Let Me Say I'm Sorry (Now, Before You Go) - a gift for leontinabowie!
Title: Let Me Say I'm Sorry (Now, Before You Go)
Author: flipflop_diva
Recipient: leontinabowie
Pairing(s): Pansy/Bellatrix, Pansy/Hermione (background Pansy/Draco)
Word Count: 2,269
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: [Spoiler!]Implied torture, slavery, implied dub-con, adultery, profane language, slightly graphic sex, canon character death
Summary: In a world where Lord Voldemort reigns, Pansy knows she has to do whatever it takes to survive. But she never expected the cost to be this high.
Author's Notes: Thank you to Fairy for beta'ing this for me, for running this amazing fest and especially for not murdering me when I tell her I need just a little more time. You are amazing, bb <33 And to leontinabowie, I hope you enjoy this. It was definitely not the story I set out to tell, but it was the one that demanded to be told.
March 1998
Hermione's screams echo through the manor, seeming to seep through every door and every wall and into every room, as Bellatrix carves deeper and deeper into her skin.
The others sit back, watching, not moving or caring, but waiting.
Bellatrix carves deeper and Hermione screams louder. Until her screams die off, fading into the night as quickly as they started.
Her body goes limp, her head dips forward.
And then it happens. Commotion from the basement, a thunder of shoes coming up the stairs, and everyone's eyes turn toward the parlor door.
Except Bellatrix, because she knows what is about to happen.
"HERMIONE!" Ron screams. Even his voice sounds on the edge of panic as he bursts through the door.
Bellatrix merely laughs.
"You will never see her again!" she screams, and as Ron stumbles toward her, Harry right behind him, the CRACK! of Bellatrix's apparition sounds through the manor.
Hermione is gone.
Ten years later
Pansy waits patiently until she is sure her husband is gone before slipping her dark cloak on and pulling the heavy hood over her head. She knows Draco won't be coming home tonight. "Late meeting," he had told her, but she knows he's really fucking his little hussy in the city.
Pansy isn't stupid. She is anything but, really. She is the most intelligent person in the room most days. She has to be. It's the only thing that has kept her alive this far, has kept her and Draco free and, most importantly, has kept her alive.
She knows Hermione has wished she were dead for a long time, has eagerly awaited the day that it happens, but still Pansy is not ready to give her up.
So Pansy slips her dark cloak on and Apparates away from her home to a dank, dark alley in the middle of nowhere.
There is no sound. There is no light. To anyone - Muggle or wizard - passing by, it is nothing but a deserted alley in a deserted town, full of broken homes and fallen trees and cracked headstones. The air always feels heavy here, oppressive, like the hopes and dreams of the people who all died here in pursuit of a freedom they were never able to achieve are now pressing in on anyone who dares to venture through the place they once called home.
Pansy doesn't like the chill in the air, but she has long grown used to it. She keeps her hood up, although there is no one within hundreds of miles, and marches forward, down the deserted alley, through another one and on and on until she reaches her destination.
From the outside, it's a broken-down little house on the edge of an abandoned town. At one point, it belonged to a witch and wizard who were loyal to the wrong side.
But not anymore.
Pansy pushes open the door and creeps in. The front rooms are all dark and the floorboards creak as she shuffles through them and down a long hall, until she finds the only lighted room in the place.
The kitchen is a far cry from the rest of the house. It is almost warm, almost cozy. A fire burns in the corner, and lanterns cast a soft yellow glow over everything.
She is sitting at the tiny table, obviously waiting for her.
She doesn't say a word, just stares at her with those cold, calculating eyes, and gestures for her to come close.
Pansy does. She has long ago learned to swallow her disgust at this part. It's worth it for what comes next.
Pansy moves until she is standing directly in front of Bellatrix, who looks her up and down. And then it starts.
Bella pushes Pansy's dark cloak away, lets it drop to the ground. Her hand caresses Pansy's thigh, clad only in a thin pair of stockings, and makes its way up under Pansy's skirt, between her legs.
