Chapter 63. The Date. Part 3. Ending
Immediately after dinner, they went to a movie theater. Strangely enough, Bella enjoyed it immensely, though she tried to hide it. She had repeatedly told him that Muggles were stupid, insignificant creatures who could never compare to wizards. As a true Black, she was too stubborn to admit her mistakes or take back her words. Even so, she still considered them insignificant; after all, uprooting beliefs planted from childhood takes more than a single day.
After that, they visited an amusement park. They both found it extremely boring, so they left after half an hour. Then they went to a shopping center, where Bella stared at the shop windows full of clothes, almost in tears. But when they passed a window displaying lingerie, she quickly pulled him forward, determined to keep him from getting any ideas about going inside and making her try on outfits. Severus, however, found her reaction amusing, especially the struggle between her principles and the beautiful clothes in the windows. He noted everything that caught her eye, and the house-elf was already buying it all behind them.
Next came a confectioner's paradise, an indoor market the size of the Great Hall at Hogwarts, filled with nothing but sweets. Bella tried to pretend she wasn't interested, but the cakes, pastries, pies, buns, and donuts overwhelmed her. The sweets had won a complete rout: her attempt to resist had failed utterly. Such an enormous assortment of sweets couldn't even be found in Diagon Alley. Even though she wasn't much of a sweet tooth, she still filled four bags.
The last stop was a simple park near Grimmauld Place, where they decided to take an evening walk.
London. 12 Grimmauld Place
Walking up to a plain three-story house that looked inconspicuous and almost indistinguishable from the others nearby, Severus couldn't hold back a smile of interest. He hadn't seen so many protective and concealing charms in a very long time.
When they finally stopped in front of the building, he looked at Bella. She looked a little tired, but satisfied, because this day had been one of the brightest of her life, not counting the beginning, of course.
"I won't ask how you know where our house is, but thank you for this day," she said with a half bow, deliberately polite. She glanced at the window, where a gloomy elderly woman was watching them.
"I hope you'll think about my words and make the right decision. Until our next meeting, Miss Black." He took out a square white box with a red bow and handed it to the suddenly flustered witch. "Don't worry, it's not a ring, and it's not a proposal. Although that could change at any moment, for now it's too early."
He placed the gift, no bigger than a ping-pong ball, into her hands and narrowed his eyes toward the window, catching the elderly woman off guard. Like the house itself, the windows were charmed, similar to the interrogation room where Severus had once been held. The fact that he had noticed her, and even smiled, sent a shock through her.
How is this possible? He noticed me through enchanted windows? And when she finally saw him apparate from their territory, Walburga felt relief, not knowing why. Then she saw her niece's satisfied face, even though Bella was trying to look indifferent, and Walburga frowned again. "First with one, and now you come home at night with another. What is happening to you? Have you decided to disgrace our family?!" Striking the windowsill in anger, she turned and walked down the long corridor toward the stairs.
At the same time, Bella entered the house, quickly shut the door behind her, and leaned back against it, smiling.
This was the strangest day of my life. But why do I not feel those same emotions? Did he really tell the truth? Before, a single mention of the Dark Lord in a bad light was enough to make her lose herself immediately and be ready to kill the bastard who dared say it. Now, although the feelings had not vanished, they seemed to have dulled. Two strange impulses fought inside her. One screamed at her to torture Severus for insulting her lord, while the other urged her to wait and watch him instead, as if two different personalities were waging war in her head. She needed to calm down and think everything through. She forced herself to pull away from the momentary obsession and lowered her gaze to the box. Hearing footsteps, she quickly hid it in her purse and lifted her eyes to Walburga.
"Bellatrix, do you want to disgrace our family? Like that ungrateful creature, Andromeda, who ran off with a Muggle?"
"No, Aunt."
"Then what does this mean?!" Walburga shouted, slamming her palm on the railing. "First you behaved like a loose woman at the ball, right in front of your fiance, and now you come home at nearly ten at night with some strange man!"
Bellatrix said nothing.
"Why are you silent?!"
