Rating:
PG-13
House:
The Dark Arts
Characters:
Regulus Black Sirius Black
Genres:
Angst Wizarding Society
Era:
1970-1981 (Including Marauders at Hogwarts)
Spoilers:
Goblet of Fire Order of the Phoenix Half-Blood Prince J.K. Rowling Interviews or Website
Stats:
Published: 08/26/2006
Updated: 08/26/2006
Words: 2,411
Chapters: 2
Hits: 601

Blinder than Bats

Queenish

Story Summary:
Regulus Black: start to finish.

Chapter 02 - 1972-1979

Posted:
08/26/2006
Hits:
282


Blinder than Bats

1972-1979

"...we are vagabonds,

we travel without seatbelts on

we live this close to death."

- The Decemberists

Regulus had been sorted into Slytherin. He sent his mother a letter, telling her so, hoping it would melt the shell of ice that had formed around her. He had been feeling it form ever since Sirius went away to Hogwarts, but he felt somehow that it had always been there, and he had been too innocent to notice.

At Hogwarts, he felt miniscule. Sirius never talked to him and all but sneered at him in the halls. As a Slytherin, he was apparently the enemy. Regulus couldn't get his head around that; they were the same blood, weren't they?

Then he found out some of Sirius's friends were Mudbloods and that changed everything. He told this to his mother too, feeling like a traitor but wanting to gain her trust again. She sent him letters too, but they were mostly all the same.

"If Sirius wants to associate with filth, then he is filth as well and it isn't your concern. You should be focusing on your studies, not judging the social climate! You need to fish the Black name out of the mud, where Sirius has dragged it through so carelessly!"

Regulus tore up these letters and flushed them down the toilet, crying quietly so no one could hear.

Regulus did focus on his schoolwork, but it was a lot harder than he had anticipated. Sirius had boasted how easy his lessons had been, how he was the top of every class and the favorite to every teacher. Regulus thought it would be just as easy for him, after all they were from the same family; they should have the same level of intelligence, right?

But apparently he was wrong about this, and almost everything else he thought he knew. He saw Mudbloods and half-bloods walk the halls beside him, sit in class next to him, and even know more about magic than he did. It was inconceivable. His mother continued sending him letters, which he tore up every time.

"... you can never count on anyone but yourself. Not your brother, or your father, or even your mother. You can only hope that you can find people who still believe in the divine purity of your blood."

***

Over the next few years, Regulus fought to keep his life in balance. He remembered his mother's letters, even if she never sent them anymore. He had found those people, who cared about his surname and the noble lineage it entailed. But they were a close knit group, and it was hard to get them to even notice him.

His classes grew harder and more complex, and Regulus continued to only be mediocre, while his brother became famous for being one of the most talented and popular student to ever grace the halls.

In Transfiguration, he kept turning his raven into a ball of yarn with feathers, and Professor McGonagall's lips thinned each time he didn't get it right. He knew what she was thinking, just like all of his teachers.

"Sirius got it right the first time... I wonder what's wrong with this one..."

Finally, he gave up trying to be as good as Sirius and focused more on a group Slytherins which included Malfoy, Wilkes, Rosier and other Seventh Years he had always admired. Once they realized he was a Black from the Blacks, they just thought of him as "Sirius's brother" and "Sirius" meant "enemy" which he was too.

One day, while he saw the group coming towards him down the hall, he spotted Lily Evans, a Mudblood in Sirius's year who Sirius had talked off constantly. He walked towards her and stuck his foot into her path. She tumbled down with a shriek, her books and papers falling everywhere.

"Mudblood..." he sneered derisively, and walked away, hoping against hope that the others had noticed him.

They had. Lucius Malfoy was looking at him in amused interest. Regulus felt his heart swell in pride. It was one of the greater moments of his life.

***

By the end of his third year, he had become very close with Malfoy and the others. His mother was reasonably impressed, but her icy demeanor hadn't thawed, in fact, seemed to grow thicker still.

Sirius on the other hand, was furious. Regulus's assault on Lily Evans had left him livid and that summer, berated Regulus almost constantly.