Pansy steadies herself against the table as Bellatrix picks up her wand, casting a quiet spell that almost instantly sheds Pansy's stockings.
Bella uses her hand to drag Pansy's knickers down her legs, and then Bella fucks her, first with her hand, then with her wand and finally with her mouth.
Pansy doesn't utter a sound the whole time, lets Bella do what she wants, but she makes sure to come hard in Bella's mouth, lets Bella lick her clean once she's done. It's the game the two of them play, have played for years.
You keep my secret and I'll keep yours.
Finally, Bella finishes. She licks her fingers and sits back, her dark eyes glinting.
Pansy doesn't even bother pulling up her knickers. Instead, she steps out of them. She's not embarrassed.
Besides, she has other things on her mind.
"She's still alive?" she asks Bellatrix, her tone remarkably impassive.
Bellatrix isn't fooled, though. She cackles, loudly.
"Not for long!"
And then she is gone, Apparating into the night, off to tell the Dark Lord that she has checked in on the Malfoys and they are cooperating as expected.
She was never here. Nor was Pansy.
Hermione has long since been dead.
You keep my secret and I'll keep yours.
•••
Bellatrix is right. Hermione doesn't have much longer. That much is obvious the second Pansy sees her.
It is almost an inky black down in the small, claustrophobic dungeon of the house. It was once a basement, for wizards to store their stuff and children to play in, but now it is nothing more than a jail cell, keeping its prisoner here as the days and the months and the years tick by.
It feels like a dungeon to Pansy. The stone walls, the rocky floor, the entire room having been made impenetrable to magic long, long ago.
Hermione lies where she always does, in the middle of a small, dirty mattress. It's the only piece of furniture in the room, and it barely even counts as that.
Hermione's ankles are clamped in iron shackles, as they always are, as if she still has the strength or the energy to try to escape if they were removed.
Pansy lifts the lantern she has brought down from upstairs and hangs it from the hook in the ceiling. A soft glow lights up Hermione's corner of the room, causing the girl to wince in pain, even the tiny light too much for her sensitive eyes.
She is barely more than a skeleton, the perfect definition of skin-and-bones. Her hair has thinned dramatically and what she does have now just hangs in clumps. In the light, her skin looks almost yellow. At least the parts that don't glow bright, sickly red from the cuts and curses Bellatrix likes to cast on her.
She is dying. Pansy can tell.
But she is still the most beautiful creature Pansy has ever seen.
Pansy creeps over to her, takes one of her pale, thin hands in hers. Hermione barely has the energy to squeeze Pansy's hand back.
"I'm glad you came." Hermione's voice is nothing more than a thin whisper, a hint of a voice that was once loud and powerful. "I don't have much time."
Pansy wants to argue with that, but she keeps quiet. They both know it's true.
"I was hoping for one last night with you," Hermione says, and she almost smiles.
Guilt fills Pansy's heart. There is no trace of bitterness or resentment left in Hermione's body. She has long since accepted her fate, long since understood that Pansy did what she had to do, that she had to pick the boy who would give her a future over the girl she had loved for years.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Pansy had cried when she had finally found her, after months of tracking Bellatrix after she had realized the Dark Lord's right-hand woman was hiding something from her master. "I didn't know!"
Hermione had begged her then, had pleaded with her.
"We can run away together!" she had begged as Pansy had shook her head no.
"But I love you!" Hermione had cried. "And I know you love me! Help me!"
But Pansy had made her choice, and Hermione had eventually accepted it, and now this was all they had. One last night together.
Pansy doesn't want to think about what will happen after this, what her life will be like once she doesn't have a secret to hold over Bellatrix's head.
You keep my secret and I'll keep yours.
But now isn't the time to think about it.
Instead Pansy smiles at the beautiful girl lying close to death on the mattress before her.
