Of Good Books and Brotherly Love

Of Good Books and Brotherly Love

When I first heard Mother's shriek resounding through the house, I didn't think much of it. I considered shrugging, then resolved it probably wasn't worth it, and I went back to my book. Now I can't remember what I was reading at that time; the only thing I know for sure is that I was very intent on keeping my reading a secret. I cannot remember what I did afterwards with the book, either, but I understand I might have burnt it. If I close my eyes, I vividly remember its feel. Soft leather and rough cracking pages. I had cut my thumb more than once on those pages. Every time I do so the thought pops up that I might be mistaking it with another book. I was also sucking on a lemon lollipop I had stolen from Sirius's stash. He never was careful where he put his sweets; usually he just threw them on his desk on the first day back, and never bothered counting them. If anything, he became easier to fool as the years went by, when he reported his attention from sweets to other things, such as Quidditch and his looks.

The book may have been stolen from Sirius as well.

I have no opinion on how the weather was, which is rather a shame as it would have been an appropriate topic. I love talking about the weather. I'd love talking about anything better than Sirius.

I went back to my book and didn't think about it, until I heard frantic pounding on my door. I cast an apprehensive glance at the door - must hide the book and answer the door, how odd for Kreacher to pound, why isn't he calling my name? I must have imagined all of this retrospectively, for I hadn't had the time to shut the book close when the door swung open, and my mother stormed into my room, something she avoided doing since Sirius had left for Hogwarts.

Now I must speak about my mother, or else you'll never understand_not that I ever understood it either. She was never a big impressive thing; she was that frail-looking porcelain doll of a witch. I was taller than her when I left for my third year, by a whole head. She had wide dark eyes, and hair just like my brother's, except greyer. She held herself very straight, and had a distinctly prim and dainty look about her when she left the house or people came for a party. She was the most frightening sight I ever had until I met the Dark Lord. Dumbledore's charisma has nothing on her presence.

She looked wild. She often did, often lost her head and started shrieking and cursing my father, who stoically endured her hexes and jinxes until her wand fell on the floor and she started to cry. Then he would pick her up and send her to bed. My mother's powers were not strong. If the hexes ever reached my father through his strictness, he never gave proof of it.

He had married her out of love, love for the poor-but-proud pure-blooded witch with fierce eyes. She was a distant cousin, from a very cadet branch of the family, but her maiden name was Black, nonetheless.

When she had one of her crisis, Sirius used to say it was in her blood; it was hereditary, that sickness of hers. It was impure, and it would get to us too. We were afraid of it when we were small boys. After I joined Hogwarts, Sirius always seemed to be mocking it, as if he didn't believe it, as if it was just a tale made up to frighten little boys. Father never should have married her, his brother never missed a chance to insinuate, when he and his perfect, docile, loving wife and their perfect three beautiful daughters came at home and Mother had to make her excuses. I never looked at Sirius in those occasions. I was too busy trying to forget the look of betrayal on my father's face.

His brother had looked consistently less smug when he told us his Perfect Daughter the Second had fooled every one of them and eloped with a Mudblood. The victory on Mother's face was something I'd like to keep forever in my memory, engraved as a trophy upon all those moments of humiliation. Wordlessly, she had gone to the tapestry. She had taken her wand out, and she had burned her niece's name from it, black flames on the Black tapestry, and an intoxicating scent that stuck to her for weeks. I remember Sirius squeezed my hand. I was nine and I'll never forget the look in Mother's eyes. I don't remember what happened after that.

This glorious moment came back to my mind as I looked at her. Her hands were steady and that was the worst thing about it.

The floor creaked and Father entered the room, something I couldn't remember him ever having done. He put his hands on Mother's shoulders and he gently led her to the door, her face pressed against his shoulder.

"Regulus," he told me with a glance above his shoulder, "your brother fled to the Potters."

He left without another word.

I went to my father's study and I sat at the desk. I got up and I locked the door, neatly. Click. I chose a book. I cannot remember the first thing about it, except that it had never been opened. I thought for a moment that it might have been a gift from a young Sirius to Father, but even I cannot systematically do the worst possible thing. Anyway it would have been too dramatic for my tastes. Sirius loved drama. He was the most perfect drama queen and it was just like his bastard drama self to pull this one on our already exceptionally dysfunctional family.

I left the study three hours later. It was the first time the reading technique had not worked. Someone, I don't remember who, once said that there was no sadness that an hour of reading could not dissipate. Then again, I didn't feel particularly sad. I felt hungry and tired. We had dinner - more subdued than when Sirius was here, and I went to Sirius' room.

