What if Peter hadn't been the secret-keeper, but still a traitor?

[alwaysimpure]

It wasn't often that Sirius considered, even for a moment, being grateful to his mother. She had made his life misery, she had turned his brother from him, she had messed him up the way only family could. But at least she had also prepared him for pain, definitely for more pain than any growing child should have to experience and through enough that he had been able to withstand more torture than most minds could take since he'd been captured.

A trap, a simple one, but he had trusted Peter and that had made this so easy. Of course he'd trusted Peter. Not because Peter was brave or overly loyal, but because he just didn't seem capable of deceit. Too much the coward, too stupid. he had underestimated him and that's how he ended up here. Some dungeon, who knew where, chained to the wall, wandless and in pain.

Deatheaters weren't gentle captors, especially not to bloodtraitors. He hadn't eaten or drunk, hell, hadn't slept or pissed since this started, not that he had any way of telling how much time had passed. But as long as there was so much importance on getting the truth from him, at least Sirius knew that they were still safe and that gave him strength like nothing else.

There was no one with him at the moment, a short but welcome reprieve. Sirius had closed his eyes, tried to use wandless magic to find some spell to break the chains, hopeless as that was. He'd have been better of focusing his strength on a healing spell, but that had never been his style. Too much of a fighter.

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[alwaysimpure]

"Fuck."

The word was quiet, just hissed on instinct when he was yanked up, stretched out so suddenly. It was a strain on his shoulders, pain for his wrists and he was damn sure it would be more pain still before long, even if this was all that'd happen. But this was Bellatrix and he knew better than to think this would be even close to all.

Looking at her, he repeated the word, this time slow, this time purposefully. Two can play that game. "Fuck." How would his mother have liked that? Not a lot, by all accounts.

The smile was a testament to his stubbornness, much like his tone, even if his voice was rougher than he'd have liked. "I'd have stood when a woman entered." Bellatrix was free to make of that what she wanted. Actually, no, subtlety wasn't in his cards right now. "I've seen men doing a better job of masquerading as women than you."

Insulting her as a bad drag queen made him feel at least marginally accomplished, even with the situation being what it was.

"I'd rather not, Lestrange." Not using any kind of formal title and very deliberately using her married name. Keeping his own name might be more an act of stubbornness than anything else, but he understood pureblood principles and pride well enough to know that it would smart her in other ways.

[sadistic]

"Language," she chastises, in a sing-song way that indicates more amusement than disapproval. She is not herself offended, but she has her own memories of Aunt Walburga as a woman bereft of patience or forgiveness. Sirius's mistakes will be counted and punished.

It's good he closed interpretation on that insult, she could have easily taken the first half for a compliment. As it stands, she is not particularly insulted. She's proud, thoroughly proud, but vanity was never her fault. Some things she takes utterly for granted. Her self-image is unassailable. He's missed the obvious mark then, but struck a glancing blow on a very different one. It doesn't show.

"I've seen men do a better job of masquerading as loyal. You are a pampered creature, Sirius. You show a childlike faithfulness to those who make it easy for you, to anyone willing to condone your behavior, but when loyalty becomes difficult, a source of pain? How quickly you run. It's only a matter of time before you betray James Potter, just as you betrayed your family, your birthright, and your truest self."

His truest self; this part she adds merely for the thought that it might wound him. He never was the Black heir he should have been, but an inadequate likeness is still a likeness. In rebellion, he may have grown to hate those parts of himself, as surely as he hates the rest of them.

"You'd rather not? Oh, pity." Her tone is too patient, altogether too forgiving to bode well. He may sense the curse coming. It's a promise crackling in the air between them, even before she casts.

"Crucio."

[alwaysimpure]

"I won't betray him." The words were spoken quietly, but he meant them and, more than that, he had to mean them, because believing that he wouldn't fail was what would keep him fighting. Not betray James and Lily and, perhaps most of all, not fail Harry.

"Not quite the same. See, Bella, you can't choose family. I chose my friends and I chose my side."

It wasn't difficult to guess that there was a Cruciatus curse coming. It was in her stance, it was even in her tone, misleading as it was. But what difference did it make that he could predict it? Sirius tried to brace himself, but there was no bracing against this. It made no different that this wasn't the first time it was used, because there was no getting used to this.

Every time the pain hits like fire cursing through each vein, cramping every muscle, feeling as if he's being ripped apart.

He managed silence for a while, a matter of pride proving something only to himself. His lip was bloody from biting down on it and then he screamed after all, because a spell designed to torture, spoken by someone like Bellatrix was more than anyone could take.

He left his head hanging when the pain subsided. It was still there, he knew, and would kick back in if he tried to move at all. Every limb was still protesting and his heart was trying to beat its way out of his rib cage. Much as she deserved a glare, right now it wasn't worth the effort.

Sirius licked his lips and stared at the ground, his hair fallen into his face. His throat hurt and he had to swallow before he could even attempt to speak. "I'd be mudblood if I had a choice."