"Those people he hangs with, they're awful, evil actually, he'll meet a sticky end with them, mark my words..." he snarled one night at supper.

"And what of the kind of people you associated yourself with, huh?" his mother countered. "Mudbloods, blood traitors and the like? What kind of end will you meet?"

Sirius exploded. It was the worst fight between them Regulus had ever seen. And the last. There were many nasty insults and objects thrown at one another. Sirius had packed his bags and left that very night. Walburga blasted her son's name from the family tree with such venom that Regulus was left in awe.

***

Regulus saw his brother at Hogwarts the next autumn, but they never spoke. Sirius considered himself severed from the family for good. Regulus didn't mind. He had found better, more loyal brothers in the Death Eaters.

It wasn't until he was fifteen that he was told the truth about them, that the society stretched far beyond Hogwarts and would one day rule the world. That was their goal: to rid the world of filth and control it as was fitting and necessary.

He told his parents all that he could. Walburga was certainly proud, but wanted to be prouder. If he could do this and make this better... than he would erase the mistakes of his brother and restore honor to the Black name again. How could he do that? Become more powerful that all the others? He was crushed by the weight of his mother's expectations.

***

It was on his seventeenth birthday that he met the Dark Lord for the first time. He lay in bed shaking for hours afterwards. It was like witnessing an explosion of some kind: he was in awe of the sheer power and force. The carnage and pain he saw was nauseating and incredible.

Regulus and his friends had stalked through a small, Muggle village in Wales, breaking into houses and terrorizing the occupants. Then, while in a cottage where a group of small children were cowering, he felt the whole building shake on its foundations. The Dark Lord, swathed in black and brandishing a red-sparking wand, threw the door off its hinges and bore down on the trembling children. He killed every one; smashing their skulls and strewing their guts over the walls.

Afterwards, Regulus vomited in the woods and wondered what the hell he had gotten himself into.

***

He was eighteen and the Dark Mark was a blazing brand on his forearm. He sat in his home, a dilapidated flat in Hogsmeade, and angrily smashed eggshells in a bowl. The violent crunching against metal made him feel better.

Earlier that day he had received a letter from his mother, the first one in over a year: his father had died. Unexpected, really. Orion Black was only fifty, very young for a wizard to die. Regulus wasn't sad or even perturbed, but he was expected to attend the funeral.

Regulus donned a black cloak and wrapped gauze around the black Mark on his arm, feeling ashamed of his weakness. In the past year, he had realized the enormity of his mistakes. He had only joined the Death Eaters so that he could have friends. Pathetic, he thought bitterly. Pathetic.

The funeral was long and pretentious. The orator went on and on about his father, saying things that didn't have the remotest bit of truth.

"Orion Black was a loving father and husband. He cared for his family deeply and always strived to provide for them. He was greatly liked in the community."

When it was over, Regulus took his mother home and listened for a good half hour about how worthless and unloving her older son was. Sirius hadn't come to the funeral, of course, but he had apparently acted as best man for what Walburga called "that Mudblood wedding."

Regulus didn't care in the least what his mother had to say. Whatever she thought, he believed that Sirius had made all the right choices and Regulus had made all the wrong ones. Sirius may be a Mudblood-lover but at least he didn't work for a child-killer.

***

Regulus sat on his ratty couch, in his crumbling flat, with the dull morning light flooding the room. He would be dead very shortly, but felt oddly at peace. He hadn't known that the locket hidden in the cave was an actual Horcrux until he had it in his hands, but he had known it was important to Voldemort, and therefore was willing to die in order to take it from him.

He hadn't been able to destroy it. The note he left was more to instill fear in the Dark Lord than to tell the absolute truth. At first, he had no idea what to do with it. The poisonous potion was running fast in his veins and the pain was incredible. He had taken a pain numbing potion to take the edge off, but he was still dying, incontrovertibly. He eventually left the locket in his mother's house, creeping through the shadows as she slept and hiding it among her many dark materials.

Regulus went to his bed and lay down. Dying wasn't really that bad, he thought. It was very much like going to sleep after a long and ultimately satisfying day. At least he had made the right choice, for once in his miserable life.

FIN