It was usually what I did, in summer. I'd go to his rooms and we'd spend a good part of the night reading his tired Quidditch magazines and his old textbooks. He'd sometimes explain to me what was marked in the margins, and we'd laugh together. That's how I came to know Sirius's friends, better than they ever knew me, I gather.

James often draw crude sketches of Slytherins, and various unpleasantness happening to Slytherins, and bad puns about Slytherins' names. In fact, there was much Slytherin bashing in what he did, perhaps because he mostly doodled in Astronomy class, which I knew he had it with Slytherins. I had heard many a fifth-year loudly complaining about them in the common room, looking almost as if they thought I ought to stand up and either go talk to my brother or defy them in my brother's name. Which I never did, because I'm many things, but not a fool. At least not for minor things. (I resented most of the Slytherin-oriented discussions)

Peter was an accomplished artist. There were whole comics in the margins done by him. They usually starred Sirius and James. Alas, the scenario and the dialogs were rather repetitive.

Remus didn't draw. He kept a running commentary on both the textbook and the class, and it was sometimes rather difficult to keep track of which was which. He acquitted himself of it with a wit drier than white wine, and he had the capacity to turn anything into an innuendo that bit you so hard in the nose you'd never forget it. Of course, I did forget them after a while and I think I started forgetting when I opened Sirius' door.

The room looked as it had during the two years he had been at Hogwarts without me. It was clean and Sirius-empty, which amounted to the same thing.

I must have sunk down on the bed and dozed off, because I woke up in the dead of the night. I was still in Sirius's bed, and it was still devastatingly empty. I sat up, turned the torchlight on and I decided it was time to do something. I didn't feel much better than I did in the afternoon. But I felt as if I'd never get better, and I was in the 'now or later, same difference' kind of mood.

I made a list after I had gone to my room for quill, ink and parchment, because I'm good at making lists and better yet at forgetting them when they're not written down. My scrawl was messier than usual, from sitting in a bed rather than on a chair, and without anything to use as a support for the parchment. I had trouble rereading it, and what comforted me is that no one could have had better luck at reading it. It was better than Invisible Ink.

Father says Sirius is gone to the Potters and Mother is sick.

They both came in my room.

Mother was not herself at dinner. Yes, I remember it now. She had been dizzy. I suspected Father of having dosed her with something. I suspected Father of something rather stronger than a soothing potion of any kind. What's the phrase? Mother wasn't quite herself. She had been... well, serene, and silent, and as they had left the dinner room she had difficultly walking. She had put her hand on his arm and she had not said one word to me. They told us about it in History, I thought, they told us sometimes husbands were allowed to - control their wives. My next thought was that perhaps I had read about it in my father's library, and not at Hogwarts. It would not be in their marriage contract, would it?... Then again, her condition did allow him a bit more lenience than it was usual...

They didn't say when he's coming back.

He didn't tell me he was leaving.

He took his trunk and his things and everything, like he did when he had been allowed to spend the last week of July at the Potters, last year. I looked up. Yes, that comparison was a good thing. It was true and it was considered a precedent. Sirius going to the Potters was nothing new. It was no frequent occurrence, but it could happen. There was nothing to worry about.

I chewed on my quill, until it became sloppy and I had lots of feathery thingies on the tongue. There were also lots of cold slithering snakes running down my veins.

1. He's left

2. I don't know when he's coming back

3.They seemed pretty final.

4. I want the wanker to come back.

5. He's at the Potters.

that's Godric's Hollow; that I know because I had a wild time teasing him about it last year when he told me about it

6-how has he gone, anyway?

broom missing

fucker didn't even think to take the Bus? Is that my parents'blood running in his veins?How do I know he's even arrived to the Potters, for fuck's sake, perhaps he's fallen from his broom! I mean, I love him and all, like and brother and everything, I do, but he's not exactly Quidditch player material! how stupid do you have to be to go and fly halfway through England and break your neck on the bloody broom?

...

7) Calming down, they told me where he was. They must have a way of knowing that I do not.

letter he left there could be his style, oh drama fucker king

sent an owl WHY DIDN'T HE WRITE TO ME???

Potters contacted the parents would make sense?...

nothing makes sense in this goddamn family, especially not the Slytherin-forsaken git of a brother and his Gryffindorkish legendary thick head and this MERLIN-BE-CURSED BUSINESS!!

...

mother's going to kill him when he comes back, wandless-style like she did on the tapestry. That's what happens when she's furious enough. else father will put him under this Imperius of his and I'm never going to see my bro again.

8° He's not coming back.

... (censored) (I put great relish on practically graving the word in the parchment)

bl(ensored)

9, he's got to come back. He's got to.

problem is that I don't know when.

