"So how long are you here for," Rabastan asked Lyra as he reached for another wedge of bread.
"Maybe a few weeks," Lyra replied, shrugging.
Bellatrix's eyes narrowed. "I think not! We just got you back. You aren't going anywhere."
"The hell I'm not," Lyra shot back, turning a surprised look on her mother that quickly turned into a glare. "I have a life back in Australia. I can't just leave that because you suddenly want to be my parents!"
Her words felt like a slap in the face, which only angered Bellatrix and caused her to glare right back. Rod spoke before she could come up with a properly terrifying threat.
"Brattiness at your age isn't appealing, just in case you were wondering," he told Lyra calmly. "You are our child, and the heir of house Lestrange at this point. You will remain here to learn what that means and get to know all of your family. For example, you still have Grandparents to meet on both sides. Australia is not your true home. You are home now."
Glad that Rod had taken the girl in hand, Bellatrix nodded her support. Where she'd allowed Lyra to make her angry, Rodolphus had remained calm, yet firm, leaving the girl no room to argue.
"Australia is my home now, thanks to you," Lyra shot back. Apparently, she was good at finding room to argue.
"WAS," Rodolphus corrected firmly. "It was your home, and you may visit frequently, but your home is here now." He matched glare for glare with his daughter for over five seconds before Lyra mutinously looked away.
Rodolphus sighed, gaze softening as he reached to touch her shoulder. "We just want to catch up on all we've missed, and we would like you to have the opportunity to do the same. You may like us if you get to know us."
"I'm sure I probably will," Lyra said. When Rabastan snickered, she grinned. Her look of amusement was short lived, however, as a resentful frown soon took its place. "It's just that you can't expect me to forget about my life back in Australia," she insisted.
"Actually, we can," Bellatrix snapped.
"We don't expect you to forget anything," Rodolphus said reasonably. "We just expect you to move forward. What were you doing in Australia that was so important anyway?"
"I have a job working security for my man's family's business. I work with him. They allowed me the time off to come here and get to know you all."
That was when Rodolphus finally lost his cool. "YOUR MAN?" he roared. "WHO IS HE, BECAUSE HE'S ABOUT TO BE DEAD!"
Kreacher cackled gleefully, leaning forward in his chair as if he were being personally entertained by a fine troop of actors.
"Oh, and that's really going to warm my heart toward you," Lyra shot back angrily. "I know and love my man which is more than I can say for either of you! What everyone says about you is true! You're both crazy." The venom in her tone matched the look she shot at Bellatrix and Rodolphus.
Hearing those words from her own daughter served to both enrage and hurt Bellatrix, but Rodolphus only smiled. "Good. I am glad we understand one another, then."
Lyra blinked, confused. "What?"
Rodolphus chuckled. "We're crazy, and you're a brat. Didn't you ever hear that it does no good to argue with someone who is crazy," he asked.
"Wow," Lyra grumbled under her breath as she reached for another wedge of bread and dipped it into her stew. Peering over it at Rod she added cautiously, "You aren't really going to try to kill my man, are you? That's just psycho."
"Have you slept with him yet," Rodolphus asked conversationally, and Lyra's brows shot up. "No!"
Rodolphus nodded. "Good. Then he lives for now."
"We have had some extremely heavy makeouts though," Lyra clarified with a tiny grin as she turned her attention deliberately back to her stew.
"Don't push your luck with too many details," Rodolphus warned.
"What's this bloke of yours like anyway," Rabastan asked. "He'd better be special. I can't have just anyone having heavy makeouts with my niece."
Lyra smiled at her uncle. "He's very nice, and he's smart and funny, and I like the way he looks at things, you know?"
Bellatrix found herself nodding. She liked the way Rod looked at things as well. The way his mind worked was hot. "Perhaps if you're good, we can have him to visit, and we'll see for ourselves," she said.
"Gee, thanks," Lyra drawled. "If you promise not to kill him."
"Probably we won't kill him," Rodolphus said, grinning at his daughter.
One of the elves came in then to clear away all the empty dishes, and another followed with a fluffy looking orange and white pumpkin cream cake for dessert. It was small and pumpkin shaped with a stem made of nuts and frosting. It stood in the center of a large crystal platter that was covered in facets that sparkled and caused the cake to appear to sparkle as well. Bellatrix watched Lyra studying the effect appreciatively. Catching her mother looking, Lyra smiled.
"I like pumpkins," she said, and Bellatrix chuckled at the incongruity of the normal moment in the midst of such an otherwise strange conversation. Strange was normal when it came to the family of Lestrange, though, and Lyra seemed to be fitting in better than she had expected.
As the elf sliced the cake and served everyone, Lyra looked on eagerly. "It's so pretty," she told him, and he bowed and smiled in appreciation before leaving the room.