"What am I supposed to say?! This was the Master's order! What can I do about it?" Bellatrix could not hold it in any longer, and the cold edge in her voice made the elderly woman fall silent. Walburga, like no one else, knew about her niece's unrequited feelings, and in the nearly twenty years Bellatrix had lived under her roof, she had come to know her well; she had watched her grow up right before her eyes. To Walburga, Bellatrix was an open book, and Bellatrix saw every line of pain on her aunt's face. "He ordered me to obey any command, no matter how terrible, and Rodolphus knows about it, so stop telling me how to live my life!"
The moment the words left her mouth, as she finally released what had been tormenting her heart all day, she felt as if something cracked inside her. It was a strange yet soothing feeling, as if she had broken through a barrier in her mind, as if she had awakened from a long sleep.
"I'm leaving. You needn't worry, Aunt. I'm still a virgin. He wasn't terrible enough that he'd force me into anything obscene. We just walked and talked," she said in an emotionless voice, then simply walked past the stunned head of the Black family and headed for her room.
Walburga didn't try to stop her because she had also noticed the sharp change in her niece, and that feeling was familiar to her too. It was an awakening.
After Bella graduated from Hogwarts, Walburga remembered her as strong-willed, cunning, clever, and confident, very much like herself in her youth. After the quarrel with Sirius, who had left the family home, Walburga and her husband, who was currently abroad, had even considered naming Bella temporary head of the family. But after Bellatrix joined the Death Eaters, she began to change drastically, and her blind infatuation with the Dark Lord deeply alarmed Walburga. She tried not to show it, because she considered Voldemort's ideas correct and was proud that her niece had joined, but she remained cautious. First and foremost came the Black family's prosperity, and only then came helping Tom Riddle carry out his plans. That was why she and her husband never joined the Death Eaters. They kept their distance and were ready, at any moment, to pull their family back to neutrality so that trouble would not befall them.
Seeing this change in Bella, Walburga felt a surge of excitement; perhaps, finally, her niece might become her old self again. Almost everyone in the family considered Walburga a cold-hearted woman, but she tried to care for everyone in her own way. Perhaps it was cruel at times, but that was the magical world.
She had considered him a smart man, but acting this way with a woman in love with him... A barely visible smile touched Walburga's lips, and the house-elf beside its mistress froze in shock at the sight.
At the same time, not far from the Black family home, Severus sat on a bench under a streetlamp in the park, watching it all from the front row.
My words still had an effect, but I hadn't expected it to happen so fast. Apparently, I had underestimated her. She was far more interesting than I had thought, and Tom had helped me a great deal. He mused with a grin, the image of Bellatrix lying on her bed in a dark room, staring at the ceiling and lost in thought, still lingering in his mind.
Of course, he could have guided her in the right direction, but he did not want to. It was much more interesting to see what Bella would come to on her own, and he was not planning to merely observe, either, because those dates had not been canceled. There was another reason he did not want to use the seal inside her: it caused personality distortion, and he was not a mind wizard. He was a fighter, and he simply could not influence a wizard's mind with that kind of subtlety.
Just then, Bellatrix sat up, turned on the light, and took out the box, hoping it would distract her from the storm in her head. As soon as she channeled magic into it, dresses, T-shirts, trousers, and much more began appearing on the bed.
"When did he manage this, and how did he guess?!" she muttered, not believing her eyes as the bed filled with outfits and the floor filled with shoes. "But how did he find out my sizes?" And when lingerie began appearing in the pile, her cheeks flushed. "Damn pervert!" she hissed through clenched teeth, rummaging through it all and realizing with mortification that everything was exactly her size.
Watching the angry, embarrassed witch, Severus could not hold back a playful smile.
She had not read his note yet. At that moment, Bellatrix found a piece of paper. Barely holding back her temper, she snatched it up and, after reading it, immediately burned it.
"So you want to see me in red with lace?" She pulled out her wand and pointed it at the pile of clothes, but she couldn't cast the spell. Snorting in displeasure, she put her wand away and glared at the heap like an offended child. "To hell with you!" With a gleam in her eyes, she walked over and began sorting through the outfits.
At the same time, Severus pulled out popcorn and set a bottle of soda beside him. Today he was in for a magnificent fashion show, and he was not going to miss it.
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