Heulwen Roku's Death

 The cell was as small and damp as the witch remembered. From somewhere, there was a leak. The dripping of the water kept time with the groaning from prisoners around her. From the small window too high to reach, the crashing waves added to the music of the prison. Lifting her arms, the chains from her shackles sang. An orchestra of dread. Azkaban had not changed since the last Heulwen had occupied a cell within the fortress. But she had. Instead of screaming, like the others, she sat back against the moist brick and closed her eyes. The spells and tinctures that had kept her looking youthful and pretty were wearing off, one by one, leaving her looking her age. The witch was nearing sixty, but had kept the appearance of a woman in her early thirties. Now, there was no denying how much time had worn her out; her eyes sunken, cheekbones jutting out, but no wrinkles. Not so much as a crease. It was, sadly, proof that happiness had not touched her, no matter how pretty she made herself.

The sound of her cell door opening made Heulwen looks up. Just a guard. 
'Up,' he instructed, and she did her best to rise to her feet. 
It was difficult, with the shackles, but she managed. 
'Just a few more questions, then you're free to rot.'
He led her to a room not better decorated than her cell, and there she sat and waited. They made her wait without even water for almost an hour. When the Auror came, supplied with a thick leather folder, he didn't even try to hide his disgust. Had there been an inkling of bravado left in her, Heulwen would have said something. Anything. But the witch just sat against the wall on a rickety bench, head lolling to the side with exhaustion. The gruel they fed her wasn't enough, and sleep was all she wanted to do. Even that was difficult with all the wailing and screaming in the cells around her.
'Heulwen Black,' the man started, flipping through the papers. 'Or is it Sunniva? Lucero?'
"Black-Roku," she corrected hoarsely, "Roku is my family name, Black is..." she paused and shook her head. "It doesn't matter. Heulwen Roku will do, if you must."
He gave a nod and crossed several things off the file, scribbling something on the page before locking his gaze on her. 'We almost had you some years ago, but your trail disappeared. Where did you go?'
"Nowhere. I...instructed one of your kind to remove the hints of my whereabouts."
"How?"
"The mind is strong, but the flesh is weak. Seduction, to put it mildly."
"Who?"
"I...I can't remember his name anymore. I can't remember his face..." she trails off, a note of sadness in her voice.
The nib of the quill scratches the parchment as something else is jotted down.
"You were a Death Eater for years, yet you evaded capture so meticulously."
"I was hiding in plain sight, I thought someday you Aurors would catch on. But you didn't, so I stopped looking over my shoulder."
A grunt and more writing.
"My manor, Chester Place, you will find evidence there of all my crimes. The butler is under the Imperio curse...he's just a muggle," she says, knowing nothing will change the life-long sentence ahead of her. "I don't care what you do with the place. I have no family, no heirs to take over. It is just me and me alone." A lie, but her children, biological or not, would not go down with her. Not again. Never again.
"It's the Dementor's kiss for you, Roku, I'm sure you know that. Nothing you confess to will lessen the punishment." He paused. "It'll buy you a couple of days, but that's it. So, it's up to you how long you want to be spared."
"I'm not going to talk."
"You sure?"
There came a knock at the door, and a man stepped in, leaning in to whisper in the Auror's ear. A look of concern crosses his features, but it's gone before Heulwen thinks anything of it.
"Wait here."
Another hour passed until someone entered the room. That someone was not the Auror. Heulwen stared at the face, took in the way he stood in front of the door. Oh. The man's hand twitches around the wand. She wasn't even going to beg or deny whatever wrong she had done. 
'Don't think 'cause yer just sittin' there lookin' like a frail woman that I don't know what and who you are. Demon bitch,' he spat.
His wand hand rises. Heulwen meets his gaze. Defeat is written all over her face, and this man sees it. He sees she's not going to fight back, not going to try to run. The look on his face says it all; there's anger and satisfaction, justice burning to be inflicted. He couldn't have been older than twenty. So young, so furious. Who had she taken from him? Did it even matter? An apology wouldn't mean anything; in the moment, whatever she had done, there had been no remorse, and she wasn't going to feign it now.
"Steady your wand," the witch says, swallowing down the rising fear. She was scared, the survival instinct flaring like a wild animal; however, she gripped the edge of the bench to ground herself. To keep herself from running. "You have to mean it," Heulwen nods shakily, "Otherwise there's no point to whatever you did to get here. You stunned them, didn't you? The guards? They'll put you away for that. So mean it."
It happened quickly: the bright emerald-green burst, the door flying open, the Aurors rushing in to tackle the intruder. It was the last thing she saw before it all went cold and dark. There was no montage of her life, no glimpses of happier times, only the edges of her consciousness going black. Heulwen had hoped, after receiving the dementor's kiss, that someone would visit the empty shell that had once been a witch. But this? Death? It was a mercy she did not deserve.