Chance Encounters || Bellatrix & Rodolphus || Early January, 1967
The woman wound her way through crowded street much like any of one of the shoppers out in the cold end of the afternoon. Diagon Alley was full of families spending their last few days together before their children would return to their schools. The atmosphere was pleasant nearly warm despite the harsh winter chill. It was too loud and full of potential recognition for the witch to be comfortable and she was glad when she reached the mouth of Diagon Alley's darker sister street. Those few who found their interests turning toward the dark shops lining the cobblestone street had little cause to laugh and chatter and any curious looks in her direction were carefully warded off by the hood of her dark fur lined cloak. She was glad for once of the natural cover that the cold weather afforded her wardrobe.
Although she was used to being recognized and honestly took no small amount of joy in the reputation that her name alone carried with it she found that some circumstances called careful discretion. Perusing shops known for their dark and unsavory wares was certainly one of those circumstances. Although she was sure that many of her acquaintances frequented the shops with less care to avoid detection she knew the scandal that might come with her face spotted among rows of poisons and knives. It might even warrant a headline in the gossip rags that so delighted in finding the 'dirty' secrets of the opulently rich. She could see the headline in her mind. Heiress Spotted Slumming the Streets in Search of Illicit Potions. Her mother would be despondent and her father would stand behind her with a slight twist of disappointment on his lips that would hurt worse than all of her mother's frantic reprimands.
Of course the best way to avoid such a scandal would have been to avoid the dark alley altogether but she had never been very good at containing urges. She'd first decided to make the trip some weeks earlier when she was in her father's study. She'd reached for an interesting looking statuette and he had sharply ordered her away from it. "That is not for you to touch Bellatrix, it's a curiosity I have been working on and I've not quite tamed the curse yet." A cursed object! and one she couldn't touch! It had not taken her long to remember the man who had visited just before the curiosity had arrived on her father's desk. She had overheard once that he worked at Borgin and Burkes and so her hungry mind had sent her off towards 13B Knockturn Alley. She told herself she was only going to look but she was already thinking of ways she could make the clerk tell her more about the nature of his delivery to her father. It drove her mad that he would not tell her when he was usually so open with her. What could be so forbidden that he would not teach her about it?
Her mind was so coiled up with frustration that she nearly missed spotting the familiar man on the other side of the street. He was a relation of her mother's not important enough to be invited to smaller family events but still quite capable of trying to gain favor with her mother through gifts of information. He was sure to ruin her entire trip if he spotted her especially if he felt the call to escort her home away from her goal. "Salazar,"she cursed under her breath when he started to glance in her direction and she ducked into the next door that she came to finding herself in a dim lit pub. It was unpleasantly crowded and it didn't take long for a man to jostle into her his eyes were bright with drink and he grinned at her with shocking familiarity despite being a stranger. "'Ello darlin' what's a pretty thing like you doin' 'ere? Looks like you could use some company," he reached for her and she sneered fiercely drawing herself up in a perfect display of well-bred Black posture her fingers already curling around the wand in her robe pocket. Fury at his manner of speaking to her began a fast boil in her chest. No one spoke to Bellatrix Black with disrespect. She would show him that. Unfamiliar as she was with such shady settings she hardly understood that a drawn wand could easily become a spark to a powder keg in a lawless pub so she was surprised when she felt a hand curl gentle but full of warning around her tensed arm. An angry curse flew to her lips before she tilted her head and found herself locking eyes with an unexpectedly familiar face.