Chapter 1: Blood and Bone Awakening
The dark arch swallowed her whole. The last thing Hel saw was the cold faces of the Order watching her fall, robes billowing, wands still raised as if they expected her to beg. She would not give them that satisfaction. She fell with her teeth clenched and her emerald eyes wide, and then the Veil closed around her like a fist.
Weight. Pressure. A tearing sensation that ripped through every nerve ending at once, as if her soul were being pulled through a keyhole. Then nothing. Just falling, endless falling through a darkness that had no bottom.
She struck stone with a crack that jarred her teeth. Marble. Cold and unforgiving beneath her spine. Air exploded from her lungs and she lay there, gasping, her body screaming in a hundred different languages of pain. Then the real agony began.
Her bones started to shift.
It was not the familiar pull of her animagus transformation, not the fluid change she had mastered at fourteen. This was violence. Her spine arched off the slab as her vertebrae ground against each other, her fingers contorting into claws she could not control. Fur rippled across her skin only to recede a heartbeat later, leaving her bare and bleeding. She could smell her own flesh tearing, could hear the wet sound of muscle and tendon realigning.
Hel screamed.
The sound bounced off the curved walls and came back at her, multiplied, distorted. She could not see where she was. Her eyes were burning, shifting between human and feline, the world blurring between shades of grey and a thousand scents she had never noticed before. Dust. Damp stone. Moss. Somewhere above, birdsong filtered through a cracked dome of glass, and she could hear the individual notes as if they were being played directly into her ears.
Her bones cracked again. This time her pelvis shifted, and she bit through her own lip to keep from screaming. Copper flooded her tongue. She tasted herself, tasted the blood dripping down her chin and the sweat slicking her skin, and somewhere beneath the pain she felt something else. A warmth. A deep, resonant heat rising from her core like a second heartbeat.
The Veil had changed her. She could feel it knitting her back together, not into what she had been, but into something new.
She slid off the marble slab and hit the cold floor with her hands and knees. Her body twitched, feline and human by turns, her black curls plastered to her face, her bare skin covered in a sheen of sweat and blood. She was naked. Her robes had not survived. She could feel every sliver of stone biting into her palms, every draft of air moving across her damp skin.
"Jesus Christ."
The voice came from somewhere to her left. Hoarse, disbelieving, with a rough edge she recognised. She forced her head up through the fog of agony.
Rabastan Lestrange stood in the shadows at the edge of the chamber, one hand braced against the marble wall, breathing hard. He was not the same man she remembered. The prison pallor was gone, replaced by sun-bronzed skin. His shoulders were broader, his jaw sharper, his form filled out with a lean, lethal muscle that strained the seams of his worn shirt. He looked like he had been carved from the same stone as the mausoleum, all hard edges and cold grey eyes.
He was staring at her like she was a ghost.
"Potter," he breathed. The word came out ragged, almost reverent. "You're alive."
She tried to answer and only managed a wet gasp. Her throat was raw from screaming, her ribs bruised from the change. She pushed herself up onto her elbows and felt something shift inside her, something vast and hungry and ancient. The warmth in her core flared, and she saw Rabastan's nostrils flare as if he had caught a scent.
He crossed the distance in three long strides and dropped to his knees beside her. His hands were on her skin before she could react, large and warm, moving over her arms and shoulders with a frantic urgency. He was checking for wounds, for breaks, and she should have shoved him away. Should have snarled and bit and clawed. She had spent the war trying to kill men like him, and he had spent it trying to kill her. But her body was shaking too hard, her mind still reeling from the changes rippling through her.
"Easy," he murmured. His fingers traced the curve of her shoulder, the dip of her collarbone. "Easy, you're safe. Whatever that thing did to you, it's done now."
His hands slid lower, skimming her ribs, her waist, the swell of her hips. She could feel the heat of his palms through her damp skin, feel the calluses on his fingers catching against her flesh. His touch was possessive, almost reverent, and she was too exhausted to do anything but gasp.
"Lestrange." Her voice came out cracked and thin. "Where are we?"
He opened his mouth to answer, and then a shadow moved in the corner of the chamber.
Dolohov stepped out of the darkness like he had been born from it. He was stripped to the waist, his shirt discarded somewhere in the gloom, his chest bare and gleaming with a thin sheen of sweat. Dark tattoos spiraled up his forearms in patterns she had never seen before, fresh ink on pale skin, and he was tracing them with his fingers as if he could not believe they were real.
