was this acting?

Bellatrix had warned Tonks about her mother.

She had betrayed Bellatrix, and she was the one acting like a victim?

She had lied to Tonks and to her husband for years, and she was asking to be believed?

No wonder she wouldn’t say anything. She had nothing to say to justify herself. Bellatrix had been right. Bellatrix was always right.

Tonks didn’t intend to speak, but she was so angry.

“You left her, and you’re pretending you’re the victim?” Tonks spat.

Andromeda froze and looked at Tonks. “She’s gotten to you.” In a flash, as quick as Bellatrix, she had her wand out. “Finite Incantatem!”

Nothing happened, because Tonks was not charmed.

“She loved you!” Tonks insisted.

“That’s not love,” Andromeda said, looking at Tonks in horror. “She’s gotten to you. Oh, what has she done to you?”

“Nothing!”

“Tell me!”

“No!”

Andromeda shook her head and commanded, “Legilimens.”

The memories flashed forward, beyond Tonks’s control.

Bellatrix with her hand on her shoulder the day before. Bellatrix caressing her. Bellatrix with her mouth on her cunt. Bellatrix with her hand around her neck. Bellatrix wiping away her tears. Bellatrix holding her tight. Bellatrix loving her. Bellatrix. Bellatrix. Bellatrix.

The spell dropped.

Tonks and Andromeda stared at each other, with matching horrified expressions. Tonks stood frozen.

Her mother had just seen everything.

“I’m taking you home,” Andromeda said as she stepped forward towards Tonks. “To hell with Hogwarts and Dumbledore’s absent leadership – I’m taking you away from her. She will never touch you again.”

“You can’t!” Tonks shouted, backing away down the alley. She stepped on a rock and stumbled but managed to catch herself.

Her mother kept striding forward. Her dark hair had come loose, her grey eyes blazed with power, and Tonks finally saw the resemblance between her and Bellatrix.

“When you’re a mother, you’ll understand. I won’t let you go back to her.”

“You can’t make me!”

“Yes I can,” Andromeda said, her voice calm for the first time all afternoon, as she raised her wand. “Imperio.”

The kernel of love expanded, enveloping Tonks, and all of her worries disappeared into it. She wanted to be a good daughter. She wanted all decisions to be simple and made for her by her mother, whom she trusted completely.

Why was she fighting with her mother? She couldn’t have been. She would never. The air was warm on her skin. She felt as though she was floating. Maybe she was floating, buoyed by a mother’s love.

She was a good daughter. She would always be her mother’s good daughter. She would go home with her mother.

How lovely to go home with her mother on a beautiful day.

The curse broke.

Tonks blinked back to sharp, cruel reality.

“You – you just –”

Andromeda’s face had twisted into open-mouthed anguish. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” she repeated. “I would never… I told myself I would never.”

She reached out towards Tonks in apology.

Tonks pushed past her and ran out of the alley into the Hogsmeade street.

“Please!” Andromeda cried after her, but Tonks just pumped her legs faster.

Her lungs bursting and legs aching, Tonks ran all the way to the castle. She did not know exactly where the wards started, and her mother, not a Hogwarts student or an invited guest, would be prevented from crossing. She was too afraid to slow down, and her fear of her mother, more than her stamina from months of training with Bellatrix, kept her going all the way to the steps of Hogwarts.

Tonks banged her fist against Bellatrix’s office door, and the sound echoed down the empty corridor. She had no plan if Bellatrix was not in. She stood, panting and panicking, in front of the door, waiting, hoping, pleading.

Finally, the door opened.

“Inside,” Bellatrix commanded, and Tonks rushed through the doorway into the safety of Bellatrix’s office.

Bellatrix shut the door behind her.

“Your mother?”

Tonks nodded. She was too out of breath to answer with words.

“Did you run all the way here from Hogsmeade?”

Tonks nodded again. Her heart rate was finally starting to slow.

“What did you tell her?” Bellatrix asked sharply.

“I tried not to tell her anything! I said you were my professor, but –” Tonks did not know whether or not to share that she had tried to defend Bellatrix. “She used Legilimency on me. She saw everything.”

To her surprise, Bellatrix smiled at that. “She saw everything? Even the most intimate moments?”

Tonks nodded.

