Bellatrix's boots were hidden under her bed.
Which, in Black Manor terms, meant they were in a shrine with no lock.
She'd shoved them back there after the parental lecture, muttering protective hexes and swearing under her breath.
The boots purred quietly in the dark.
Inside the leather, Nico's tiny fragment napped and thought about boobs.
Occasionally, he thought about asses.
Then boobs again.
That was the entire rotation.
---
Narcissa walked into Bella's room, stared once at the bed, and immediately crouched.
"Move," she told the cursed hatbox, shoving it aside.
Her fingers closed around leather.
> mmm thigh, Nico thought sleepily. new thigh?
He woke up like a pervert alarm clock.
Narcissa dragged the boots out and straightened, satisfied.
"Absolutely not," said Andromeda from the doorway.
Narcissa glanced back. "I'm just checking the fit."
"That's exactly what Bella said before she came home looking like the Dark Lord's groupie," Andromeda said.
"She is the Dark Lord's groupie," Narcissa said. "I intend to look better than her while doing nothing that stupid."
She sat on the edge of the bed and shoved her foot in.
The leather closed over her calf like a hand.
> this leg is skinny but hot, Nico thought. 7/10, would climb.
By the time the second boot was on, the fragment had already slithered from the lining to her skin, up the Achilles, tasting.
Cold shot up Narcissa's calves.
She sucked in a breath.
Andromeda saw it. "What did you feel," she asked sharply.
"Regret," Narcissa said. "And something… crawling."
"Put them back," Andy said immediately.
"No," Cissy replied, standing.
The world dropped under her by several inches.
Her body compensated without asking.
Hips forward. Shoulders back. Perfect balance.
She walked.
Click. Click.
> wow, Nico thought. self-stabilizing milf in progress.
The boots adjusted micro-muscles along her ankles to keep her from falling.
Narcissa hated how natural it felt.
Andromeda pinched the bridge of her nose. "This is idiotic."
"Bella's idiotic," Narcissa said. "I'm gathering data."
The bathroom door opened.
Bellatrix stepped out in a towel, wet hair clinging to her shoulders.
She clocked the boots in one second.
"TRAITOR," she exploded. "Take your grubby debutante feet out of my sanctified war shoes!"
"You stole dark magic," Narcissa said primly. "I'm browsing."
"They are attuned to me," Bella said. "You'll insult him."
Him, in this case, being "the Dark Lord's power blob in her wrist." Bella still had no clue she was worshipping a horny extradimensional idiot named Nico.
> hi, Nico said in Cissy's head, curious. hellooo new boobs?
Narcissa froze.
"You heard that?" she demanded.
"Who," Andromeda said.
"The voice," Narcissa said. "Your Lord is in my calf being stupid."
Bella brightened. "You can hear him too? Good. I thought I imagined him when he started commenting on my bra."
Andromeda made a strangled noise. "Explain. Slowly. Without the word 'bra'."
Bella waved her damp hand. "He lives in the mark. He's definitely him, just… extra. He likes shoes. And tits."
> also butts, Nico added helpfully. equality.
Narcissa closed her eyes a second. "He's talking about… arses now."
Andromeda stared at the ceiling. "We are hosting the apocalypse and it has three fetishes and no impulse control."
Bella grinned, half proud, half deranged. "Isn't it great?"
---
Cissy started pacing to test the height.
First malfunction hit at the third turn.
Her robes were tailored for "reasonable Black daughter." The boots were from "we are not reasonable."
As she pivoted, the robe's side seam caught on the boot top.
RIIIP.
The slit rocketed from mid-calf to mid-thigh.
And then just kept going.
Narcissa froze.
Bella screamed laughing. "OH LOOK, YOUR LEG CAME OUT TO SAY HELLO."
Andromeda slapped both hands over her face. "Nope. No. We're done. Scene's over. Curtain."
Narcissa grabbed at her skirt with murder in her eyes.
> nice, Nico thought reverently. 10/10, longer next time.
"Fix it," Cissy hissed at Andy.
Andromeda peeked through her fingers, wand already in hand.
A quick Reparo pulled the fabric together.
For one glorious second, it was modest again.
Then the repair slid back open by an inch. Then another.
The robe seemed to rethink its life choices.
Andromeda frowned. "That is not how Mending Charms work."
> hehe, Nico thought. seams are lying. they wanna breathe.
Narcissa's eye twitched. "He's doing it. He likes it."
"He has taste," Bella said.
"He has brain damage," Andy snapped.
"He has three brain cells and two of them are in my cleavage," Bella said cheerfully.
The slit reached "skirt from a dodgy magazine."
Andromeda cast a stronger, snappier Reparo. The seam finally fused and stayed shut.
Narcissa glared down the boots. "You try that in public and I will transfigure you into flats."
> noooo, Nico thought. prison.
---
They moved to Andromeda's room. Less risk of cousins. More privacy for humiliation.
Bella stole one of Andy's hairbrushes and sat on the bed, towel hitched indecently up her thigh, drying her hair like nothing was wrong.
Narcissa paced in a slow circle, feeling out the range.
"Talk to him," Andromeda told Bella. "Properly. You understand him best. Somehow."
Bella puffed up with stupid pride.
"My Lord," she said in her head, because that's who she thought he was, "what are you?"
> uhh, Nico thought. hungry. inside. like… magic slime? but sexy.
She repeated that out loud.
Andromeda blinked. "He called himself slime?"
"Sexy slime," Bella corrected.
"Sexy is doing heavy lifting there," Narcissa muttered.
