Work Text:
Regulus knocked on his brother’s bedroom door.
“Alright alright, give me a minute, I’m coming” came the slightly annoyed voice of the room’s occupant.
“Sirius, it’s me” Regulus called.
“Oh, right. Sure, come in”
Regulus couldn’t help but note the distinct lack of enthusiasm in his brother’s impatient tone.
As he always did when entering Sirius’s bedroom, and had done for as long as he could remember, Regulus bit his tongue to refrain from commenting on the mess. Sirius had always hated him mentioning his lack of habit for keeping his room tidy.
“Reg, the next time you tell me I ought to make my bed, I’ll plant a nest of ants in yours” Sirius had threatened his brother several years ago, jabbing him in the chest for good measure.
Regulus had taken the threat to heart and instead devoted his efforts ever since to ignoring the unmade bed and items left strewn carelessly about the floor.
The younger Black’s gaze drifted towards his elder brother, who sat at his desk under the window, hunched low over a piece of parchment. The sound of his quill frantically scratching away filled the thick silence between them.
“Sirius, it’s nearly eleven o’clock”
“So?”
Regulus chewed his lip nervously.
“We need to go”
“Yeah, okay, in a minute”
Regulus’s foot rubbed against the floor, a nervous habit he had been trying to groom himself out of before he started school, with few results.
“Sirius, please, we’ll be late” he urged, trying not to let his nerves show through his voice. “Father said-“
“Father can wait two more minutes, Reg”
Regulus felt his stomach jolt as his brother snapped at him. He was used to Sirius’s short words, but so rarely had his renowned snappiness been directed at him.
The younger boy retreated into rigid silence, awaiting his brother’s next move. He glanced anxiously at the clock above Sirius's bedroom fireplace.
Eleven o’clock exactly. They were late.
Regulus tried to push the thought of the stern, disapproving look they were sure to get from Father out of his mind.
He watched as Sirius finally finished scribbling out the rest of whatever he was writing. Sirius then hastily folded the parchment and stuffed it into an envelope, scribbling an address on the front before handing the letter to his impatient-looking owl waiting on his perch beside the desk.
The handsome eagle owl had been a present from their parents for Sirius’s twelfth birthday last November.
Regulus remembered accompanying his father to Diagon Alley last autumn to purchase the owl. He never liked Eeylop's Owl Emporium at the best of times, with its pungent smell of straw and feathers and its mixture of loud screeches and claws scrabbling against the metal cages.
He'd had hated how the chosen bird’s bright yellow eyes had stared down at him intimidatingly, far harsher in appearance than the smaller, softer owls perched around it, but Father said the eagle owl was a dignified choice. And who was Regulus to disagree with him?
All the same, he hoped Father might choose one of the softer-looking birds for his own twelfth birthday later this year.
The owl, which Sirius had told them he’d named Hera in his thank-you letter home, was the result of a promise made to both boys by their mother that they could each have their own owls when they turned twelve, by which time they would be in school and have proper need of one.
Regulus had momentarily wondered to himself whether the promise would still be upheld in the lead up to Sirius’s birthday, considering the dramatics of his school Sorting less than two months previously.
Though it was common knowledge, even to those awaiting their turn under its judging gaze, that the Sorting Hat’s decision was final and that one had very little input into their own Sorting, Regulus had still wondered if Sirius’s surprise defection to Gryffindor could somehow be interpreted as yet another one of his dramatic, defiant stunts, for which he was known for.
The look on Mother’s face the morning of the 2nd September, when she had told Regulus the news of his brother’s failure to join his family in the ranks of Slytherin house as expected, had been an expression that practically screamed her disapproval of the news simply by her sheer, obvious struggle to conceal it.
Regulus had been left stunned that morning. Try as he might, he simply couldn’t imagine the Gryffindor colours of red and gold adorning his brother’s school robes. But then, there had never before been cause to imagine it. Not for one moment had this situation been expected by anyone in the family. Blacks were Slytherins, not Gryffindors.
It simply wasn’t done.
