you have never been in love
To anyone else, it might have been a terrifying sight. Once, a cozy but unremarkable little clearing atop a hill, now decorated with a brusque boulder and an ever-growing pile of atrocities. The grass had died around them in a little circle, as if unable to grow in such desecrated soil. Even the animals avoided this place, for more than one had died in attempt to explore the source of the change-her, of course.
To her, this was the most beautiful place in the world. It was the only place she could experience anything like peace and quiet, where she could sprawl across the boulder and just... relax.
It was here that she surveyed her little trophies-if He was not above them, then certainly neither should she be, though hers leaned toward the grotesque rather than the valuable. Her collection had, since her teenage years, expanded so that she could no longer set them out in neat little rows but instead amassed a sort of monolith; quite an impressive stack with the newest or best examples of her work occupying place of significance. When she had most recently arranged them, she had placed her favourite at the top: a bleached, unblemished human skull.
It had, long ago, belonged to the first person that Bellatrix Black had ever killed-a Muggle girl, her own age, who had happened upon her in the woods and teased her for her black robes and patent boots and funny stick. She had bellowed, “You dare speak that way to the pride of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black?” before she cast the curse. She had always regretted killing the girl so quickly; the filthy thing had been given no time to reflect upon her trespass. She had never made that mistake again.
Now, from her perch, she admired the play of the sunset across the texture of the bone. Muggles, she decided, were much prettier in death.