A/N: This one-shot was inspired by Ella's (Bellamort500) amazing The Curse of Azkaban, which contained the phrase of the title. The whole story was very well written as always, but that specific line was so simple and sad I had to write something about it. This is the outcome. Please and enjoy and let me know what you think.

Disclaimer: You know how it goes, I don't own the thing, I don't make money, blah, blah, blah.

Well, since it's your story, La La, I should thank you first for this great opportunity and afterwords dedicate the piece to you, got being a strong, fabulous person and a precious friend. This is all for you :)

Lord Voldemort hurried towards the library of Malfoy Manor, all triumph for his loyal follower's reunion gone. The break-out had been excellently planned and executed, all 12 of his most important Death Eaters were out and about. Or at least out.

He had seen many horrifying things as a child in the slums of London and soon he had added a fair amount of nasty incidents himself, as he took immense pleasure observing pain and misery. But the condition in which these once brutal and merciless killers had come to be was... disturbing. Of course he had known that their health would have been compromised and their skills rusty. This... he had most definitely not been expecting this. Bones with pieces of flesh hanging loosely from them, gaunt faces, whining like they were little children. Lestrange was doing his best to speed up the healing, only he was in bad shape himself. It was a terrible waste of his time.

And Bellatrix. Bellatrix was a whole other story and a very annoying one at that. Quickly he pushed her in a back corner of his mind, concentrating solely on choosing a book to read. Malfoy was an idiot but the library contained many rare and old books that only his mind power could understand. He found himself in front of the two doors and pushed them open quietly not bothering to knock. If anyone was inside they would just have to leave right away.

Thankfully, the huge area was completely quiet. No Malfoys. And the fire had already been lit. Voldemort didn't exactly smile, but the left corner of his mouth was lifted a bit. That was as far as he could go. He raised his wand and "Prophetia te Prophetes" flew into his hand from a shelf. With the heavy leather in his one hand and the familiar yew in the other he walked closer to the fire, where a large throne-like armchair stood.

However someone was occupying it already. A skeletal body wearing a thin, precious silk nightgown and dead-looking hair down to its waist was curled up like a baby on it with a large green blanket wrapped around it.

If Voldemort hadn't known who it was, he wouldn't have identified the figure as Bellatrix, his lieutenant, within three guesses. Probably not even ten. The once breath-taking beauty who had preferred to become a warrior for the cause, his warrior, reminded him of a girl from the orphanage who had died, like so many others, of malnourishment and disease during the bitter cold English winter when he was a boy. She had covered most of her body, head included, with a filthy piece of cloth like a shroud and had stared at the ceiling until she had died. Bellatrix' eyes, with the magnificent midnight-blue irises were too staring at the fire, not really seeing.

Voldemort approached the woman a little more. She didn't seem to notice, just continued staring at the dancing flames. He wondered why she was there. Her health had been terrible right after the break-out so he had ordered her sister to look after her day and night. He would take care of her treatment personally if it came down to that, he had added silently. When Bellatrix had first seen him she had had a real respiratory reaction, struggling to draw breath and crying hysterically. The few other times he had visited her in her room she had tried to talk to him, he suspected he had heard the words "master", "I knew it" and "honor", but the fever didn't let her say anything more intelligible.

So now he looked at her, peaceful for the first time, with keen interest. And some horror. He couldn't take his mind away from the dying girl, the combination of puss and blood leaking from her mouth, the dark hungry circles under her eyes, the way she hang on to the filthy rag as if it would protect her from death. He had opened his mouth before he knew it.

"Bellatrix", he hissed.

The skull instantly turned up, the black pupil almost extinguishing the dark blue as realization hit the mind.

"Master!", she whispered. The hoarseness in her voice now had nothing to do with the hints of the one she had once possessed that had managed to unbutton even his own robes.

"I-I am very sorry-I-I just-". She looked around in panic and tried to uncurl herself, but Voldemort raised his hand.

"Remain where you are", he said coolly. "You cannot stand."

His statement seemed to have both embarrassed and relieved her. It would be fun to watch her explain that reaction, but he doubted she was in a state of participating in such "difficult" conversation. So he went for the easy question.

"It is very late. What are you doing here?"

She watched him with fear and fascination in her eyes as he towered over her and when he uttered these words she curled up even tighter.

"Master I-I didn't mean to take your seat, I-"

"Then why did you come here?", he asked in the same steady tone.

She gave him a pleading look, as if she was begging him to punish her without hearing the actual word.

"Nightmares", he stated coolly, no empathy colouring his voice, but no mocking either.

Bellatrix' grey cheekbones turned a bit pink and she averted his fiery gaze.

"I thought the fire would help", she muttered to her lap.

"Did it?"

She opened her mouth with her head lolling at the side.

"Yes, a bit, master".

He pondered the two options in his mind for a while: he could send her to her room where she would probably stay awake all night and then collapse from over-exhaustion in a couple of days or let her stay there while he studied risking getting annoyed by her.

"Then you should stay here" he reached his decision. How annoying could she become? She could barely keep her head up.

"Thank you, my lord", she whispered and her eyes widened again as he twirled his wand elegantly and a second, even bigger, armchair appeared quite far from her. Most likely she hadn't been expecting him to stay with her and indeed a second later a small smile lit her face. He did not comment and they lapsed into silence broken only by the crackling of the fire and the turning pages.

"Master", the hoarse voice came from somewhere at the left. Lord Voldemort blinked. He had forgotten Bellatrix' presence. His first thought was to ignore her, only she wouldn't dare distract him for just anything. Perhaps something was wrong. Memorizing the page and line he had stopped reading, he looked at her.

Bellatrix' eyes, that had been making her look dead three hours ago were now filled with fear.

"What is it, Bella?"

"Master, am I mad?", she asked softy.

This took him by surprise. It wasn't a question he expected her to be asking, and, oddly, he felt he wasn't the ideal person to direct it to. He was a sociopath, he could never judge these things unbiased, but something told him that even asking him that question confirmed the answer.

"Yes", he told her simply.

"Have I- have I always been mad? I can't remember much before Azkaban".

He breathed with a hiss of annoyance. She was a sadistic psychopath since birth, he had seen it in her eyes when she had been a toddler and he had been invited to her house by her parents, his old classmates. That, along with her outstanding intellect and impressive magical power had been the reason he had handpicked her to recruit and train her. And fuck her.

Alarmingly he couldn't remember much before his rebirth either, like he couldn't remember the pain from the day that bombshell had found his shoulder during the Blitz and it had to be taken out with no anesthetic by a drunk barber. Still, he could sense the difference in the types of madness.

"Not in a bad way".

A/N: Thanx for reading :)

The book title is Ancient Greek and means "Prophecy and Prophets".

It's true, poor people like Tom Riddle couldn't afford a surgeon back in the day, so barbers had to do minor (or major) procedures. Awesome times to live.