"Kreacher can do better, but it will do," Kreacher said, watching the elf depart with a slight frown. "Kreacher thinks Piper could've added more nuts to the edges."
"I'm sure it's wonderful," Lyra said and Kreacher gave a slight nod, though his expression was skeptical. Bellatrix assumed he'd lost some of his precision in the kitchen when becoming a vampire made him unable to enjoy the taste or even the smell of food. Having to leave his culinary art to be carried out by those he believed to be lesser elves must gall. Then again, Kreacher believed any elf who wasn't him to be lesser.
"So you work security," Rabastan asked Lyra curiously as he lifted a forkful of pumpkin cake to his mouth. "You must have some sharp defense skills."
"I believe so," Lyra said with a slight smirk. "My aunt and uncle said they've never seen anything like it. Later when I began my formal education, my professors agreed. I couldn't really get much training in school for my specialty. There was a telepath who showed me a few things, but most of it I discovered on my own. I'm not sure if it has a technical term, but I call it Mind Ripping."
"Yours or someone else's," Bellatrix asked, smiling in amused interest.
"Oh, definitely other people's," Lyra said. "A little gives them a very unpleasant headache, and a lot makes them utterly useless forever. A telepath would see no thoughts at all anymore if they looked into the mind of someone I ripped all the way."
"How do you know that," Rabastan asked. Lyra had the unwavering attention of everyone at the table.
"Because someone broke into our house when I was sixteen. My aunt and uncle were away for the weekend, and I was looking after my sister... Cousin, hell, whatever Lillian is." She frowned in annoyance, then continued with her story. "He was climbing in through the window and had a nasty curse ready to knock me out with. I let loose, and he just stopped moving and stared into space. I called for the Aurors and told them what had happened. They brought in the telepath my school hired to try to train me, and he said the burglar had no mind left. Like he was an empty shell, but his mind looked torn. That made sense to me because it's how I think of what I do... Just reaching with my mind and will into theirs and...ripping."
"Well, that's pretty," Rabastan said. From the appreciative look on his face, Bellatrix could see that he was being entirely sincere. He smiled at Lyra, who blushed. "My niece is a total badass," he announced, and she laughed. "I'm glad you approve."
"We all do," Bellatrix said and Rodolphus nodded. "It's faster and far more efficient than what we did to the Longbottoms," Bellatrix concluded. "Probably less fun, but still...sometimes it's about being expedient, I suppose."
"Oh, it was still fun," Lyra assured with a grin. "Like that satisfying feeling you get from tearing paper."
"You're already doing the family proud with such an unusual and dangerous ability," Rodolphus said, giving Lyra a pleased smile. Lyra frowned. Somehow she didn't seem as warmed by her father's praise as she was by her uncle's.
"Am I supposed to be pleased that you approve," she asked and his expression slipped.
"Well, that would be nice," he drawled.
"What you don't understand is that forcing me to be here isn't going to make me want to be," she told him.
He grinned. "I have confidence in your ability to adjust."
Lyra glared, and Bellatrix sighed, giving her daughter a pleading look and suddenly feeling tired. "Please, Lyra. We didn't want to leave you. We did it for your own protection. I don't know how to make you understand that if you insist on not caring."
Lyra shook her head in disbelief. "But you still did! You left me and... Do you know how heartbroken I was?
I had nightmares for years after! Until I was seven or eight, I would wake up crying as though my world had just shattered, and I didn't know why!"
"But leaving us now won't fix that," Rabastan told her gently. Bellatrix felt her heart twisting in hurt and frustration as she looked into her daughter's beautiful and unrelenting face.
"Were you even there when I was a baby," Lyra asked Rabastan.
He nodded and grinned. "Yeah...I looked after you some, but your parents wanted you most of the time so I didn't get much of a chance. They knew we would have to leave, and they wanted all the time with you they could have."
"I can only say that parents are a precious treasure," Regulus said. "As children are as well. I had parents that loved me very much, and now both of them are dead. I miss them every day, and even now, on those particularly difficult days, I find myself wishing they were still here to look after things." He gave Lyra a sad smile. "You were blessed with two sets of parents. I think that makes you a very lucky, loved, and protected young woman, and you should allow yourself to enjoy that."
At least Lyra was polite enough not to lash out at Regulus. Instead she asked, "Did Voldemort get to your parents?"
Regulus nodded. "Yes. My father most definitely, and probably my mother as well, but since she died after Voldemort's first death, I can't be certain. Her death was unexplained, though, and it doesn't add up."
"I am sorry for your loss," Lyra said, giving him a look of genuine sympathy, and he smiled.
"Thank you."
"Where do you live," Lyra asked, turning back to her own parents.
"It's called Raven's Nest. It is one of the old Lestrange family properties, and my father gifted it to me when Bellatrix and I were about to be married," Rodolphus answered. "We have fifteen extra bedrooms, so you will have plenty to choose from."