"You know I wouldn't let you do this alone," Pansy whispers, and Hermione manages to squeeze her hand almost tightly this time.
"I can just lie with you," Pansy says softly, but Hermione shakes her head.
"I want to feel you," she says, and Pansy nods, understanding perfectly as she feels something unexpected - tears welling up in her eyes.
Pansy hasn't cried in ten years, and she knows she can't start now. She shakes her head to clear out the moisture and instead leans down and presses her lips against Hermione's.
Hermione's lips have also grown thinner over the years, and now they are cold from being down in this dungeon, but they feel like home to Pansy.
Pansy takes her time, snogging her with all the emotion and feeling she can muster, using her right hand to trace her fingers up and down Hermione's face, trying to sear Hermione's features into her memory. She traces Hermione's eyebrows, threads her fingers through her hair and pushes the thin strands behind her ears, pulls back from their kiss and smoothes her fingers across Hermione's lips.
Then she starts moving, touching and nipping and kissing under Hermione's jawbone and down her neck and all around her tiny breasts.
Pansy wants to burn every detail of Hermione into her mind, but she also wants Hermione to forget all the pain and all the horror and all the torture she has endured from being Bellatrix's captive.
Pansy couldn't save her from her fate but maybe she can help her now.
Pansy takes one of Hermione's nipples into her mouth and sucks gingerly on it. Hermione arches her back, just slightly, pushing herself deeper into Pansy, and she sighs, an almost contented sigh.
Pansy keeps going, abandoning Hermione's breast and making her way farther south, her kisses and touches going over Hermione's stomach and around her belly button and down to her pelvis.
Finally, Pansy gets to where she needs to be, and she has to fight once more against an onslaught of tears.
She presses her nose between Hermione's legs, bumps Hermione's clit and listen as the other girl moans softly.
Pansy continues to take her time, using her fingers and her tongue to explore every fold and every crevice like she had never been here hundreds of times before.
Hermione shifts under her touch and makes soft whimpering noises. Pansy slides a finger into her and starts to move it.
"I love you," Pansy whispers into Hermione's sensitive flesh. She doesn't think Hermione can make out her words, but Hermione wiggles her hips, as though she wants to grind herself deeper into Pansy.
Pansy flashes back to the first time they had sex, sixth years hiding in the Room of Requirement, Hermione grinding herself against Pansy's face, her come spreading everywhere.
Now Pansy slides in a second finger and wraps her mouth around Hermione's clit. Hermione is wet, so very wet, and it takes Pansy a few moments to realize most of the wetness is from her own tears.
Somehow that realization makes Pansy cry harder. She pumps her fingers faster to make up for it, angles them in the way she knows Hermione likes, and keeps going until she feels Hermione's muscles clamp around her for what she knows will be the last time.
Pansy sobs harder and keeps her fingers moving until long after she feels Hermione still. Then she finally pulls her hand out of the other girl and climbs back up her pale, thin body.
Hermione's eyes are closed. She is barely breathing.
Pansy presses her lips against Hermione's one last time.
A hint of brown opens in the dark room, a tiny echo of sound fills her ears.
"Thank you."
Pansy collapses on Hermione's chest, her sobs echoing around the room.
By the time she looks up, Hermione is gone. Pansy knows even before she checks for breath.
The only person she has ever loved is gone. The choice she made so many years ago when she said yes to Draco feels like a regret she will never live down.
But there is nothing she can do about that now.
Pansy stands up, looks down on Hermione's body, studies her for what feels like hours, until she is sure she will never forget her image.
Then she turns around and heads back upstairs to find her clothes. Bellatrix will want to take care of the body, and Pansy can't take any more risks.
Her only chance in this dark world is her husband.
"I want you to be happy," Hermione had whispered to her once, a long time ago.
Pansy thinks maybe she still would want that for her, even if Pansy doesn't think that's possible.
But she has to try.
So Pansy slips the dark cloak back on and pulls the hood up over her head.
