He'd seen her in Azkaban, remembered how she'd been imprisoned and how she'd changed over the years, but now he was faced with a young woman "in her prime" looking around the dark room with a mixture of sadness and nostalgia, shaking her head strangely. The Japanese man lurked a little to the side, watching the scene before him with great interest. The woman had been here hoping to meet Sora, but she hadn't even noticed Sirius on the couch.
Sirius was frantically searching his memory... or rather trying to remember something from his childhood and the first few years when he had not yet had time to fight with his parents and they had taught him about family charms and curses. He tried to recall that knowledge in the hope that it might hold the key to escaping this undoubtedly worse situation.
To think that he himself, Sirius, had thought well of that Jap and he had turned out to be just another fanatic who had sold out to the Death Eaters! And that thing is close to Harry! What could be worse? No, it could be worse, and probably would be, but he didn't want to think about it, and it was better to focus his thoughts on saving him, even if the chances were slim.
As the man stared at the woman, his ears filled with smoke from overexertion: it had been a long time since he had put so much effort into thinking. At some point, Bellatrix turned quite unexpectedly — clearly sensing the attention, the thin eyebrows on her well-groomed face flew up in extreme surprise, and then her wand appeared in her hand and her other hand froze in a very familiar gesture for the wandless application of Protego. For a few seconds they stared at each other, waiting for one of them to start a fight, to lower the bowstring, to start or restart (?) a war, but neither of them did.
Actually, Sirius would have unleashed a cascade of spells long ago, but the collar had tightened warningly around his neck since Bellatrix had appeared, even scratching his skin slightly, confirming the comparison to barbed wire. The woman herself had changed a great deal after the healing and the therapy of peace and simple, pleasant company, much calmer, more poised, the qualities for which the Hat had determined her to be a Slytherin manifesting themselves in all their glory. When Kreacher had arrived, she had been surprised that Sora had managed to penetrate the shields of House Black, but now everything was in place.
On the other hand, there were many more questions than before, and the woman was determined to get them answered — Lady Black had a right to do so. After a moment of tension, Bellatrix straightened up, her wand disappearing into the sleeve of her softly corsetted black and purple dress, her whole expression changing from "fierce" to "neutral-cold", her sharp chin raised. A few moments later, the disheveled and unkempt man stood before the real lady, who, even though she was naked, would not lose her aura of superiority and power.
Sirius had never been able to put up with his parents' nonsense, and when his cousins started imitating them, and then his younger brother, it was bad enough. Despite the circumstances, the man was in no hurry to hide his wand: even though he was forbidden to attack, he felt he could defend himself, and the chances of being attacked by a mad psychopath were far from zero, so it was better to be safe than sorry.
— Sirius? — The woman asked in a cool, even tone, looking very much like the hated Malfoy.
— Who else did you expect to find in our ancestral home? — The man grimaced: asking obvious questions was not the best way to show his level of intelligence.
— Yes, it's you, — the woman nodded, smiling. — What are you doing here? You ran away from your family and were burned out of the Ancestral Tapestry, so why did you come back?
— What do you care? — Black growled, clearly coming to his senses. — Besides, I thought you and those two freaks had been feeding worms... or fish... for a long time.
— You really are a Gryffindor. — The woman sighed and shook her head. — So many generations of one of the finest bloodlines, education, magic, and still you behave like the last filthy blood of Knockturn Alley. — Another heavy sigh, and Bellatrix turned to look at Hoshino, finding him unmistakably in the shadows. — Sora, have you decided to change your plan? — Glasses gleamed in the darkness and a white smile stretched out. It was strange, and Sirius thought about it for a while afterwards, but at that moment, the gleam of the glasses and the unreal glow of a smile with slightly elongated fangs were really visible between the thick shadows.
— I hadn't considered that house elves are overly impressionable, which is why they are attacked by talkativeness. — The boy stepped out of the shadows, still smiling, and Black didn't expect anything good from that smile. — I'm not as good at planning as the esteemed Headmaster of Hogwarts, and I can't calculate all the probabilities and variables. But I'm very good at improvising, and I'm also lucky.
— Luck is fickle and changeable, and it's best not to rely on it too much. — Bellatrix commented sternly, her tone, her expression, her choice of words all reminding Sirius of his mother, which made him cringe. The woman noticed this and again raised her thin eyebrow in a most aristocratic manner, but remained silent. — But let us return to our sad business. I understand that Kreacher, in a fit of emotion, said something inappropriate in front of Sirius?
— That is correct. — The Japanese nodded and approached the woman, standing quite close to her. — I had originally intended to put Sirius on display, to draw attention to him in any way I could, while you, Bella, stayed in the shadows and took care of the family's business. Neither he nor anyone else was to know of your existence, preferably not until the first expulsion of the future head of the Black family, that is, until his name appeared in the Book of Souls. Now there is a danger, and I have decided to involve you, as the Lady of the Clan, in solving this problem. Sirius is your blood, and you have the right to decide his fate.
Sirius was not pleased with what he heard. More than that, he had an overwhelming urge to run, and if it hadn't been for the collar, he would have been long gone by now. At least that's what he thought. Bella, though unhappy with the details of the boy's plan, was forced to see the logic in it. In the past, she would probably have caused a real scandal with a lot of spoiled property and even bodily harm at the mere hint of being locked up somewhere.
Now, her outlook on life had changed, and her opinion of this guy was one of the best. In this conversation, the woman had learned WHAT Sora had really done for her and her kind, what kind of position he had put himself in, and it couldn't help but impress her. She had never heard of such rituals, and she doubted very much that any of the modern Britons would agree to expose themselves to such danger in exchange for something... well, it was hard to put those feelings into words. The terms of the ritual are simple and brutal: the mage turns to Magic and asks her for leniency for the family he vouches for.
Then, in the course of the ritual, a child is magically conceived, to which the magician must become, if not a father, then a godfather, a mentor, and raise and educate it properly, so that at a certain age the child will be able to withstand an indefinite test, prove its right to supremacy over its own kind, and only then will the obligations be considered fulfilled. If something goes wrong, both the guarantor magician and the wards are punished. And while the wards get off relatively lightly, the guardian takes most of the fall.
How cruel the punishment can be — the guy did not say, but Afiri told that she knows two stories when the conditions were not met, and the guarantor mage lived more than three hundred years in an old, decrepit body, deprived of magic, happiness and luck. To be honest, Bella herself would not have dared to take such a step, unlike a Japanese, she knew how to weigh the risks (until recently). On the other hand, the woman had noticed the man's intelligence and his ability to think and draw conclusions, so the payment for such a ritual should be comparatively dangerous, and she really wanted to know what Sora was counting on.
— You could just cast a Forgetting. — The woman shrugged, pushing aside all thoughts that were not relevant to the current situation.
— This spell is only one hundred percent guaranteed for Muggles. If you cast Obliviate on a wizard, there's a good chance that a skilled mentalist will be able to untangle the knot of memories.
— There are no such masters left in Britain. — The woman shrugged again. — The last one was the Dark Lord, but he's gone, so I think the danger is far-fetched. ....