10. anyway I'm not surehe even arrived there. I have to make sure. (too bad you can't just use Floo powder. Though he wouldn't have though of it anyway, the git)

11. I'm going to the Potters and dragging him back, kicking and screaming all the way from Godrics Hollow if I have to - and if he wants to ridicule himself by acting like a girl, fine by me.

I resolutely set the quill down, folded the parchment and put it in my pocket. My wand never left me, even at home; we had ways of practising magic that the Ministry didn't need to know about, and the wards pulled on the house at Mother's instigation insured - Oh. Oh, fuck. The wards. How was I to leave without setting them off? How had Sirius done?...

Well, anything Sirius bloody Black had done, I could do just as well, and more cleverly, because I wasn't an overgrown drama queen weeping for attention, I viciously thought as I was almost strangling myself with my scarf - I remember now, it was a lousy weather, rainy and cold. March weather. Not July.

Downstairs I found the elf I was looking for. She adored Sirius from afar and she was helpful to me because my big stupid brother was an idol to both of us. I asked her to open the wards for me, as I assumed she had probably done for my brother. She burst into tears and my impatience was steadily increasing, until finally, after swearing down, up, sideways, and on my wand, that I would return no matter what, she meekly agreed on my terms. I could have kissed her, and I was thanking Merlin that she was nothing like Kreacher - even willing to deliberately disobey my father's orders, as I learned while she chatted on our way to the foundation of the wards.

"Master forbid Bist to come near the wards - he forbid Bist and Kreacher and Anemole and-"

"What did he forbid?"

"Master forbid helping Master's sons, Master did!"

I stayed silent, but I filed this little titbit of information away. Father knew I'd do something about Sirius. I wondered if he could do something about it, too. I doubted it. Well, he probably could: he had the law on his side; after all, Sirius wasn't of age, OWLs notwithstanding. But Sirius had shamed the family name so frequently in his Hogwarts years that Father probably thought it would be a lost cause and it was much better to focus their best efforts instead on Sirius' more malleable little brother, i.e. me. Sirius would have thrown a fit at being called malleable; I merely tended to acknowledge it and go back to my room. I don't really care about it one way or another as long as I'm not expected to act like, say, my brother. Or Lucius Malfoy.

No, my name isn't drama queen. Too bad I'm the only one in this family. Well, at least Sirius's temper would perfectly agree with that part of duties the Black name would demand of him. Good thing he was the heir, I supposed, and not me. I wondered if my parents bore Sirius's eccentricities with that idea as a consolation, or if--

I stopped dead in my tracks, frozen in realisation. How could Father allow his heir to 'defile' the family name? Pulling scandals after scandals, that could be forgiven, forgotten, or whispered in quiet ballrooms as a nobility title; I knew for a fact Father's youth had been neither respectful of traditions nor respectable at all, with or without his marrying Mother; and Bellatrix's sumptuous wedding was more than proof enough. Rather a target for scandal, my cousin Bellatrix - imagine, a girl who had been on a Hogwarts Quidditch team! And of course, her husband was something like three years younger than her.

The Black family name was adept at causing fashionable scandals and was positively attention-craving. I had hoped this wouldn't be expected of me.

But Sirius had not merely caused scandals. He had run away. He had abandoned, deserted, forsaken the family name. As far as I knew, it was a sin for which there was no redemption - kind of when Andromeda had pregnantly run away with her shabby Mudblood boyfriend.

My breath caught in my chest. He needed to go back. I hadn't heard of Andromeda since then. He wasn't of age; fabulous OWLs or not, he had no NEWTs; he had not Gringotts vault of his own, just the family's one, in which the two of us could only dip into with Father's written agreement. Mother herself could not take too much money at once without her husband's presence. It was more the (elder) Black vault than anything else. He couldn't open his vault before his seventeenth birthday; he had no money of his own.

He needed to come back.

No doubt he'd come to his senses, sooner or later; but I knew whatever Father and Mother would do, it would still be less painful if he came back just tonight, of his own, with me, and pretended he had never wanted to run away, he had just wanted to spend a day at his friend's, or he had had something to say, or he had thought nobody would realise he had been gone for all day and when he had decided he'd come back it was already night time and the Potters had refused to even let him go back alone, Knight Bus or no Knight Bus... My mind was reeling with possible excuses as Bist crouched before the intricate motif.

Placed at the very heart of the house, in what my parents used as a reception room, the grey and greyer tiles drew an abstract pattern on the marble floor, flowing lines interconnecting in a symmetric labyrinth. It did not change as Bist looked and chanted and moved her hands, as if she was deftly unravelling invisible knots. I bate my lips, hoping the pavement couldn't feed on my anxiety or such other highly mystical things. My father could do that, I knew.

