InsaneJournal

Fear is only in our minds...
Character: Barty
Summary: Barty has been settling into his new life and freedom. However, it seems that he can't completely escape his past.


Barty let himself into his house with a discreet flick of his wand, and breathed a sigh of relief as he closed the door behind him. It was getting easier each time, to leave the safety of his new home, but he couldn't help the way his heart would start hammering as he walked the last stretch home, fearful that Bella would jump out at the last minute and reclaim him. He closed his eyes and let the scent of polished wood and air freshening charms calm him. He was home. He was safe.

Feeling foolish, he opened his eyes and moved down the hallway to the kitchen. He took out and un-shrunk his shopping, and began putting the bread and milk and eggs away. It was a mundane activity and soothing because of it. The brightly lit kitchen was a far cry from the cellar Bella had kept him in. Making sure the butter went into the magical cooler held a quiet sanity which Barty clung to.

The shopping put away, Barty went into the living room and picked up the book he had been reading that morning. He had read it before. In fact, he had read every book in the house. It was what he had spent the past months of freedom doing, unless necessity sent him out for food, or, in the first weeks, clothing. He flicked idly through the pages, looking at the illustrations of places that he knew about, but which he still didn't have any real memory of.

He paused on a sketch of Hogwarts Castle. He knew that it was school, hadn't needed the travel book to know that, or to know about the house divisions, or the Great Hall. Barty knew that he had gone to the school, but he couldn't find a mental picture to put to that knowledge. He couldn't remember what he had looked like in his yellow and black school tie.

He had gone back to the records office he had visited when researching his soul's family. He had found out that he had been in Hufflepuff house, renowned for their loyalty and hard work. Barty knew that he was loyal... Had been loyal... To the end...

Rubbing at his forehead, Barty wondered if his former self had really been the madman Bella and newspaper reports had described to him. Under Bella's spell, under her fake protection and care, he had believed fiercely in his loyalty to their past master, and their cause. His belief in Bella had been broken, and his belief in the ideals she had preached had been shaken. She was mad, and he felt that he couldn't remain loyal to ethics spouted by somebody so unstable.

However...

However, a part of him wondered what he would be like if he had not been given a new soul, if somehow Bella had been able to return him the way she had wanted to, just the way he had been before he had been kissed. He had done terrible things even with Rilind Hedera's soul. If he had been given back his own...

Barty searched for something to distract him. He knew that it was this kind of thinking that was causing his nightmares, the dreams in which he thought he remembered his past life, in which he revelled in death and bowed in front of his master, willing to do anything in his service.

Kneading at his temple, Barty tried to reassure himself with the knowledge that they could only be dreams. That it was his imagination and Bella's words playing cruel tricks on him. He couldn't be remembering now. He had lost his memories with his soul, and he wanted neither back.

Getting jerkily to his feet, Barty let his feet carry him upstairs so the bathroom where he drowned out his thoughts with the heavy beat of shower water on the back of his skull.

He had escaped Bella, but he feared he was going mad anyway.