And yet, done was precisely what it had been.
And as odd as Regulus had found his own mental images of red-and-gold banners and rampant lions, it was nothing compared to the oddity his brother’s entire image had become in the few short weeks he had been home from school for the summer following his First Year.
Regulus had stared in awe, and bafflement, as his brother had approached them on the station platform on his first visit home from school. Whereas most of the other students had changed into Muggle clothes (“denim jeans”, Regulus had heard one of them calling the strange blue trousers he wore), Sirius was still clad in his school robes – his bright red and gold tie sticking out boldly against his white shirt, his Gryffindor badge with its rampant lion worn proudly on the breast of his black robes.
Regulus had pushed aside his thoughts of how strangely proud his brother looked of his uniform in favour of instead being glad that at least he hadn’t adopted the unfortunately growing trend for students to adopt Muggle dress.
As inwardly disapproving their parents looked at their eldest son's new school colours, Regulus could scarcely imagine how they'd have concealed their fury if Sirius had marched up to them on the station platform proudly sporting a pair of denim jeans.
Now, Regulus glanced around at the walls of his brother’s bedroom, eyeing the Gryffindor banners Sirius had proudly put up on his first night at home for the summer. Those banners, with their garish, snarling red-and-gold lions, had become a symbol of the newfound distance between the brothers that Regulus had felt growing a little more with each passing day of the holidays.
And now the end of the summer was fast approaching, the distance between them felt more painfully evident than ever.
As much as the younger Black hoped that his impeding First Year at Hogwarts would rekindle his bond with his brother, he was quite certain that he did not wish to follow his brother’s footsteps into the lion’s den of Gryffindor. Sirius may wear his bold colours of individuality with pride, but Regulus struggled to imagine how he would manage to resist withering under his parents’ critical gaze if he himself dared to do the same.
Giving his owl an affectionate stroke between her eyes (her harsh eyes seemed to soften only for him), Sirius unlatched his window and sent her off on her mission to deliver his letter. Regulus supposed it was yet another note addressed to James, the Potter boy from school with whom his brother seemed to have struck up a friendship which bordered on obsessive, in his opinion, for the amount of time Sirius spent holed up in his bedroom scribbling letters to him.
Far more time than he spent with his brother, these days.
The ugly, blaring noise of the Muggle vehicles trundling down the streets below filled the room for a few seconds, before a deafening silence filled the air between the two boys once more.
“Right, come on then” Sirius sighed as he shrugged his travelling cloak over his shoulders and did up the fastenings, tossing his hair out of his eyes. “Let’s get this over with”
Regulus felt a knot twist in the pit of his stomach. As nervous as he was about the prospect of getting his first wand, this was still a momentous occasion for both himself, and his family. He was stung by his brother’s seeming lack of enthusiasm for his big day.
He followed Sirius out of his bedroom and down the hallway in silence, remembering his brother’s reassuring words as he’d squeezed his hand one year ago today: “Only one more year, Reg…”.
The two boys entered the drawing room to find their parents stood by the fireplace, both clad in their smart travelling cloaks and impatient expressions.
“You’re late” said Orion Black, gesturing to the grandfather clock opposite the fireplace, proudly declaring the time to be five minutes past eleven.
“By what, five minutes? Hardly”
Regulus felt a fresh knot of nerves tighten inside him at Sirius's casual, defiant tone. Although known for his cheek, Sirius had never been so blatantly defiant quite so often as he had done in this past summer.
Regulus had felt the tension within the family rising a little more with each passing day of Sirius's sarcastic remarks, disrespectful tones and wilful disobedience of the simplest of orders.
“If your father says eleven o’clock, then we expect you to be here at eleven o’clock, Sirius Orion” said Walburga sternly to her eldest son, a clear note of annoyance flaring threateningly in her voice.
Regulus shuddered. Their mother had never had a high tolerance for Sirius’s penchant for wilfulness, but her patience seemed to have grown significantly shorter in the days that Sirius had been home from school. It took less effort for him to ignite her than it ever had before.