Finally, she looked up. I had imagined the pavement would glow as the wards rearranged themselves to allow my exit or something impressive like that, but I supposed no glowing would be more practical - for instance, if you needed to change the wards' definition while there were guests. Apparently my family was not as unrealistic as I had spent thirteen years believing. (It was really my part to say that, I thought, with a Muggle book hidden under my pillow and all my so-called poems slipped between my clothes.) I couldn't help but reflect this wasn't half as satisfying.

I looked at her, and her small, screwed-up face told me all I needed to know. I didn't even hear her squealed excuses that she couldn't modify the wards. I was just numbly staring at the pavement. Suddenly, it didn't look so petrified anymore; I imagined I could see its lines twirling as deadly fumes, mocking me with a thousand of echoing silvery laughs. In my mind, the laughs sounded as my cousins', high and hysterical and never-ending and crueller than sunrays on snow. I saw teeth, blinding ivory; I saw long hair cascading, shaking with laughter; I saw flashes of white skin and blue veins.

I turned away, forgetting everything of the wailing creature whose incessant moans pierced my mind. My steps were heavy on the stone, and I could hear their flat, lifeless sound.

I remember I halted at the door, as my hand had reached to push the cold wood open, and I looked back. The pavement was glittering in the moonlight that fell through the arched windows, still but quietly laughing at me. It seemed as peaceful and treacherous as the Hogwarts lake, when you admire its waters from afar: slightly ruffled by a summer breeze, smiling like a mirror that some goddess would have forgotten there. Once close-up, as you'd want to go swimming, it would only look muddy and dangerous, and suddenly you'd be drowning, feet caught by Grindylows, and the water would still silently laugh when you'd be dead.

It was provoking me.

Damn if a Black was going to back down a challenge.

I purposefully strode to the pattern's limit, where Bist was rocking back and forth, skinny arms around skinnier knees. I thought I glimpsed at the pattern's assurance faltering a bit. Well. I was a Black, and centuries of distilling our blood to the purest had made me better than ancestors since long gone. Less generations had separated them from mud; we, I, had risen above the earth, similar to our namesakes. Their tool wouldn't frighten me into submission.

"What is keeping you from breaking it open?" My voice was poised, mild. And unshakable. For the first time in my life, I was positive of something; more so than when I had gloated at Mother's victory.

She looked at me with tear-filled eyes. "M-Master p-prevented it," she hiccupped, "ag-gainst elf-f ma-magic!" Whether she was sobbing at her trying to break her master's rules or failing to rescue my brother, I never knew.

I chewed on my lips, suddenly feeling very much like I was Sirius, standing on the doorway to an incredible adventure. My heart was pounding, the pavement's twinkle was crazier than ever, and the gentle moonlight was humming a wordless lullaby in my ears. My throat was dry. I was determined. So that was why Sirius was such a thrill-seeker, after all. It didn't feel so bad to flout and recklessly disregard every unquestionable rule. I promised myself I'd tell Sirius as soon as I'd see him.

I paced up and down, circling around the pattern. In my mind, it had taken a diabolical personality; I wouldn't have done much more than startling if a blazing, sulphur-reeking salamander-like entity had materialised inside the circle. I didn't dare crossing its lines: I could feel power coursing through them, I was too afraid I'd be gone in a bolt of lightning, with only my shoes left behind as a proof to what happened to badly-behaved little wizards. (At the time, half-hearted attempts at humour were my strongest weapons)

I only wanted to flee, but, undisturbed, my feet went on. Damned if I backed down. I felt I had done too much of that. Particularly where my brother was concerned. I had treated him as some would of an exotic idol that had displayed unknown powers. Well, the idol was going to be thrown down of its pedestal, I coldly thought as I once again immobilised to consider the paving.

I didn't want to wait, I wanted my brother back as soon as possible. But the library wards did not permit me to enter at night - a souvenir of the days when Father's great-great-great-great-grand-aunt had been a bookworm of the sneaky species, and would have foregone eating and sleeping to revel in the joys of learning. Since that time, the spells had not been lifted. The closest deed I could accomplish was plotting my avenging of the Black name, and this required careful planning. I doubted whether Father would allow me on his plans, and I was in no mind of letting Sirius walk away so easily and spend the best summer of his life while leaving his little brother dead bored back at home. I wasn't his bloody trophy wife, to accept such a conduct.

A routine was set up, where I'd spend the best part of my time in the family library, flipping through impressive volumes that spoke of spells I had never heard of, each one more outlandish than the previous ones.

