A touch of sugar, no milk Date: Tuesday, 2 December, 2001 Time: Afternoon Characters: Bellatrix Black and Draco Malfoy Location: Yaxley Residence
Her reliable force of habit was slipping. Had been slipping. Since Regulus had come to stay with her, she'd spent more time at home with the locket in one of her pockets. It left her vulnerable, she knew, but the wards around her home were severe. They would provide her with plenty of warning. However, even though the wards had been altered only to permit her nephew admittance, it seemed to entice a thread of tension to hang in the air. Meeting Draco at Malfoy Manor would have posed different challenges - Cissy, for one. As much as she cared for her sister, the youngest daughter Black was too... soft, biased, emotionally driven when it came to her own son. Were Bellatrix a woman who fell prey to regret, her own absence in her nephew's life would have been a lamentable thing. There was no way to change what had been, and the only thing left to do was to deal with the way things were.
The locket dangled from the new silver chain threaded through her fingers. She lifted her other hand, tracing over the intricate engraving that concealed with magic within. Quite a clever piece of work, if she did say so herself. Clasping the locket itself back in the palm of her hand, she returned her attention to the parchment in her hands. There were serious benefits, she knew, to being a woman that few men were ever capable of appreciating. It granted access, to parties, to people, to contacts, that could be excused as strictly social. A few of her contacts - her own, she noted with pride, not all of them simply borrowed from Cissy - were beginning to understand what she was saying behind their casual, lilting political discussions. Some of them agreed with her. Integration was failing, would fail, she knew this deep in her bones. But what she had in mind would go far beyond that, if only Draco could learn to manage his public identity.
With a sigh and a shake of her head she picked up her teacup from the tray that say atop the coffee table of her sitting room. Taking a sip, she crossed her legs, leaned back in her chair, and returned her eyes to the long-winded note.
... and like I knew it would, the new propositions are going to come to a vote on Friday. That anyone has any kind of expectation that it'll get the votes necessary to pass is beyond me. My wife sends her regards and wonders if you'd join us.....