20th March 1957

She grabbed the gnome hard between her little soiled hands in an iron grip, digging her nails into its grubby flesh until dark blue blood began to trickle out of its body. She giggled faintly as it squealed with pain and fright, taking delight in its torment, and smiling as it writhed in her hand. She was about to drown it in the lake next to her when she heard her name being called faintly on the breeze.

"Bella! Bella!"

The young girl scowled darkly, realising her favourite game had been interrupted. She threw the gnome to the ground, breaking both its spindly legs with two sickening cracks as it hit a rock. She watched it writhe and moan by her feet for a second, enjoying her feeling of power over it, until finally turning away to look up at Black Manor about one hundred yards away from the edge of the small copse where she was standing.

6 years previously, Bella had been born in the huge castle. It was made of dark brick and had ivy creeping up its walls. It stood proudly; overlooking the many acres of land that surrounded it. It was a grand and impressive sight; the manor had two hundred rooms all wonderfully presented and kept in order by an army of house elves never seen nor heard. The house was one of the best in the wizarding world, fit for only the highest aristocratic order, thought Bella, mimicking her father. Even from her young age Bella was already proud of her family's pureblood status and convinced of her superiority over most other wizarding families. Her father had drummed their pureblood family motto into her head for as long as she could remember; "Toujours Pur" he often said, Always Pure, "Never forget that Bella". And she didn't. Her hatred for the impure scum of the wizarding world, the mudbloods and the half-bloods, was intense. They had dirtied their pure magical blood with that of some common muggle filth. For that they could never be forgiven. They disgusted Bella more than anything else and she grimaced at the thought of their presence in her world.

She heard her name being called again, this time looking up to see her mother, dark blue robes billowing out behind her, striding towards where she stood. Bella nervously looked down at her white moccasin which was covered in grass stains and thick with mud, then eyed her hands which were stained blue.

"Bellatrix Black, where on earth have you been this afternoon young lady!?" shouted her mother, "And my gosh! Look at yourself! It's straight in the bathtub with you!"

Bella scowled and stamped her foot until her mother yanked her forcibly by the arm dragging her back towards the house.

"I can't believe you've ruined your new moccasin robes Bella. The Malfoys are coming for dinner, do you really want to look like this in front of them?!"

Bella screamed loudly in protest at her mother but not one tear fell from her eyes. She had learnt in her own small way never to show that weakness because it meant being completely at someone else's mercy. Instead she looked angrily at her mother and her heavily pregnant stomach and longed to kick it hard.

"No mother!" She screeched, "I hate the Malfoys, their stupid baby Lucius doesn't stop crying! I don't care what I look like — "

Her mother promptly slapped her.

"Stop this obscene behaviour Bella, this instant! Do you want your father to see you like this?"

Bella's eyes opened wide. She gulped and shook her head allowing herself to be dragged back to the mansion, the dusk light dimming further, whilst half listening to her mother's mutterings.

"Don't know what has gotten into you… Always out in the wood doing Merlin knows what …not like any other young witch I've ever known…"

Bella sat stiffly in the bathtub whilst one of the maids washed her hair. The candlelight flickered in the luxurious bathroom picking out the beautiful panelled walls and flagstone floor. Her robes were hanging up to the left on one of the mahogany cupboards, Bella's favourite set, made out of silky dark green cloth embroidered with magical flowers on the hem of the sleeves. Her mother said they complemented her dark brown eyes and hair.

"There you go, all done now miss."

"Don't look at me!" Bella snapped, "help me with my robes."

"Yes miss, begging your pardon miss"

As three towels hovered around her, drying her, Bella heard the sound of her fathers voice as he greeted the Malfoys and beckoned them to the dining hall. One maid brushed Bella's hair with a comb that dried it magically whilst the other dressed her. It was a most annoying spectacle to the young girl who wished they would just leave her alone but she had promised her mother she would be good and didn't retaliate. She slipped on her shoes and walked out the bathroom door, followed by the two maids cooing about how pretty she looked, towards the mahogany stair case where she met her mother who was looking beautiful with her hair decorated in diamonds and sapphires. She held out a delicate pearl drop necklace in her hand and told Bella to turn around so she could put it on her and the same time clicking her fingers twice at the maids who immediately curtsied and disappeared behind a tapestry.