First, there were the simple warding spells that just asked for brute strength to remove them: anyone with a wand could have a go, as well as some wandless-gifted - I tried to shake my mind off Mother's move at the tapestry, for if I still couldn't believe it could have simply been caused by a curse that I knew Father could barely handle, I refused to admit that my mother's powers dabbling in wandless magic would have been the most logical solution to that magical riddle.

There was a legion of blood-wards, some asking for mere presence, other demanding to be fed by some drops of blood to be changed in any way, some that automatically maimed anyone who tried to alter them when they weren't of the blood, some that fed upon muggle blood and that could be used to protect a wizarding family, some that asked for all the family to be reunited, with no outsider, and even one or two that were triggered by sacrificing a descendant of the blood.

There were others that asked for incantations and candle-burning and tears and wax, and for wand-drawn pentacles upon a human chest. There was a handful that were to be woven in the foundations of the shelter; there a dozen which had to be built by a former enemy, and some that could only collapse when touched by the one who had crafted them. There were those that could be activated by a password and those that only the death of the enchanter could switch off. There were mad travelling wards whose physical attach was constantly travelling, and wards you could curse your foes with, making them as good as vanish, for all purposes, putting them out of the reach of their allies, until it pleased you to bring the chase to an end.

There were wards that fed upon the attempts to dispel them and wards that only started to exist when enemies believed they did. There were wards that adapted to whatever was thrown at them and others that could regrow themselves. Some would create an illusion of your home, luring enemies in a sense of false security, until they ate through the wizards; some could be wished upon a sole individual by another sacrificing, consenting individual. Some were so small they could be used as shields against Bludgers, and others could be articulated to adjust to any disposition, independently of the others.

I can remember the parchment and leather of the books. They were sticky with dust, unopened since generations, house-elves forbidden to touch them. Their smell was sharp like forgotten tea that had been left to infuse for too long, with a musty trace of soured glue. Some looked as if they dated back to the Middle Ages, and, more than once, I developed a headache deciphering the peculiar writing. Sometimes the spells were accompanied by illustrations, more often gruesome than not. In a couple of books, the ink had turned to rust; in others, vermin had prospered, often to magical proportions, turning into monstrous mix of worm and mouse, into tiny insect unicorns that left slug traces behind them. Or I'd found vermin mysteriously dead between two pages of a book, and the ink on those pages would seem more vivid than elsewhere.

My eyes would water and I'd be sent in a coughing fit, and I'd feel my shoulders and arms pulling, but the leather was strong and never broke, and the binding still wore traces of gilding, and the title was still in relief; when I ran my fingertips on the letters I'd feel a pleasant tickling sensation.

I'd find that sensation again, when, during the night, I'd sit cross-legged next to the pattern to experiment the spells I had came across. I had never been happier I had taken Arithmancy at Hogwarts; I tried for combinations of two or more wards, and I'd squint at the pavement, refusing to let myself be distracted by its glowing in the night, refusing to let my eyes close. More than once, I childishly played hop-scotch on the dignified and so dangerous marble, puffing myself up at my conscientious ridiculing the heirloom. More than once, I'd get into my rooms, feeling distressed, to stare at my bed and stumble back to the pavement, where I'd spend some more hours trying desperately to shake its grounds.

When I'd sleep, my dreams were filled with labyrinths of dancing marbles in which I'd lose all of mine, endeavouring to catch the glimmering stones back. With cousins that alternatively appeared as sphinxes, as Greek goddesses or as banshees, always laughing the laugh of the pavement. With a brother that was sometimes laughing at me and sometimes prisoner somewhere in the labyrinth, dusty books keeping him from joining me. With sombre and hovering presences I knew were my parents that obliged me to duck behind the nearest rock, with scenes taken right out of the illustrations I had watched.

Each new task left me rummaging frantically in my schoolbag, in which I found failing marks in Arithmancy, lemon lollipops that spelled strength into me and Muggle books that gave away the solutions of the trials. Now I think I may have had two or three times the same dream, where Andromeda would purposely burn my bag before cutting my veins open, stating it was to help Sirius and she knew I loved him and he was my brother and I really should be happy to help him. Which I was, explaining how I unfailingly let myself be convinced by her sweet words. I think I may have dreamt of my cousins killing him after Mother set Andromeda on flames, as revenge.

During the days, after some hours spent in the library, I'd often feel as if the books were eluding me; I'd put one on a desk but when I'd look back, it would have appeared back to its shelf; I'd reach for a book but when I'd put my hand on it, I'd realise it was some other title; I'd turn back to return to the table but I'd suddenly find myself facing another shelf where I thought was an alley; entire shelves seemed to migrate from one part of the library to the opposite area; sheets I had taken notes on disappeared between the pages of a book, and sometimes I'd realise I had but recopied twenty pages of a book on Dreamcatchers Wards.