Andromeda pointed her wand at Cissy's boots. "Can he control your legs?"
> oh yes, Nico thought instantly. legs good. can run, jump, wrap around things–
"Answer sanely," Andromeda snapped, somehow getting that even though she couldn't hear exact words.
Narcissa reluctantly let her knees unlock.
"Try to shove me," she told the voice in her calf. "If you can."
> ok, Nico thought, thrilled.
For half a second nothing happened.
Then her foot moved.
Just half an inch sideways.
And stopped.
She felt the impulse. The start of a lunge. Then resistance as her own muscles said: No, idiot.
Narcissa remained upright.
"He can… twitch me," she said. "But not override. It's like… he presses, I decide."
"That's… less horrible than it could be," Andromeda said. "Still horrible."
Bella sprawled back, smearing water on Andy's covers. "He makes my magic hotter," she said dreamily. "Spells are easier. And I can do this—"
She lifted one hand, fingers spread.
Her towel tightened and tucked itself precisely in place, defying gravity and modesty at once.
Andromeda made a choked noise. "Is he doing that?"
"Half," Bella said. "I started, he finished. It's great."
> towels good, Nico thought. towels dangerous. can fall.
"Stop thinking about my towel," Bella scolded the mark.
Narcissa rubbed her temple. "Andy. He's in both of us. He's clearly not going anywhere. You either get him yourself or spend the entire war yelling from outside the pit."
"Why would I crawl into the pit," Andromeda said. "That's where the teeth are."
"Because we're in it," Bella said simply.
That one landed.
Andromeda stared at her sisters. One feral, one fraying.
Whatever this… thing was, it had them already. If she stayed out, she'd just watch them get yanked around by something they thought belonged to the Dark Lord.
"If he's part of Him," Andy said carefully, "we're talking about a shard of soul or power with… clinical stupidity and a fixation on shoes and body parts."
"Exactly," Narcissa said. "You know what happens when people like that are left unsupervised."
Bella raised her hand. "They get funnier?"
"They get dead," Andromeda snapped.
She sat down hard on the floor and dragged her hair back.
"All right," she said, glaring into the middle distance. "You. Thing. Listen."
> listening, Nico thought. ears on. metaphorical. also boobs on, but ears too.
"You do not control us," she said. "You do not go rummaging in our heads. You do not strip us in public because something you think is sexy makes you laugh."
> but–
"NO," she said, with the full force of Black rage and Prefect training.
The hum in all three of them flinched.
Even Bella sat up a bit straighter.
> okay, Nico thought, small. no public strip. sad. but ok.
"And if I let you into me," Andromeda continued, "it's so I can watch you. If you hurt them, I will find out how to boil you."
> boiling bad, Nico thought immediately. seen kettles. no thanks.
Bella leaned forward eagerly. "He's sulking. I can feel it."
"Good," Andy said. "Sulking is the beginning of morality."
Narcissa sank into a chair, crossing her legs. The boots posed with her.
"I vote yes," Cissy said. "He's in my ankles, I don't trust him alone. Get him in your skull so someone with sense hears every stupid thing he thinks."
Bella nodded vigorously. Towel slipped. Towel auto-adjusted. Of course it did.
"Join us in corruption," she said. "For safety."
Andromeda stared at them both.
Then at her hand.
Then at the ceiling.
"Fine," she snarled. "But this is monitoring, not worship. I don't kneel to your slime fragment."
> she's scary, Nico thought, impressed. like teacher but hot.
She held out her hand like she was about to pet a rabid dog.
"Do it," she said.
Cold shot into her palm.
She didn't flinch.
It crawled up her arm, over her shoulder, around her ribs. Less like invasion, more like someone dumping icy water into her magical circuits.
"Scale of one to Cruciatus?" Bella asked, bouncing.
"Detention with Slughorn," Andy ground out. "Sticky and annoying."
> she strong, Nico thought. like spine. good spine. wanna wrap.
The humming settled.
Something ringed her wrist, skin-tight and invisible.
Her magic flickered.
She raised her wand, pointed at her inkwell.
"Wingardium Leviosa," she said.
The inkwell bobbed up so smoothly it made her teeth itch.
She lowered it carefully.
"Hate it," she said.
"But?" Narcissa pressed.
Andromeda exhaled.
"But it works," she admitted.
Bella fist-pumped. "Three out of three corrupted!"
"We are not corrupted," Andromeda said. "We are… unfortunately optimized."
Narcissa shifted in the chair.
Her belt slid down her waist.
She grabbed it on instinct.
It had undone itself.
"NO," she hissed.
Bella snorted so hard she nearly snorted towel.
> oops, Nico thought faintly. hands slipped.
Andromeda glared at the air. "You stop untying things on my sisters when they're trying to be serious. You get one more accident. Then we see how you handle exorcism."
> ok, Nico thought. small accident only. funny ones. clothes stay mostly on.
"Define 'mostly'," Narcissa said darkly.
> 70%, Nico offered.
"Try 100," Andy said.
> 80, he bargained.
"All negotiation with him is banned," Andromeda told her sisters. "He's not allowed percentages."
Bella flopped back on the bed, smug.
"We have a Dark Lord," she said. "And a dumb horny ghost of him in our blood. We're unstoppable."
"You're unhinged," Narcissa corrected. "That's different."
Andromeda sat there feeling the new hum under her skin, already mentally drafting emergency procedures, curse-break plans, and at least six ways to weaponize this mess if she had to.
Inside three Black girls, one slime braincell ping-ponged between thoughts:
> boobs
ass
heels
magic
don't get boiled
It wasn't much.
It was enough.