Hermione is gone. Draco is not.
Pansy doesn't have a choice. She Apparates back home.
Author: flipflop_diva
Recipient: leontinabowie
Pairing(s): Pansy/Bellatrix, Pansy/Hermione (background Pansy/Draco)
Word Count: 2,269
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: [Spoiler!]Implied torture, slavery, implied dub-con, adultery, profane language, slightly graphic sex, canon character death
Summary: In a world where Lord Voldemort reigns, Pansy knows she has to do whatever it takes to survive. But she never expected the cost to be this high.
Author's Notes: Thank you to Fairy for beta'ing this for me, for running this amazing fest and especially for not murdering me when I tell her I need just a little more time. You are amazing, bb <33 And to leontinabowie, I hope you enjoy this. It was definitely not the story I set out to tell, but it was the one that demanded to be told.
March 1998
Hermione's screams echo through the manor, seeming to seep through every door and every wall and into every room, as Bellatrix carves deeper and deeper into her skin.
The others sit back, watching, not moving or caring, but waiting.
Bellatrix carves deeper and Hermione screams louder. Until her screams die off, fading into the night as quickly as they started.
Her body goes limp, her head dips forward.
And then it happens. Commotion from the basement, a thunder of shoes coming up the stairs, and everyone's eyes turn toward the parlor door.
Except Bellatrix, because she knows what is about to happen.
"HERMIONE!" Ron screams. Even his voice sounds on the edge of panic as he bursts through the door.
Bellatrix merely laughs.
"You will never see her again!" she screams, and as Ron stumbles toward her, Harry right behind him, the CRACK! of Bellatrix's apparition sounds through the manor.
Hermione is gone.
Ten years later
Pansy waits patiently until she is sure her husband is gone before slipping her dark cloak on and pulling the heavy hood over her head. She knows Draco won't be coming home tonight. "Late meeting," he had told her, but she knows he's really fucking his little hussy in the city.
Pansy isn't stupid. She is anything but, really. She is the most intelligent person in the room most days. She has to be. It's the only thing that has kept her alive this far, has kept her and Draco free and, most importantly, has kept her alive.
She knows Hermione has wished she were dead for a long time, has eagerly awaited the day that it happens, but still Pansy is not ready to give her up.
So Pansy slips her dark cloak on and Apparates away from her home to a dank, dark alley in the middle of nowhere.
There is no sound. There is no light. To anyone - Muggle or wizard - passing by, it is nothing but a deserted alley in a deserted town, full of broken homes and fallen trees and cracked headstones. The air always feels heavy here, oppressive, like the hopes and dreams of the people who all died here in pursuit of a freedom they were never able to achieve are now pressing in on anyone who dares to venture through the place they once called home.
Pansy doesn't like the chill in the air, but she has long grown used to it. She keeps her hood up, although there is no one within hundreds of miles, and marches forward, down the deserted alley, through another one and on and on until she reaches her destination.
From the outside, it's a broken-down little house on the edge of an abandoned town. At one point, it belonged to a witch and wizard who were loyal to the wrong side.
But not anymore.
Pansy pushes open the door and creeps in. The front rooms are all dark and the floorboards creak as she shuffles through them and down a long hall, until she finds the only lighted room in the place.
The kitchen is a far cry from the rest of the house. It is almost warm, almost cozy. A fire burns in the corner, and lanterns cast a soft yellow glow over everything.
She is sitting at the tiny table, obviously waiting for her.
She doesn't say a word, just stares at her with those cold, calculating eyes, and gestures for her to come close.
Pansy does. She has long ago learned to swallow her disgust at this part. It's worth it for what comes next.
Pansy moves until she is standing directly in front of Bellatrix, who looks her up and down. And then it starts.
Bella pushes Pansy's dark cloak away, lets it drop to the ground. Her hand caresses Pansy's thigh, clad only in a thin pair of stockings, and makes its way up under Pansy's skirt, between her legs.