"Remember Bella," she said as they walked down the mahogany stair case, "always be polite, smile and answer their questions with courtesy. Your father does a lot of business with Mr Malfoy and it benefits this household greatly. Now put your shoulders back and walk proudly Bella" whispered her mother as they walked into the dining hall.

The Malfoys arose from their seats as they walked in, Bella saw their baby near the fire in her old cot. At least it wasn't crying. She looked up at the Malfoys from under her eyelashes smiling bemusedly as they greeted her mother then turned their sickeningly fake attentions on to her.

"My hasn't she grown since the last time we were here, she's going to be as beautiful as her mother" observed Mrs Malfoy smiling at Mrs Black. Bella gripped her fists together and forced herself to smile sweetly at the woman and her huge bosoms. She hated being treated like a doll and not being addressed directly. In truth, she looked nothing like her mother; Bella had a harder, more angular face and heavier eyes compared to her mother's petite features.

They all sat down around the long table and immediately steaming food appeared in the bowls, roast potatoes seasoned with herbs and spices, a sumptuous brown steak sliced in the middle of the table took pride of place on a real silver platter, with vegetables steaming around it. Firstly however their bowls filled with a golden creamy soup. Bella sipped it delicately while listening to the adults' conversation.

"I'm still having trouble with the ministry; they are convinced I was involved with Grindlewald. Someone must have tipped them off that I leant him money in the 30's," said Mr Malfoy in posh English drawl. "If I had known that he had no ideals, it would have been a different story. He was simply a mad wizard."

"He no sense of class or how things should be done properly. Simply killing Wizards regardless of there status or birth. He had no real aims." Bella's father continued and Bella thought she caught a glimpse of a sly glint in his eye.

"Shame though, he was a talented wizard, willing to do anything for power, we simply couldn't mould him into someone who could lead our world, cleansing it of impure filth, instead he simply tried to destroy anyone who didn't support him and his uncivilised ways." Answered Mr Malfoy. He was not in fact referring to Grindlewald's killings, but simply the way he had lived. Bella had come to the conclusion in her young mind that he could not have possibly been powerful enough as he had been beaten. Really, part of Grindlewald's downfall was that the dark wizard had simply not been powerful enough to secure fear in these wealthy, pureblood families.

"It did seem he went too insane in the end and met the champion commoner, Dumbledore. The rest I suppose is history; blew him apart didn't he, Dumbledore?" added Mrs Malfoy, timidly.

"Don't mention that man to me" interjected her mother softly, closing her eyes as if she had been slapped. "Hogwarts has become a shambles because of him. He lets all manner of filth into that school, worse than the previous, Armando Dippit. If it wasn't for the fact Durmstrang was in Bulgaria hundreds of miles away, I'd be sending Bella there." She looked at her husband as she said this with a slight hint of anger in her voice.

Bella's attention wavered as the conversation developed into the choice of wizarding schools. She had heard it all before in her parents' argument a few months ago. Personally Bella had wanted to go to Durmstrang, as she was someone who considered it a great injustice, to even have to share a room with anyone who had something like a squib in their ancestry, let alone having to encounter a fully walking, talking, breathing mudblood in the same building. Her father had thought it "necessary to the greater cause" to send her to Hogwarts, to which her mother had replied "what could possibly be a greater cause than not letting her mix with dirt and scum?" Her father had simply smiled icily and said that she was going to Hogwarts, and that her mother had better accept it, even if it was simply because Bella didn't know how to speak Bulgarian. Her mother knowing defeat, had swept from the room, luckily not uncovering Bella in her favourite hiding place inside the wall in the corridor, behind one of the panels.