Bellatrix’s satisfied smile broke into a full, victorious grin, which Tonks could not comprehend. “It’s all worth it then – my husband, that old professor Darkworth. What was her reaction? Tell me exactly.”

“Er, shock, horror, panic – She used the Imperius curse on me!” Tonks stammered out, still unsure if she could believe it. “That’s an Unforgivable!”

“Not Unforgivable when it’s to your underage child, as both your mother and I know well,” Bellatrix answered, still inexplicably smiling. “Our country offers great leniency to selfish parents, not so much for those who survive them.” She looked at Tonks and dropped her smile. “I am sorry. That must have been very scary for you.”

“It’s alright,” Tonks said because that was a thing one said sometimes, and she could not think of anything else to say. Then she asked what she needed to know most. “You’re not angry with me?”

“Angry? No, you did so well, my nymphet. I’m so proud.” She reached out to cup Tonks’s cheek before drawing back. “Oh, she will manage an invitation to the castle. She may be duplicitous, controlling, and cruel, but she’s no fool.”

“What’s going to happen to you?”

Bellatrix began to pace, the sound of her steps muted on the carpet, and did not answer for a moment. “We must move quickly.”

“What?”

Bellatrix sighed, still pacing. “It’s the only way. I need to protect you. You must come to Zaire with me, and we need to leave right now before she gets into the castle.”

It was too much too quickly. She would go with Bellatrix and – what? Never see her parents again? Never step foot in England again until she was of age? If ever?

She had thought she would have weeks to consider and plan, to at least write a letter goodbye.

Bellatrix sensed her hesitation. Her softness dissolved, and she snapped, “I need not remind you that your mother just attempted to use the Imperius curse on you, and she would not hesitate to again if it meant she could keep you away from me. She hates me, and she doesn’t understand you, and what she does not understand, she will try to control until there is nothing of you that’s truly you, the you I know and love, left.”

Around them, Bellatrix’s belongings were rolling up, zooming into trucks, folding smaller. The chaos matched Tonks’s internal state, and she moved towards the one solid, the one constant in the room and in her life.

“We don’t have to run away,” Tonks pleaded as she stepped close to Bellatrix. “We could write to my dad! He’ll talk sense into her. Or we can tell everyone she’s mad – she’s acting like it. Or you can duel her! You’d surely win.”

At that, Bellatrix smiled. She reached out and pulled Tonks to her chest. “Unfortunately, if she manages to convince Albus to look into the matter, to look inside your mind, he’ll find what he must not, and we may be able to discredit her, but we would not be able to discredit him.” Tonks pulled away but Bellatrix held her tighter. “No, it’s not your fault. He is just… dangerous. And, I would love to duel your mother, believe me, but I’m afraid the law is on her side. No, we must take you out of the country.”

She had ignored the comment about Tonks’s father.

Tonks stood frozen in Bellatrix’s arms. There had to be another way. Bellatrix needed her. She needed Bellatrix, but there had to be another way.

Bellatrix grabbed Tonks by the back of the head and held her even closer. The packing around them had ceased, and the room was silent except for their breathing and the sound of Bellatrix’s pounding heart in her ear.

“What I told you the first night I became yours is still true. You hold my life in your hands.” Bellatrix’s voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m afraid I will die without you.”

Tonks surrendered.

“Okay.”

From there, she let herself be carried by Bellatrix’s energy. Bellatrix kissed her mouth, and Tonks’s body moved in response, but her mind had paused.

She did not understand how they would leave the castle. She did not have the composure to ask.

She stood as Bellatrix waved her wand to pile her belongings together before she moved into her bedchamber to finish the process. The room felt cavernous and empty without Bellatrix’s things. Or was that how Tonks felt, without Bellatrix?

The doubt crept in, in the space Bellatrix had left.

Tonks could walk out of the office. The door was only ten steps away.

Tonks could go to her mother.

Tonks could be taken home, away from this castle, from magic, from this boiling intensity.

She could let her dad hold her.

She missed him.

But if Tonks walked out of this room, Bellatrix said she might die. Tonks could not believe that. Bellatrix was too strong. But Tonks might die, without Bellatrix.

How could she live with the emptiness? If this much joy were possible, how could she walk away?