Pansy steadies herself against the table as Bellatrix picks up her wand, casting a quiet spell that almost instantly sheds Pansy's stockings.
Bella uses her hand to drag Pansy's knickers down her legs, and then Bella fucks her, first with her hand, then with her wand and finally with her mouth.
Pansy doesn't utter a sound the whole time, lets Bella do what she wants, but she makes sure to come hard in Bella's mouth, lets Bella lick her clean once she's done. It's the game the two of them play, have played for years.
You keep my secret and I'll keep yours.
Finally, Bella finishes. She licks her fingers and sits back, her dark eyes glinting.
Pansy doesn't even bother pulling up her knickers. Instead, she steps out of them. She's not embarrassed.
Besides, she has other things on her mind.
"She's still alive?" she asks Bellatrix, her tone remarkably impassive.
Bellatrix isn't fooled, though. She cackles, loudly.
"Not for long!"
And then she is gone, Apparating into the night, off to tell the Dark Lord that she has checked in on the Malfoys and they are cooperating as expected.
She was never here. Nor was Pansy.
Hermione has long since been dead.
You keep my secret and I'll keep yours.
•••
Bellatrix is right. Hermione doesn't have much longer. That much is obvious the second Pansy sees her.
It is almost an inky black down in the small, claustrophobic dungeon of the house. It was once a basement, for wizards to store their stuff and children to play in, but now it is nothing more than a jail cell, keeping its prisoner here as the days and the months and the years tick by.
It feels like a dungeon to Pansy. The stone walls, the rocky floor, the entire room having been made impenetrable to magic long, long ago.
Hermione lies where she always does, in the middle of a small, dirty mattress. It's the only piece of furniture in the room, and it barely even counts as that.
Hermione's ankles are clamped in iron shackles, as they always are, as if she still has the strength or the energy to try to escape if they were removed.
Pansy lifts the lantern she has brought down from upstairs and hangs it from the hook in the ceiling. A soft glow lights up Hermione's corner of the room, causing the girl to wince in pain, even the tiny light too much for her sensitive eyes.
She is barely more than a skeleton, the perfect definition of skin-and-bones. Her hair has thinned dramatically and what she does have now just hangs in clumps. In the light, her skin looks almost yellow. At least the parts that don't glow bright, sickly red from the cuts and curses Bellatrix likes to cast on her.
She is dying. Pansy can tell.
But she is still the most beautiful creature Pansy has ever seen.
Pansy creeps over to her, takes one of her pale, thin hands in hers. Hermione barely has the energy to squeeze Pansy's hand back.
"I'm glad you came." Hermione's voice is nothing more than a thin whisper, a hint of a voice that was once loud and powerful. "I don't have much time."
Pansy wants to argue with that, but she keeps quiet. They both know it's true.
"I was hoping for one last night with you," Hermione says, and she almost smiles.
Guilt fills Pansy's heart. There is no trace of bitterness or resentment left in Hermione's body. She has long since accepted her fate, long since understood that Pansy did what she had to do, that she had to pick the boy who would give her a future over the girl she had loved for years.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Pansy had cried when she had finally found her, after months of tracking Bellatrix after she had realized the Dark Lord's right-hand woman was hiding something from her master. "I didn't know!"
Hermione had begged her then, had pleaded with her.
"We can run away together!" she had begged as Pansy had shook her head no.
"But I love you!" Hermione had cried. "And I know you love me! Help me!"
But Pansy had made her choice, and Hermione had eventually accepted it, and now this was all they had. One last night together.
Pansy doesn't want to think about what will happen after this, what her life will be like once she doesn't have a secret to hold over Bellatrix's head.
You keep my secret and I'll keep yours.
But now isn't the time to think about it.
Instead Pansy smiles at the beautiful girl lying close to death on the mattress before her.
"You know I wouldn't let you do this alone," Pansy whispers, and Hermione manages to squeeze her hand almost tightly this time.