Sensing yet another argument brewing between his wife and eldest son, Orion cut off the confrontation with a firm order for Sirius to come forward to stand beside him.
Sirius may pick holes in his mother’s words with snarky and moody comments, but he still silently, begrudgingly, came forward when his father called.
Orion reached out to steer Sirius forward to the fireplace beside him, his hand gripping his eldest son’s shoulder tightly.
Jaw clenched in what appeared to Regulus to be an impressive attempt at restraint, Sirius stepped forwards into the fireplace alongside his father, keeping his grey eyes fixed firmly, unseeing, on the opposite wall, completely overlooking the sympathetic smile being offered to him by his little brother.
In a burst of green flames, father and son suddenly disappeared from the hearth a few seconds after Orion’s command of “The Leaky Cauldron”.
“Regulus, come”
His mother’s voice was notably less strained when she addressed Regulus than it had been when correcting his elder brother.
Regulus allowed himself to be led into the fireplace and tried not to think about the way his mother’s nails dug hard into his arm as she sent them on their way, following Orion and Sirius to the Leaky Cauldron in a burst of green flames.
Regulus coughed as the coal dust of the Leaky Cauldron hearth swirled up around him. He blinked harshly and went to rub his eyes free from the dark clouds of dust. Before he could gather his wits, he felt himself being firmly steered out of the fireplace. He stumbled to follow the guiding pull of the familiar hand on his shoulder and quickly found himself being vigorously brushed down by the invisible force of his mother’s cleaning spell.
“Gods have mercy, will they ever manage to keep this fireplace up to a reasonable standard of cleanliness?” said Walburga impatiently, turning her younger son this way and that to inspect him. “It’s absolutely ridiculous, a Floo fireplace shouldn’t leave one resembling a common Muggle sweep!”
With Regulus finally up to her high standard, the witch then turned her attention to her elder son. But although Sirius had always sullenly endured his mother’s fussing, with a token whine of resistance, Regulus was put out to see his brother outright jerk himself free from their mother’s grasp and attempt to dodge her cleaning spell.
“Hold still, you foolish boy” Walburga hissed sharply, grabbing her wilful eldest child firmly by the arm as she cast the spell to brush away the soot smuts from his robes.
“Get off” Sirius moaned, wriggling free of his mother's grasp. “I can do it myself”
“Really?” Walburga raised a critical eyebrow at her twelve-year-old. “I wasn’t aware that Hogwarts’ standards had fallen to the point that they allowed underage wizards to play about with cleaning charms at home”
“What’s the point when I can just brush it off?”
Sirius’s demonstration of wiping his hands down the sooty hems of his robes that his mother’s spell hadn’t yet reached was ill-advised.
“Now look what you’ve done!” Walburga snapped grabbing Sirius’s blackened hands and shaking her head in frustration when he tried to pull them free from her grasp.
“It’s only a bit of dirt!” he shot back, scowling.
“That’s quite enough of this”
The firm, commanding voice of warning from Orion Black never failed to instantly make Regulus feel he had done something wrong, even when, as it almost always was, the warning was directed at his elder brother and not him. But Sirius rarely ever seemed to let himself be bothered by it, at least outwardly.
“Sirius, you will cease this foolish juvenile behaviour and listen to your mother” Orion narrowed his eyes icily at his eldest son and heir, who continued to scowl but silently gritted his teeth and averted his eyes to the ground.
“Fine” he muttered. The closest to an admission of defeat his parents knew to expect from him. They had long since learned that an outright apology for his behaviour was hardly worth going through the tedium of forcing out of him. There simply wasn’t time, if they were to purchase all of Regulus’s school equipment and get to Ollivander’s Wand Emporium before they closed.
Besides, the little side room housing the pub’s Floo fireplace may be secluded, but they were still in public.
The family now suitably soot-free once more, Orion led the way through the door leading to the main pub entrance, his hand clamped firmly on Sirius's shoulder, who was wise enough not to pull himself free again.