He was different too. The gaunt, hollow-eyed Death Eater she remembered from the war had been replaced by a man in his prime, lean and predatory, with pale blue eyes that had gone dark and hungry. His gaze swept over her body with an intensity that made her skin prickle.
"Well," he said softly. His voice had a rough Russian cadence, low and dangerous. "It seems the Veil was not so eager to claim us after all."
Rabastan's hand tightened on Hel's hip. "Dolohov. She's injured."
"She's naked," Dolohov said. He was not looking at her face. "And alive. Both are improvements over our last moments in that courtroom."
Hel tried to push herself up and her arm buckled. Rabastan caught her before she hit the floor, pulling her against his chest, and she felt the heat of him sear through her skin. So warm. So solid. She wanted to lean into it and hated herself for the impulse.
"Get off me," she managed.
"Soon," Rabastan said. His hand was in her hair now, gentle despite its size, smoothing the damp curls back from her face. "Once you can stand. What happened to you, Potter? When you went through, I thought..."
"I thought we were dead," Dolohov finished. He was moving closer now, barefoot and silent. The tattoos on his forearms seemed to shift as he flexed his hands. "The Veil of Death. We all knew what it was. Winged through it expecting silence. Instead I wake up in this place with a headache and skin covered in ink, feeling like I've slept a century."
His eyes dropped to Hel's body again, and the hunger there made something coil low in her belly. She could feel it stirring, that warmth, that strange new sensitivity. Her nipples had hardened in the cold air, and Dolohov noticed. He noticed everything.
"I'm fine," she said. The lie tasted flat. She was shaking so hard her teeth were chattering, and every breath made her ribs ache.
"You're not," Rabastan said. He tilted her chin up, forcing her to meet his eyes. They were no longer cold. They were hot, fierce, burning with something she could not name. "You changed. I saw it. You were glowing, Potter. Light pouring out of you like you were made of it. Then you fell and your bones started moving, and I thought I was watching you die."
"Did you catch me?" she asked.
His mouth curved, almost a smile. "Would have, if I'd been quicker. That slab was unforgiving."
Dolohov crouched beside them, close enough that she could smell him. Smoke and leather and something sharp, like ozone after a storm. He reached out and brushed a strand of hair from her cheek, his fingers lingering against her skin.
"What did it do to you?" he asked softly. There was no mockery in his voice, only a dark, clinical curiosity. "You're different. I can smell it on you."
The warmth in her core surged at his touch, and Hel sucked in a sharp breath. Her body was betraying her. Every nerve ending was standing at attention, hyperaware of the two men bracketing her, of their heat and their scent and the weight of their hands on her skin. She had never felt anything like it. It was like being drunk, like having her senses peeled open to the raw world.
"I don't know," she admitted. "Everything's... louder. I can hear things. Smell things. And there's something in my chest. Like a fire."
"Good." Dolohov's thumb traced along her jaw, and she could not help the shiver that ran through her. "Fire is useful. Better than being fragile. This world is strange. I can feel magic in it, but it's not the same. Not like back home."
"There's no home anymore," Rabastan said flatly. "That world judged us. Executed us. And Potter, the girl who fought for them, they threw her through with us like she was the same as the rest of the dead."
Hel flinched. He was not wrong. She had been sentenced alongside them, her name read off the same list of horrors, and not one of the Order had spoken in her defense. They had stood silent and watched her fall.
"They didn't want me," she said quietly. "They used me. I was a weapon to them. That's all I ever was."
Rabastan's hand tightened in her hair. "You're not a weapon anymore. You're something else now. Something new."
Dolohov laughed, a low sound that vibrated through his chest. "New. Yes. I think we are all new now." He flexed his hand, and a spark of flame flickered along his fingertips before dying. "The Veil gave us gifts. I can feel it. This world will not know what hit it."
Hel pushed against Rabastan's chest, and this time he let her go. She wobbled to her feet, unsteady but standing, her bare skin pebbled with goosebumps in the cold air. The mausoleum stretched above her, its cracked dome letting in beams of dusty light. Tombstones lined the walls, weathered and ancient, and the floor was thick with centuries of dust.
"Where are the others?" she asked.
Rabastan rose smoothly, his body moving like a predator's. "Scattered. I woke up alone. Dolohov found me an hour ago. We've been looking for you, or anyone else."
"The Veil must have pushed us through at different points," Dolohov said. He was still watching her like she was a puzzle he wanted to solve. "We need to find the rest. Rodolphus. Mulciber. Travers. If they woke up anywhere near this place, there will be bodies in the morning."