"I can just lie with you," Pansy says softly, but Hermione shakes her head.
"I want to feel you," she says, and Pansy nods, understanding perfectly as she feels something unexpected - tears welling up in her eyes.
Pansy hasn't cried in ten years, and she knows she can't start now. She shakes her head to clear out the moisture and instead leans down and presses her lips against Hermione's.
Hermione's lips have also grown thinner over the years, and now they are cold from being down in this dungeon, but they feel like home to Pansy.
Pansy takes her time, snogging her with all the emotion and feeling she can muster, using her right hand to trace her fingers up and down Hermione's face, trying to sear Hermione's features into her memory. She traces Hermione's eyebrows, threads her fingers through her hair and pushes the thin strands behind her ears, pulls back from their kiss and smoothes her fingers across Hermione's lips.
Then she starts moving, touching and nipping and kissing under Hermione's jawbone and down her neck and all around her tiny breasts.
Pansy wants to burn every detail of Hermione into her mind, but she also wants Hermione to forget all the pain and all the horror and all the torture she has endured from being Bellatrix's captive.
Pansy couldn't save her from her fate but maybe she can help her now.
Pansy takes one of Hermione's nipples into her mouth and sucks gingerly on it. Hermione arches her back, just slightly, pushing herself deeper into Pansy, and she sighs, an almost contented sigh.
Pansy keeps going, abandoning Hermione's breast and making her way farther south, her kisses and touches going over Hermione's stomach and around her belly button and down to her pelvis.
Finally, Pansy gets to where she needs to be, and she has to fight once more against an onslaught of tears.
She presses her nose between Hermione's legs, bumps Hermione's clit and listen as the other girl moans softly.
Pansy continues to take her time, using her fingers and her tongue to explore every fold and every crevice like she had never been here hundreds of times before.
Hermione shifts under her touch and makes soft whimpering noises. Pansy slides a finger into her and starts to move it.
"I love you," Pansy whispers into Hermione's sensitive flesh. She doesn't think Hermione can make out her words, but Hermione wiggles her hips, as though she wants to grind herself deeper into Pansy.
Pansy flashes back to the first time they had sex, sixth years hiding in the Room of Requirement, Hermione grinding herself against Pansy's face, her come spreading everywhere.
Now Pansy slides in a second finger and wraps her mouth around Hermione's clit. Hermione is wet, so very wet, and it takes Pansy a few moments to realize most of the wetness is from her own tears.
Somehow that realization makes Pansy cry harder. She pumps her fingers faster to make up for it, angles them in the way she knows Hermione likes, and keeps going until she feels Hermione's muscles clamp around her for what she knows will be the last time.
Pansy sobs harder and keeps her fingers moving until long after she feels Hermione still. Then she finally pulls her hand out of the other girl and climbs back up her pale, thin body.
Hermione's eyes are closed. She is barely breathing.
Pansy presses her lips against Hermione's one last time.
A hint of brown opens in the dark room, a tiny echo of sound fills her ears.
"Thank you."
Pansy collapses on Hermione's chest, her sobs echoing around the room.
By the time she looks up, Hermione is gone. Pansy knows even before she checks for breath.
The only person she has ever loved is gone. The choice she made so many years ago when she said yes to Draco feels like a regret she will never live down.
But there is nothing she can do about that now.
Pansy stands up, looks down on Hermione's body, studies her for what feels like hours, until she is sure she will never forget her image.
Then she turns around and heads back upstairs to find her clothes. Bellatrix will want to take care of the body, and Pansy can't take any more risks.
Her only chance in this dark world is her husband.
"I want you to be happy," Hermione had whispered to her once, a long time ago.
Pansy thinks maybe she still would want that for her, even if Pansy doesn't think that's possible.
But she has to try.
So Pansy slips the dark cloak back on and pulls the hood up over her head.
Hermione is gone. Draco is not.
Pansy doesn't have a choice. She Apparates back home.