As Walburga and Regulus followed behind them, a loud crack pierced through the icy silence between the four and their faithful house elf appeared, scurrying along behind as they made their way through the pub towards the entrance of the Alley.
As always, Regulus tried to keep his eyes averted from the curious (and somewhat suspicious) gazes of the pub-goers as they passed through the crowd. He hated being stared at, as though something about him was worth noticing.
"Of course they notice us. We're Blacks" Sirius had said of it once, a couple of years back, before he'd gone to school. "Blacks are special. You know that"
Regulus did know that. And so did Sirius. Or at least, Regulus thought he had. The lessons of their family's prestige within the Wizarding world - their wealth, status and above all, purity, had been driven into the two of them early on by their tutors, long before thoughts of Hogwarts even crossed their minds.
But now, one year into his Hogwarts education, Sirius did not carry his head high amongst the states of onlookers, as he once had. If anything, their half-hidden sideways glances seemed only to deepen his sullenness even further.
Regulus focused on avoiding eye-contact with the occupants of the pub as he followed the steering push of his mother's hand pressed to his back, towards the noise and bustle of the Alleyway and the relief of the relative anonymity the crowds provided.
As it had been exactly a year ago, the Alley was alive with the comings and goings of witches and wizards gathering supplies for the fast-approaching school year. Too many feet jostled for space on the too-narrow cobbled pathway and one could barely hear oneself speak over the many voices vying to be heard over the buzz.
Looking ahead at his elder brother, Regulus could see that Sirius had perked up now they were actually on Diagon Alley. Sirius had always loved visiting the Alley, and looked forward to every rare visit, despite their parents never allowing him to visit any of the strange and obscure shops that caught his interest.
However, Regulus couldn't help but notice a slight difference in what caught his brother's attention. On last summer's visit to the Alley, to procure Sirius's school things, Sirius's head had darted in the direction of the various shops and stalls that always caught his eye. This time, however, his keen gaze didn't seem to quite meet the shop fronts. Sirius instead seemed to be searching the crowds of people swirling around them.
Searching for his new friends, Regulus supposed to himself, with a pang of bitterness.
And it seemed his search was not one-sided.
"Hi Sirius!"
The high-pitched voice of a boy about Sirius's own age rang clear as day over the buzz of the hundreds of other voices in the Alley. Regulus followed it to find a tall boy in smart robes offering a friendly wave to his brother as he passed them by, accompanied by a man whom Regulus could only assume was his father.
Sirius waved back with a smile - a smile which Regulus realised was the first genuine, lively, smile he had seen his brother give since he'd been home from school.
There it was again. That pang of bitterness.
"Who was that?"
His mother's suspicious voice drew Regulus away from his thoughts. He glanced up to see her leaning forward to ensure her elder son could not claim to have not heard her question.
"A friend" Sirius replied blankly, his smile wiped clean away once more.
"Which friend?"
"A friend from school"
"Don't play coy with me, Sirius Orion"
"Relax, Mother, he's a pureblood"
Regulus bit his lip nervously. Their mother was not in the mood for cheek today, that much had already been made perfectly clear.
"Well he certainly can't be one of any standing or I wouldn't need to enquire his name" Walburga's icy tone sent shivers down her younger son's spine, but seemed to do nothing to chastise her elder.
"And do not take that tone with me"
Sirius flinched ever so slightly at the hiss of her last words, but didn't get any further than opening his mouth to retaliate before he was cut off by his father.
"Enough" Orion snapped, shooting a warning glare neither directly to his wife or son. "We have enough to get through today without delays due to silly arguments"
He turned his head down towards Sirius. Regulus noticed his grip on his brother's shoulder tighten possessively.
"Sirius, when your mother asks you a question, you will answer it properly. If you cannot behave properly in public then I will have her escort you home. Is that understood?"
"Fine" Sirius muttered, turning his head to stare into the crowd in the opposite direction of his father's gaze bearing down on him.
"Excuse me?"