"Then let's go," Hel said. She took a step and stumbled, her knees buckling. Rabastan caught her arm, steadying her, and she hated how good it felt. How safe.
"You can't walk like that," he said. "You're barely standing."
"I'm fine." She tried to pull away and swayed instead.
Dolohov moved behind her, his chest pressing against her back, his hands closing over her bare shoulders. The contact sent a jolt of heat through her that made her gasp.
"You'll be fine," he murmured against her ear. "We'll find you something to wear. And then we'll find the others. But first, I think we need to talk about what happened to you, malyshka. Because whatever that Veil did to you, I want to understand it."
His fingers trailed down her arms, tracing patterns on her skin, and Hel felt the warmth in her core surge again. It was getting harder to think. Harder to remember why she should be fighting them, why she should be afraid.
Rabastan moved.
It was unhurried, deliberate, the way a big cat stalks. He closed the space until his chest brushed hers, until she could feel the heat rolling off him in waves, until there was barely a breath between her lips and his. Dolohov pressed in behind her, hard and solid, and her body was caught between two walls of muscle.
"Rabastan," she said, and her voice came out thinner than she meant it to.
His hands found her waist. Big hands, warm, spanning the curve of her hips like he was measuring her. His thumbs traced circles on her skin, slow and patient, and she felt the warmth in her core surge until it was almost unbearable. Her nipples brushed his chest through the thin fabric of his torn shirt, and she could not help the small sound that escaped her throat.
"Shh," he murmured. "Easy. We're not going to hurt you."
Dolohov laughed against her ear. "Speak for yourself."
His hands slid down her arms, gripping her wrists and drawing them back, spreading her open against him. She felt every ridge of his chest, every flex of his abdominal muscles as he adjusted his stance. Something hard pressed against the small of her back, and her breath caught.
"You feel that?" Dolohov asked. His mouth was on her neck now, hot and wet. "That's what you do to us, Potter. You always did. Even when you were nothing but a scrawny little girl with a wand, we wanted you. And now you're... this."
She should have been afraid. She should have been fighting, clawing, snarling. But her body was betraying her, melting into their heat, her hips tilting forward without permission. The warmth in her core had become a hunger, sharp and aching, and it was making her knees weak.
"What did the Veil do to me?" she breathed.
Rabastan's hands slid up her sides, thumbs brushing the underside of her breasts. "I don't know. But I can smell it on you. Something sweet. Something that wasn't there before."
"It's in the air," Dolohov said against her ear. "I can taste it. Can you, Rabastan?"
"Yes." Rabastan leaned in, his nose brushing her jaw. "Like honey and smoke. Like summer.
"You're trembling." His fingers tightened on her waist. "What are you feeling, Potter? Tell me."
She could barely form words. The hunger was expanding, filling her chest, pooling low in her belly. Her thighs pressed together and found nothing to ease the ache.
"I'm... warm," she managed. "On fire. Everywhere."
Dolohov's hands came around her hips, fingers splaying across her belly. "Show me where."
His touch was too much. She arched into it, her head falling back against his shoulder, and her mouth fell open on a gasp. Rabastan watched her with dark, hungry eyes, and she saw him swallow hard.
"She's responding," he said. "Like a drug."
"It's not a drug." Dolohov's hand slid lower, brushing the curls at the apex of her thighs. "It's need. She needs to be touched. Filled. I can feel it radiating off her."
Hel wanted to deny it. Wanted to shove them both away and run. But when Dolohov's fingers parted her folds, found her slick and aching, she cried out instead.
"So wet," he murmured. "Already. Just from being between us."
Rabastan's hands came up to cup her face, tilting her head back. His gaze was fierce, almost violent in its intensity.
"Look at me," he said. "I want to see your eyes when you come apart."
"I haven't..." She could barely breathe. "I've never..."
"Never what?" Dolohov's finger circled her clit, slow and teasing.
"Never been touched." The words came out on a broken sob. "I was a weapon. They made sure I was pure. A virgin. They said it made my magic stronger."
Both men went still.
"Pure," Rabastan repeated. His voice was flat, dangerous. "They weaponized your innocence. Kept you untouched so you would burn brighter for their cause."
"Yes." She was shaking now, hating how small she sounded. "Dumbledore. The Order. They gave me potions, spells. I didn't understand until later. They were keeping me... fresh."