Then I would leave the silent library. It didn't feel as if it were mocking or hostile. It only felt quiet and quietly happy at having managed to lead an intruder away.

I'd go to the door that had once let me to Grimmauld Square, and I'd try pulling it open, fingers clenched against the black iron snake-shaped handle. I was afraid if I battled against it I'd set alarms shrieking and that would alert Father, but he never showed up and I finally decided it was because he had been very sure a thirteen years-old boy never could work through the wards. I had smiled to myself in reaction, and I had coldly gone back to my equations. I would show him his second son was just as worthy of wearing the Black name as his heir.

I only saw my parents at mealtimes, similarly to every other summer holidays. They were of the opinion young wizards should be watched from afar, if at all. I knew Sirius had often been; but I was softer, and they couldn't imagine I'd challenge them at thirteen - though I know now they were on the verge of fretfulness the years after, especially concerning my frequentation of pretty Muggle-born witches.

One night at last, the glow emitted by the pavestone flickered, and I knew something had happened; one of the wards was defected. All my sleepiness disappeared with the yellowish glint; I quickly performed a battery of discerning spells, so I knew what kind of ward was momentarily suppressed, and stifled a sigh of disappointment when I realised it was the ward on our fireplace: I now could communicate through Floo powder, though I knew the ward on Floo travel was still effective.

My nervousness returned, a thousand times stronger than before. I hesitated for a minute on which fireplace I should use: I felt as though I couldn't remember what rooms had one, and I was obsessively worrying about being caught while running to a room corridors and corridors away, slippers thumping against the hard stone floor as I'd run, vainly striving for discretion. All it would take was for my heart to beat as noisily and fast as it was now doing, and at a corner there'd be Kreacher, grinning with a mad spark in his eyes at the idea of carrying my parents' orders out. Would I manage to convince him telling Mother would only hurt her? I doubted it. Kreacher was a stupid as any other elf.

Incapable of concentration, I just turned towards the gigantic fireplace of the room. In winter, there was a blue fire that perpetually ruffled in its dark cavity; now, it was empty and seemingly-bottomless like a too-deep well. Before I had time to think about it, the fire was dancing with azure flames, my wand in my hand. I thanked my ancestors we were such an ancient family we children could use magic without having the Ministry breathing down our necks. From a chiselled vase of cool green crystal on the mantelpiece, I took a handful of Floo powder usually only my parents could use, and I threw it into the hearth.

Crouched before the flames, I stuck my head in them as they turned green, and whispered as clearly as I could, "Godric's Hollow". I struggled to keep my eyes open as everything whirled and buzzed around my head, until I found myself looking out from a fireplace in a kitchen. Two teenagers, older than me, both black-haired, were sat, heads bent down to the kitchen table, upon which a stack of parchments of all sizes was messily piled up. They had two mugs close to their elbows.

It took me half a second to adapt to the light and to recognise my brother. "Sirius!"

Both of them jumped up, Sirius's elbow barely missing his mug, and looked straight at me. Their faces took an astonished expression, and Sirius's eyes widened. "Regulus?" he asked in a puzzled voice. "What are you doing here?"

I tried to nod at my name, but only succeeded in rapping my chin against the rough grate stone. "You need to come back!" I exclaimed before my mouth had the time to demand if he was all right. Sirius's expression closed, his mouth thinned and he glared at me. I was oblivious to everything but the pain in my knees and how crucial it was that Sirius come back home.

"You have to come back," I repeated when Sirius didn't answer.

"I need to."

I didn't pause, I didn't think, I didn't listen. I acted exactly like Sirius would have.

(it should be the perfect moment to worry about what-ifs, what if I had paused, what if I had analysed his words or his expression or his countenance, what if I had not forgotten Potter was still in the room and not about to leave - leave! Imagine that, a Potter respecting privacy, a Potter discreetly leaving to let two brothers have a private talk, leaving before a Black, while Potter was in his own kitchen! It would be the perfect moment for what-ifs, but I decided long ago that Sirius wasn't worth what-iffing over, so don't expect me to break down. Don't expect tears, don't expect excuses, don't expect remorse. If I were Time-Turned to then, I'd still handle it that way)

"Of course you need to!" I impatiently replied. "You can't spend your whole summer there, can you!"

"I can't, can I?"

I realised then what I should have realised from the beginning. Sirius had assumed that mutinous and stubborn visage I knew all too well. I had witnessed him using it on countless occasions at Mother's recommendations, mirroring her own.

"No, no, I mean," I tried to make up for my foolish challenging, "you probably could, but you just can't!" My tone was nothing short of imploring. I caught a snort coming from Potter, but I didn't spare a glance for him, wholly focused on Sirius, and on the way his shoulders tensed at Potter's interference. "You must come back," I piteously added.