"Yes, Sir"
As the family traipsed from shop to shop, picking up booked, potion ingredients and robes, Regulus was distracted from the day he had looked forward to with such nervous excitement by the fact that Sirius seemed very... distracted. He craned his neck as he stood still being measured for his school robes to see his elder brother staring eagerly out of the window, searching the crowd yet again.
On the one hand, it stung to see Sirius so withdrawn from the day they had both anticipated for so long - the day it would finally sink in that they would both be going to Hogwarts, together.
But on the other hand, if Sirius was quiet, at least that meant he wasn't clashing with their parents.
By the time they left Twilfitt and Tatting's robe outfitters with a large parcel of new school robes (added to the top of the growing pile weighing down poor Kreacher's spindly arms), Sirius was looking more bored than ever, attempting to lag behind the rest of the family.
Regulus couldn't help but notice that his brother's head still lifted to scan the passing crowds, hopefully. He was sure his brother was on the lookout for someone in particular.
James Potter, I bet, Regulus thought to himself. His mind wandered back to the letter his brother had been so insistent in sending right before they'd left for the Leaky Cauldron. Had he perhaps been trying to arrange some sort of meeting?
If he had, Regulus knew better than to voice his suspicions. Sirius would only loudly deny them, and their parents would surely send him home early, just in case. And Sirius would do worse than ignore him. He would shun him.
Besides, Regulus reasoned to himself as they approached Ollivanders' wand emporium at long last, it's not like Sirius would ever have a hope of escaping long enough to meet up with his school friend.
"Don't dawdle, Sirius" said their mother as she herded her lagging elder son into the shop.
"Wouldn't dream of it" Regulus heard him reply sullenly from behind.
A fresh wave of nerves washed over Regulus as he entered the dimly-lit shop and was hit by the same stale, dusty smell that had lingered in the air a year ago. This was it. The moment he'd been waiting for. At long last, he was getting his own wand.
The shop front was deserted, as it had been the last time the family had set foot inside it. Ollivander was once again nowhere in sight. And once again, after a few moments of waiting, Orion cleared his throat expectantly and, as if by magic, Garrick Ollivander appeared from behind one of his many shelves of wands, as though he'd been waiting just behind the corner this whole time.
"Good day to all, good day" the wandsmith greeted airily, striding forward to his shop counter. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"My son, Regulus Black" announced Orion, clapping a hand on Regulus's shoulder. "Is ready to receive his wand"
In spite of his nerves, Regulus couldn't help but feel a little warmer inside. There was the same faint note of pride in his father's voice as he spoke of him as there had been when he'd introduced Sirius to Ollivander a year ago.
Before he'd received his unconventional wand, the voice of doubt reminded Regulus from the back of his mind.
Ollivander's crystal blue gaze dropped downwards from the elder Black to the boy stood beside him.
"Regulus Black, you say?" he asked, raising his eyebrows.
"Yes, sir" Regulus replied politely.
"Ah yes, of course!"
To Regulus's surprise, the wandmaker's attention diverted away from him, and he pointed a long, spindly finger in the direction of Sirius, who leaned heavily against the shop window and had been gazing out of it absent-mindedly until he heard his name being spoken.
"Sirius Black, wood of ebony, twelve inches, and phoenix feather core" the wandsmith recited, as he had done to their parents last year. Regulus wondered if the man was capable of not greeting folk by their wand specifications.
"Yes, indeed, I remember you most clearly. How could I forget the first phoenix wand I've ever sold to a Black? It has served you well, I trust, in school?"
"It has" Sirius replied as he reached into the inside pocket of his robes and drew out his wand, square-handled and etched with runes, and twirled it round in his fingers proudly.
Caught off guard, Sirius didn't notice his mother snatching his wand from his grasp until it had fully slipped from his fingers.
"Hey!" he snapped, leaning forward in an attempt to grab it back, but Walburga had already deposited it inside the pocket of her travelling cloak, irretrievable.