Still, she looked towards the door. Just ten steps and a twist of a doorknob.

Ten steps and a twist of a doorknob.

Bellatrix returned to the office with all of her belongings floating behind her, and Tonks knew her only choice, and she hoped her father would forgive her.

In a daze, she accepted Bellatrix’s hand and let herself be led towards the fireplace.

Bellatrix was saying something about Floo connections out of Hogwarts and the Lestrange home in England, but Tonks could not follow, but she knew Bellatrix wanted her to step into the fireplace, and so she did.

She could not bring herself to say the words Bellatrix kept repeating at her. Bellatrix had to toss in a second round of Floo powder before Tonks felt her own throat voice, “Lestrange Manor.”

She spun, dizzy from the Floo and dizzy from her choice, and stepped out into the grandest home she had ever entered. Her steps on the stone fireplace echoed throughout the cavernous room. Upon second look, as she walked out further, some of the moulding on the ceiling was cracked, and one of the sofa cushions had a tear. Dust covered the floor. No one had cleaned this home in a long time.

From across the room, she saw the bar cart and knew Bellatrix would not mind. She didn’t bother to use magic to clean. She used the edge of her robe to wipe around the glass before filling it with whatever amber liquid was in the decanter. She drank and waited for Bellatrix to arrive and for her world to start anew. She would be loyal to the dream she chose, the nightmare she chose, whichever it was.

Tonks stirred awake. The breeze of the cooling charm wafted over her but was unable to block out the entirety of the oppressive humidity which still hung thick in the room. She was too tired to raise her head, but she could see a corner of the window revealing the setting sun over the thick forest canopy. The golden light still felt too bright on her tired eyes, but she trusted it would set soon enough. Someday, if she had the energy, she would learn the names of the myriad birds outside the window and learn which ones cooed, which ones chirped, and which ones tutted away. For now, she would lie back and listen to the cacophony of birdsong.

Her mouth still tasted sweet from the cherries Bellatrix had fed her before she left in the morning, a taste which was not sweet enough to cover up the potion, but sweet enough so that Tonks could pretend she had eaten only sugared cherries.

Bellatrix said little girls liked sweets, and Tonks liked when Bellatrix was happy.

She had had more freedom once, before she was a little girl, but she had been naughty, and Bellatrix needed to keep her safe from the muggles and other animals who roamed the jungle.

The cherries left her floaty, like she was on the back of one of the chatty birds outside whose names she did not know. Bellatrix said they helped keep her mind young and innocent, and Bellatrix would take care of everything else. She was to eat them, especially when Bellatrix was out doing her important work, the details of which Tonks did not need to worry about.

Sometimes Bellatrix returned with something to practise her magic on, but Tonks had gotten so sad the last time, when the muggle never started moving again after her curse had hit him, leaking dark blood all over the wooden floor. Bellatrix had to kiss her and give her more sweet drinks then sweet cherries to silence her sobs. Bellatrix had charmed the floor clean as carelessly as she had disposed of the body, and sometimes Tonks ran her finger down a still-stained grove to help her remember that his death had been real. 

Finally, Tonks found the energy to roll over on her bed, hoping for a cooler position. The morning’s cherries must be wearing off. Worry might creep in soon. She wished Bellatrix were home so she could use her wand to cool the pillow, but Bellatrix kept Tonks’s wand safely locked when she was not home. Tonks was too powerful with a wand without Bellatrix’s supervision.

Bellatrix, her love, her protector, her everything. Bellatrix, who moulded her every day in the shape she wanted. Tonks was a hollow clay toy, unfired and ever shifting, slowly being perfected, always in danger of reverting to a lump of dirt without Bellatrix’s hands to guide her. Bellatrix took care of Tonks when she could not take care of herself, and Tonks could not be trusted to take care of herself. She was too young and unfinished.

Tonks had asked her, days or weeks ago, time being so fickle, “What will you do when I grow up?”

She knew little girls did not stay little forever. She remembered that from long ago. Little girls grow big and run away.

“You never have to,” Bellatrix breathed out as she let her hand roam down Tonks’s narrow hips, towards her soft sex. “Every shift in your appearance is at my command alone. You’ll be young for me forever, my nymphet.”

The birds whose names Tonks did not know continued their song outside.