"It's the parents that sent you?"

Defiance. Probably other emotions, too, but at the time it took the breath out of me, and it was as if it blinded me. My knees and neck hurt terribly, and I felt very vulnerable, with him literally looking down on me. I was cold, and I'd have given anything to be still a little boy of eight wrapped up in his brother's cloak, upset because Sirius was going to leave for Hogwarts and leave him alone in a solemn house of many centuries.

"No!"

"Then why are you here?"

I couldn't believe the cruelty and callousness I heard in his voice. I must have looked utterly silly, jaw hanging open and eyes slowly filling up with tears, like a good house-elf. When I think I used to be completely crazy about him... had me wrapped up around his little finger, he did. I sometimes wonder if it was the same with his friends, if that's the reason why he acted like that, or if it wasn't, which would also explain why he acted like that, feeling like he had to prove he was worthy. Certainly not worth me, in any case. But I can only say that now. At the time it was the worst thing that had happened in my whole life. Is it still? I wonder.

He was eyeing me with great disgust showing in his every feature. (As a matter of fact, I'm now wondering if there was something kin to fear in his eyes, or if I imagined it afterwards, because it would have been more forgivable that way, if he was unsure of himself. I think this might be relevant, and perhaps revealing of something too, though about him or about me, I'm not sure. I probably imbibed too much alcohol for this, but that was the only way I could defeat my inhibitions and speak about it. Going back to the topic)

I know I was crying, and his nose wrinkled. Everyone always said he and Bellatrix looked remarkably alike, and I never was more aware of their resemblance than at that time, as my nightmares flew before my eyes.

"Why are you here?" Harder tone. I remember I felt as if I was being interrogated by a Polyjuiced Auror. There was another snicker from Potter, along with something that sounded like "Snivellus", or perhaps I just didn't hear. I was busy staring at my brother.

Looking back, I suppose I wouldn't have been surprised if I had realised it had just been a nightmare of a novel kind. There was no way it could have been worse. I've always had surprisingly bad luck every time something could go wrong. You'll just need to remember what happened an hour ago, when I tried reflecting that curse. Ahem.

I think my voice was trembling, and feeble, and unsure, but I'm almost sure it wasn't whiny. "Because you're my brother, Sirius. You're my brother," I pressed when I saw him about to object, "whether you like it or not. You can't just disappear and expect me to do nothing!"

"It's always about blood with you, isn't it?"

"What are you on about, Sirius? You're my brother, so of course it's about blood! It's not something you can change because you're upset that Father didn't congratulate you on your OWLs or because Mother failed to notice you had two detentions less than last year!"

"I wouldn't be so sure of it, if I were you," he advised.

"I beg your pardon?" I asked. Shouting at Sirius in order to make him do as I wanted was not the wisest thing to do, and going against him when he so clearly liked to follow no-one but himself - and possibly Potter, but that one is another problem - was plainly stupid, but the git had managed to infuriate me more effortlessly than my uncle looking at me in condescension when, as a child, I had tried to speak up for Mother.

"I said don't be so sure of yourself," he said with a satisfied smirk.

I willed my anger under control. At that instant, I thought him more childish than ever before, and I was utterly unbelieving. "Right. So, my not-brother, may I be so audacious as to ask you when you intend on coming back, or, alternatively, when you thought you were going to tell me you'd spend your summer with your friends?"

He rolled his eyes. "Drop it, Reg."

"And I should 'drop it' because?" My sarcasm was wearying itself out, and my voice was rising to a point where I couldn't pretend I wasn't angry any more, which I wasn't, of course. I was beside myself with blind, blue-hot fury. "You're acting as if you were four, running away and sulking because you're unhappy with Mother, so take it upon yourself and don't moan that it looks as if I'm the big brother!..."

"Of course, because it's my fault, then? It always is, isn't it?" Sirius heatedly retorted.

"Yes! It is!"

He gawked and did a wonderful goldfish imitation. Somewhere in my wrath, it reached me as somehow venomously rewarding.

"Look around you, Sirius. What are you doing here? Is that Gryffindor bravery? Running away because you're too much of a coward to face your family?" I didn't let him start again. "Yes, I know we're not your nice and happy Gryffindor family, but we're still your family! And pretending we aren't isn't going to make things any better! If you tried doing what Mother told you, perhaps it'd be easier for everyone involved!"

"Oh, I see." He sneered. "So I should just imitate you?"

"Well - I - Sirius, stop that!"

"Oh, really? You can come and disturb a quiet evening in between friends, shouting at one for no good reason at all, but of course we can't speak for ourselves, right?"