"Your wand is not a toy to be played with during the holidays, Sirius Orion" Walburga said firmly, smoothing the material of her cloak. "And when I placed it inside the first floor storage cupboard and locked it, I'd assumed that it went without saying that I expected it to stay there until the end of the summer"
Before Sirius could argue back, he was cut off by the voice of Ollivander himself, a tad more serious than before.
"Your mother is indeed correct, my boy. A wand is not for playing with, especially not outside of school at your age"
Regulus felt his father's grip on his shoulder tighten a little, a clear sign of his displeasure at the wandsmith's remark. Papa never appreciated outsiders attempting to discipline his sons. Well, Sirius.
Sirius's face retreated to its sullen scowl once more, the corner of his mouth twitching in irritation.
He slouched heavily against the shop window, reluctantly standing up straight after receiving a firm, correcting tap from his mother.
"Now then" Ollivander's brisk, cheerful voice returned, breaking the awkward silence hanging in the air and startling Regulus a little. "Come forward, young Regulus, and we shall begin"
Waiting for his father to release his grip on his shoulder, Regulus stepped forward to the desk.
"Your wand arm, if you please"
He held up his right arm and the tape measure on the counter sprang to life and leapt into action, coiling itself around Regulus's arm at every conceivable angle before reporting back to its master for inspection.
Regulus watched apprehensively as Ollivander peered closely at the measuring tape, muttering to himself.
"Hmm, yes. Yes, indeed. Ah, I see. Most interesting"
Regulus didn't like the sound of interesting. Interesting meant peculiar, which meant different. Different was Sirius's job, not his.
"Now then, young Regulus" Ollivander peered down at him over the desk, his ice-blue eyes glimmering curiously. "Tell me, have you found your magic to be particularly forthcoming?"
Regulus hesitated before shaking his head timidly.
"Not really" he admitted, trying to hide the note of shame threatening to make itself known.
"Come off it, Reg, what about that time you cast a full-power shield charm when you were five?"
Regulus turned at the sound of his elder brother's voice and couldn't help but smile a little to see Sirius looking as proud as he'd spoken.
Beside him, their mother's brow furrowed in scolding at her firstborn's loud interruption.
"Remember, that Christmas we spent at Noire House? That was one hell of a shield"
"Yes, but only because you were throwing snowballs at me" Regulus retorted, smiling shyly at his brother, glad of the encouragement in spite of their mother's obvious disapproval.
"Interesting, indeed" Ollivander cut in, tapping his fingers on the wooden counter. "I sense your magic is rather timid, my boy. Not quite as, shall we say, bold, as your brother's hmm?"
"Regulus's magic is perfectly strong, I assure you" came Orion's clipped voice, clearly put out by the hint of a suggestion that a son of his could be classed as weak in any sense.
"Oh no, I don't suggest otherwise" Ollivander replied, airily, absentmindedly brushing a speck of dust off of his counter.
Regulus had seen younger, stronger men stammer in response to the suggestion they had insulted his father and was struck by the wandsmith's lack of care for the matter.
"Merely that perhaps your son will require a rather different wand to that of his brother. Despite their bond, I do not sense their individual magic styles to be two peas in a pod, shall we say"
If Orion had deemed the aged wizard's comments on his offspring worth a reply, he did not get a chance to offer it, for the wandmaker turned away with a swish of his robes and retreated into his high fortress of wand shelves, humming to himself thoughtfully.
After several minutes of awkward silence between the family, broken only by the scuffling of footsteps and the sound of boxes being pulled out, opened, and pushed back into their place on the shelves, Ollivander finally returned to the shop front with a long, black wand box, identical to the ones Regulus remembered seeing from their visit last year.
"Now," began Ollivander, sliding the wand out of its box and holding it up to be seen before offering it to Regulus. "Alder wood, eleven inches, dragon heartstring"
Regulus reached out and wrapped his fingers around the handle of the wand, gripping it tighter as he felt the warmth of the wand's power mingling with his magic.
"A most interesting wood, alder" Ollivander explained as Regulus examined the wand closely, noting it's swirling markings. "Not a wand for the particularly chatty wizard. But then, I rather think that's not quite your forte either, is it, my dear boy?"