Dolohov's finger moved again, slower, more deliberate. "And now? Who do you belong to now, Potter? Them or us?"
The hunger was overwhelming. She was dripping onto his fingers, her hips rolling against his hand, and she could not stop herself. "No one. I belong to no one."
"No," Rabastan agreed. His thumb traced her lower lip, pulling it down just slightly. "But you will."
Dolohov's finger slid inside her, and Hel's whole body seized. A sound tore out of her throat, something between a gasp and a cry, and her hips bucked against his hand. She was so tight, so slick, and the sensation of being filled even that much sent stars bursting across her vision.
"There she is," Dolohov murmured against her neck. "Look at her, Rabastan. So responsive. So hungry."
Rabastan's hand fisted in her hair, tilting her head back further. His mouth descended on hers, hard and demanding, and she tasted him like smoke and wine. His tongue swept into her mouth, claiming, devouring, and she found herself kissing him back, her hands rising to grip his shoulders.
Dolohov worked a second finger into her, stretching her slowly, and she whimpered into Rabastan's mouth. The heat was unbearable now, a furnace in her core that had spread to every nerve ending. She could feel her own slickness coating Dolohov's fingers, could feel the rhythmic clench of her body trying to pull him deeper.
"She's dripping," Dolohov said, breaking away from her neck. "I can smell her, Rabastan. Sweet and hot. Like she's been waiting for us."
Rabastan broke the kiss, his breath ragged against her lips. "She has been. All her life, she's been waiting."
"No." Hel tried to shake her head, but Rabastan's grip held her still. "I don't... this isn't..."
"You don't what?" Dolohov's fingers curled inside her, stroking a spot that made her knees buckle. "You don't want this? Tell me to stop, Potter. Say the word."
She could not say it. Her body was screaming for more, her hips grinding against his hand, her nails digging into Rabastan's shoulders. The hunger had become a living thing, twisting and coiling in her belly, demanding to be fed.
"I can't," she gasped. "I don't know how to make it stop."
"You don't." Rabastan's mouth moved down her throat, teeth scraping her pulse point. "You let it take you. You let us take you. And then the fire inside you will learn what it's for."
Dolohov withdrew his fingers, and she cried out at the loss. But before she could mourn it, he was lifting her, turning her, pressing her back against the cold marble of the slab she had fallen on. The stone bit into her spine, but the shock of it only made her more aware of the heat between her thighs.
"Spread your legs," Dolohov said. It was not a request.
She should have refused. Should have clawed his eyes out and run into the darkness. But her body moved on its own, her thighs falling open, her hands gripping the edges of the marble slab.
Rabastan was there, his hands on her knees, pushing them wider apart. He knelt between her legs, his eyes fixed on her exposed flesh, and she saw his tongue wet his lips. The hunger in his gaze was unmistakable now, raw and primal.
"Beautiful," he breathed. "You're perfect, Potter. Every inch of you."
He lowered his head, and the first touch of his tongue against her clit made her arch off the slab. A hoarse cry tore from her throat, echoing off the stone walls, and she felt Dolohov's hands close over her breasts, his thumbs circling her hardened nipples.
"Taste her," Dolohov said. "Feed her. She needs it."
Rabastan's tongue lapped at her, broad and flat, then focused on her clit with a precision that made her see stars. He groaned against her flesh, the vibration sending shockwaves through her, and she felt her hips rolling against his mouth without permission.
"She's sweet," Rabastan said, pulling back just enough to speak. "Honey and fire. I could eat her for days."
"Don't." Hel's voice came out broken, desperate. "Don't stop."
Rabastan's laugh vibrated against her thigh. "As you wish."
He dove back in, his tongue spearing into her, and she cried out. His fingers joined his mouth, two of them sliding into her, pumping in rhythm with his tongue. She was so full, so stretched, and still she wanted more.
Dolohov's mouth found her nipple, drawing it between his teeth, and the twin sensations sent her spiraling. She could feel something building, coiling tight in her core, and she knew she was going to break.
"Please," she gasped. "Please, I'm going to..."
"Come for us," Rabastan said against her. "Let go, Potter. Let us taste you."
The orgasm slammed into her like a wall of fire. Her back bowed off the slab, her scream raw and primal, and she felt herself clenching around Rabastan's fingers as wave after wave of pleasure crashed through her. The warmth in her core exploded, flooding her veins with liquid heat, and she saw white.
Rabastan drank her, lapping at her soaked flesh until she was twitching and oversensitive. Only then did he rise, his mouth wet with her, his grey eyes burning in the dim light.