Bored now with the meal and direction of conversation, she slumped in her chair. She was about to excuse herself and go and play with baby Lucius when her father shot her a warning glare indicating she could by no accounts leave the table yet. The six year old sighed and found herself staring at the cot by the roaring log fire. She imagined herself rocking it, backwards and forwards…backwards and forwards, slowly…getting faster and faster until it toppled…straight into the fire. She let out a shrill giggle which silenced the discussion on the best way to eliminate half-breeds and all four adults turned to face her, her parents with disapproving expressions etched on their faces.

"Are you feeling well Bella?" Asked her mother sternly.

She nodded quickly. "Errr yes just laughing about the one where you burn them, on a big, big bonfire," she made up, "with a smelly smell because they're burning."

"I don't believe we discussed that one…" whispered Mrs Malfoy to her husband. Her mother raised an eyebrow and delicately cut her potato while her father seemed to have a little smile on his lips, surveying his daughter with something that seemed like amusement. Bella simply scowled darkly at them all and wished like anything that this would be over soon.

"Speaking of half-breeds and Hogwarts," began Mr Malfoy, clearing his throat importantly, "there was one a few years ago, part giant I believe, who managed to set a monster on the school's mudbloods. It was all hushed up of course but as a governor of the school I managed to gain a bit of knowledge into the matter," he continued, eager to fill the silence but this news was nothing the Blacks hadn't heard before. They had other sources to which they could find out this information. They had benefited from Grindlewald's reign of terror, and, at this time, their family was central and pivotal to pure-blood society, and they were well informed of most events which happened in the wizarding world; much more so than that of the Ministry of Magic even, who were simply too prudish and not ruthless enough to gain more beneficial connections.

"The beast that was set upon the school was in fact from The Chamber of Secrets, left by Salazar Slytherin himself as a way to all the filth being brought into the school -"

"-as legend goes" interrupted Bella's mother

"Indeed," answered Mr Malfoy, a little peeved his story had been interrupted. He dearly loved to tell this to select pureblood families he dined with as he felt personally involved, carrying insider's information. So he continued:

"And it was in fact this that was responsible for killing the Mudblood girl." He gave a little chuckle, "not a freak accident as her scum parents were told."

It was now that Bella's father took over, in a way that was so eager it was like he'd found his cue to say something he had been desperate to for a long time.

"But in fact, my dear friends," he said knowingly with a smile "it was most definitely not the right monster that was caught -"

"- or the right person," suddenly came the voice of a young man who had just at that second appeared through the dining hall door. He was perhaps in his mid-twenties, extremely handsome, with high cheekbones and black hair, slightly long but waved and elegant. Bella was like all the others in the room at that moment, shocked at this sudden appearance, except perhaps her father who had steadied himself quickly upon the man's arrival. She felt almost struck dumb by the man and was left to staring at him, her mouth parted slightly as she surveyed his eyes which were so dark and harsh but eluded an overwhelming feeling of power. In fact his whole body did and even at her young age she could feel it and see the effect it had had on the adults. Bella felt herself almost entranced by him; his presence in the room made her body tingle all over and caused hairs to raise on her arms.

"You should really train your servants better, Black, the one that answered the door distinctly refused to let me in to see you." He said this politely, but his tone did not reach the menacing expression in his eyes.

Her father sighed. "And what have you done with my maid this time young sir?"

"She can be revived. I wouldn't let you suffer a greater inconveniency," he said in the same cool tone.

"But still, better if I informed them of your arrival next time, I understand?" answered her father with a slight smile and expression that plainly said that he wouldn't.

The man nodded curtly at him, and Bella's father stood up to announce this unexpected visitor to the table.

"May I introduce to you all, the true wizard who opened the Chamber of Secrets and the only living descendent of the great Salazar Slytherin himself; Tom Marvolo Riddle."