"Well, I'm sorry to disturb, but if your friend-" I spat the word with, alas, unmistakable scorn "- deigned to take his noble Gryffindor arse somewhere else, then it would take considerably less time!"

"Don't insult James."

"Don't divert the topic. Topic is that you have to come back, if only because we're family. We're your family," I repeated. I think I may have been trying to convince myself. Looking back, I don't know when it suddenly became a matter of coming back at all, and not just a fit of teenage anger, when I realised what it was, when I started pleading for Sirius to come back.

"Not anymore," he grimly informed me. If I looked as horrified as I felt, there's no wondering at why he continued like he did.

"What?" I gasped. "Sirius - I know you think you hate her and she hates you, but I know she loves you, she does," I insisted, "and Father, Father was so proud of your OWLs results, and I miss you."

He slowly shook his head, eyebrows raised, and I exploded. "Dammit, Sirius, I'm your brother!" (it has since then struck me how pathetic it was that that was my only argument)

He laughed, a cold laugh that sent shivers down my neck as I remembered my cousins laughing in my dreams. I was fearfully gazing at him. He abruptly stopped.

"No, you're not. You are Regulus fucking Black, the fucking Black heir, and you are no brother of mine. You are not; Peter is, and Remus is, and James is." He looked as if he wanted to go on, and he probably did, but instead, he clenched his jaw and left.

I wanted to shout at him, but some part of me must have been afraid I'd be heard by Kreacher, because I didn't.

I got up, mechanically brushed the dust off my robes, and went to the tapestry. It was not that I had avoided looking at it; but I had spent all of my thirteen years walking every day next to it, and nothing new had happened on it for years, no weddings, no births, no deaths. In fact, I was so completely used to seeing it that admitting there had been something, I never would have noticed it without someone telling me. But at that moment, I looked at it, and I looked straight at the lowest line of the tapestry, where I remembered having seen first five names, then four, and, now three.

Where Sirius' name used to be embroidered, first in the line, oldest child of an oldest child, the tapestry was now marred by an ugly burning mark.

I pictured my mother pointing her wand at her first-born's name.

I supposed I understood why she had looked so put out recently.

I admitted to myself this didn't surprise me as much as I'd have liked. I had more or less feared something like that since Father had stated Sirius had fled. I didn't know when she had done it; anytime since that day... That was two weeks ago. I realised I had forgotten to count those two weeks trying to break through the wards when I had endeavoured to sweet-talk Sirius into spending the remaining part of the summer at home; there would have been only two weeks, not one month. In fact, I had tried to persuade myself things hadn't been broken beyond repair, and I had succeeded, but reality couldn't be mended like I had wished.

I admitted everything and I admitted that was real.

Then I went to my room, and, replaying Sirius' words as he told me I wasn't his brother, I burnt everything that had once belonged to him. They were his brothers. For what it was worth. After experiencing first hand how exactly Sirius treated his brothers, I didn't doubt they'd get what was coming to them. He had already betrayed one brother; it shouldn't ask much more efforts to do the same with three others.

He hasn't yet, and now I don't think I will ever see him do so, if only because I think he has changed. I've given much thought to the matter during the last few years, and I'm convinced I was wrong: he wasn't betraying me, or at least he didn't think he was. The Dark Lord would be wasting his time if he tried to recruit him, and I won't lose mine that way. I've already prayed and implored and pleaded and cried at Sirius' feet. I was young; I had excuses. It wasn't pleasant. I'm not about to do it again. Anyway, it'll be no use. He's more mulish than I am.

I'm wasting my life instead?... Oh, well. You know. I never wanted to be the Black heir. And after all, blood is more important than name, so I suppose there's nothing to worry about : the Black blood will still run in the child my cousin Narcissa is bearing.

No, I'm not angry. Though this is an odd question to ask in such circumstances. Obviously, you're drunk. No need to argue, I completely agree. That's the only reason you wondered why I had defied the Dark Lord and I answered. No, I didn't make you drink as a part of my nefarious purpose to flee and get you killed by an irate Dark Lord in the process; I'm quite smashed. Couldn't remember which end of the wand to point at you.

Well, let's get done with it, then. Send my wand to my brother after you're finished, and try not to be around when the Dark Lord designate a volunteer to go and convince Sirius, if you take my meaning. No future in it.

Right, I'm not angry at you. No, not even at your carrying out Master's orders. There, get a grip on yourself. I understand it's hard to kill a friend, but - I'm about to be, if you insist on keeping asking if I'm not angry. I'd have done the same if I were you, you know; obeyed the Master's orders, I mean.

Ah, but Sirius is something you'll never be. My brother.