Regulus answered Ollivander's chuckle with a weak smile, holding up the wand stiffly.
He ran his fingertips over the wand's handle for a moment, suddenly feeling very awkward in the expectant silence that followed. He could feel the waiting eyes of the wandmaker and his family baring down on him. He'd waited so long to hold a wand that could potentially be his, so why was he suddenly so self-conscious about waving it now he had one?
"Wave it, Regulus" at last came the gently prompting voice of his father.
Breathing in a steadying breath, Regulus waved the wand apprehensively in the air and promptly jumped backwards, bumping into Orion in the process, as the crystal vase of flowers on the counter shattered with a loud bang.
"I'm sorry!" Regulus squeaked anxiously, shakily putting the wand back onto the counter and snatching his hand away quick, as though it were red hot.
"Wow, nice one, Reg!" came the laughing voice of Sirius from across the room.
Regulus turned round to see his brother's face lit up with joy, clearly amused by his humiliation.
"I didn't think you had it in you!"
"Be quiet, Sirius" snapped their mother, shooting a sideways scowl at Sirius as she smoothed the front of her robes awkwardly, masking the way she'd clutched her chest at the sudden explosion.
"Not to worry, my boy, not to worry" Ollivander's reassuring voice sang as he mended the vase with his own wand. "That old vase has seen far more explosions than you've seen sunrises, I'll have you know"
He took up the alder wand from where Regulus had left it on the counter, and brought it close to his face for inspection before placing it back into its box.
"Alas, I expect that was enough of a hint for us to assume that the alder wand and yourself are not one in the same"
Reg drooped a little, disappointed at his unfortunate first go.
"Still, no matter, nothing to worry about. On to the next candidate!"
The wandsmith retreated back into his wand shelves once more, returning surprisingly quickly with a second box.
"Now then, perhaps something a little more subtle for your next try"
Relief washed over Regulus.
He watched as Ollivander slid the next wand out of his box, revealing a rather short, spindly wand with a swirling handle.
"Acacia wood, nine inches, dragon heartstring-"
Regulus spared a moment to silently thank the fates that the wandsmith seemed to think that he, unlike his brother, would uphold the Black tradition for dragon wands.
"A rather peculiar wood, acacia" Ollivander explained, twirling the wand lightly in his fingertips. "Not one I work with very often. A rather rare wood for a rather rare kind of wizard"
"I never got to try an acacia wand"
There was a clearly evident trace of bitterness in Sirius's voice.
"This is not about you, Sirius Orion"
"I know, I was only saying-"
"Well, don't. Be quiet and behave"
Regulus looked to his brother just in time to see him glance out of the show window wistfully as he sighed. His brother was getting bored already. And Regulus knew all too well that Sirius was at his most irritable towards their parents when he was bored.
Feeling the impatience of the situation, Regulus barely allowed the wand to tingle his fingertips as he took it from Ollivander before he gave it a determined wave.
"Not so-"
Ollivander scarcely had time to jump back from his counter before the entire wooden structure burst into flames. The tape measure sprang into life and launched itself around it's master's neck like a possessed scarf, with the man himself batting its coils away as he frantically cast jets of water from his wand to put out the fire.
"-hasty"
Regulus stood, rooted to the spot, petrified with shock at the damage he had caused.
He anxiously looked up at his father to find his grey eyes wide with alarm, staring at the charred desk as its owner set about mending the damage.
Behind him, his mother looked equally shocked at the damage her timid younger son had produced, whilst, beside her, even Sirius looked startled. The joking remark Regulus had expected from his brother never arrived.
"No, not a match either, I'm afraid" Ollivander chortled a little, as though one's shop counter bursting into flames were the most ordinary of events to occur of an afternoon.
Several minutes later, after coaxing the tape measure from around his neck and back onto the counter like a particularly nervous pet snake, with the counter gleaming freshly as if it were carved yesterday, Ollivander took back the offending wand from Regulus, who was only too happy to give it up, and deposited it back into its box.