"More," he said. It was not a question.
Dolohov's hands were on his belt, unbuckling it with quick, efficient movements. His trousers fell, and his cock sprang free, thick and hard, the head glistening. Hel stared at it, this thing she had never seen before, never touched, never taken into her body. The fear should have been overwhelming.
Instead, the hunger surged.
"Let me taste you," she said, and the words surprised her as much as them.
Dolohov's eyes went dark with surprise, then savage satisfaction. "Come here then, malyshka. Open that pretty mouth."
She slid off the slab, her legs shaky, and dropped to her knees on the cold marble. The stone bit into her skin, but she did not care. She reached for him, both hands wrapping around the base of his cock, and she was struck by the heat of him. He was like a brand against her palms, thick and pulsing.
"Show me," she breathed. "Teach me."
Dolohov's hand fisted in her hair, not hard, but possessive. "Open wide. Take me to the back of your throat. Don't bite."
She opened her mouth and leaned forward. The head of his cock pressed against her lips, and she tasted him, salt and skin and something darker. She took him in, inch by inch, her tongue flattening against the underside, her jaw stretching to accommodate him.
"That's it," he groaned. "That's it, Potter. Suck me."
She did not know what she was doing. She only knew the taste of him, the weight of him on her tongue, and the desperate need to please. She bobbed her head, taking him deeper, and when he hit the back of her throat she gagged.
"Easy," he said, his hand tightening in her hair. "Breathe through your nose. Relax your throat."
She tried. She breathed through her nose, focused on relaxing, and took him again. This time he slid deeper, and she felt her throat open around him. The sensation was strange, invasive, and yet the hunger in her core flared brighter.
"Fuck," Dolohov breathed. "She's a natural."
Rabastan moved behind her, his hands settling on her hips. She felt the heat of his body, the brush of his cock against her ass, and she understood what he wanted before he spoke.
"I'm going to take you from behind, Potter," he said. "While you're on your knees for him. Do you want that?"
She pulled off Dolohov's cock with a wet pop, her lips swollen and slick. "Yes."
It was the only word she could manage. The hunger was consuming her now, making her mind blank, making her body a vessel for nothing but need.
Rabastan entered her with one hard thrust, and she screamed around Dolohov's cock as Rabastan shoved back in. The stretch was blinding, her body so tight around him that she felt every inch. He was bigger than his fingers, so much bigger, and she clawed at Dolohov's thighs as pleasure and pain twisted together.
"Look at that," Rabastan growled. "She's so tight. So perfect. Like she was made for this."
He pulled out and thrust back in, and Hel's vision blurred. Dolohov's hands guided her head, setting a rhythm that matched Rabastan's strokes, and she was caught between them, filled at both ends, her body a conduit for sensation.
"Fuck," she moaned, the word muffled by flesh. "Fuck, yes."
Rabastan's hand came around her, fingers finding her clit, and she shattered again. Her orgasm ripped through her, her body convulsing, her mouth locked around Dolohov as he groaned and spilled down her throat, hot and salty. She swallowed, drinking him, and the warmth in her core roared like a furnace.
Rabastan kept thrusting through her climax, his rhythm becoming desperate, jagged. He slammed into her, buried himself to the hilt, and came with a roar that echoed off the stone walls. She felt him emptying into her, felt the heat of him flooding her, and something inside her bloomed.
When he pulled out, she collapsed forward, her hands hitting the cold marble. She was shaking, covered in sweat and seed, her body singing with a pleasure she had never known.
"That was..." she started, but she could not finish.
"That was the beginning," Dolohov said. He was tucking himself away, but his eyes were still hungry. "You feed on this, Potter. I can feel it. The Veil gave you hunger, and we are going to feed it."
A sound came from the shadows. Footsteps, slow and deliberate, crunching on the ancient dust.
Hel's body tensed, and she twisted around. Rabastan was already rising, turning toward the sound. Dolohov's hand moved to his waist, where a knife gleamed in the dusty light.
But the figure that emerged from the shadows was familiar. Tall and lean, dark hair streaked with silver, wearing a torn suit jacket and a furrowed brow.
Rodolphus.
He stopped, his eyes sweeping over the scene, over his brother's bare chest and Dolohov's satisfied expression, over Hel on her knees, naked and glistening. Something flickered in his gaze, dark and possessive.
"Well," he said, his voice low. "Isn't this a welcome sight."