The wandsmith must have felt the slight tremble in the eleven-year-old's fingers as he took back the wand, as he leaned over the counter and clasped a hand to the boy's shoulder, giving it an encouraging shake.
"Not to worry, my boy, not to worry. We've barely begun. Now, let us stop for a moment, take a deep breath and take stock of the situation"
His soothing tone worked it's magic, as Regulus felt himself a little more at ease from his reassurance.
An ease that quickly melted once more at the sound of his father's sharp voice.
"Sirius, stop fidgeting" Orion ordered as faint sounds of Sirius's shoe scuffing impatiently against the floor and nudging the spindly wooden chair beside him filled the room.
Regulus saw his brother glance impatiently at the old grandfather clock on the opposite wall of the shop for a moment before peering, somewhat anxiously, out into the bustling street. His foot, no longer nudging the chair, tapped the floor restlessly.
"Sirius, I won't tell you again" their mother hissed quietly, giving her wilful son a firm warning tap. "Be quiet and behave or I will take you home right now"
Regulus bit his lip anxiously. His brother was clearly reaching the limit of his famously-short patience. He needed to hurry up and find his wand before a row broke out - the atmosphere at home would be painfully cold all day if Sirius made a scene in public.
If his gaze hadn't been so fixed down at his own shoes, he may have noticed the wandmaker's intelligent gaze flickering between the family members thoughtfully.
"Perhaps something a tad more subtle may be what you need..."
A moment of silence followed as the wandmaker seemed to stare into space, deep in thought.
"Tell me, Regulus" he said suddenly, making the boy before him flinch at the sudden break in the silence. "I assume you have had lessons, prior to receiving your Hogwarts letter?"
Regulus nodded, a little curious as to why such a thing mattered now.
"Yes, sir" he said.
"And did you enjoy these lessons?"
Regulus did rather enjoy his lessons, as it happened. Unlike Sirius, who had lazily slouched back at his desk and doodled on the corners of his parchment during their tutor's lectures on astronomy, wizarding literature, blood purity and family genealogy (the subjects all Blacks were required to be expertly versed in) and yet still came out with impressive marks, Regulus had paid close attention to his lessons, genuinely finding the content interesting and wanting to prove himself worth of the name he'd been born with by mastering the skills expected of him.
"Yes, I do" Regulus nodded.
"In which case..."
Ollivander strolled back into the depth of his wand shelves, quickly returning with his next wand of choice.
"Ten inches, dragon heartstring, wood of beech" he announced, holding the wand out to Regulus, who took it and felt a reassuring warmth flow along his hand.
"May I suggest an attempt at turning those flowers from red to blue?" Ollivander suggested helpfully, gesturing to the recently-repaired vase.
Regulus dearly hoped the vase would not need to go through another repair today. But, unlike the alder wand, the beech did indeed feel more subtle.
He gave the wand a hesitant flick, noting that the wand's warmth increased for a moment, before suddenly going colder than before, as though it had decided once and for all that it was rejecting him as a potential partner.
Before him, the flowers on the counter began to grow a bluish tinge, before suddenly stopping halfway, the crimson mingled with the blue in a rather unfinished manner.
"Hmm"
Ollivander sounded thoughtful.
"One more time, dear boy, one more time"
Regulus tried again, forcing himself not to panic.
The flowers obediently became a little more blue at his request, but still failed to fully turn.
"Curious, I must say. I rather thought I may have hit that mark, for a moment" Ollivander sighed as he took back the wand from Regulus, who flushed slightly at his failure. "The beech does tend to favour the studious type. But then there's also the matter of..."
He paused for a moment, his twinkling blue eyes flickering up towards the formidable-looking Black parents thoughtfully for a moment before shaking his head, as though snapping himself out of a thought.
"No no, in any case, this is not a match. Moving on!"
Regulus wished he could feel as cheerful as the old wizard did.
Several more wands came and went. Regulus waved each one hopefully, and each time he was rejected. Though there were thankfully no more explosions or fires to speak of, his disappointment began to mount, thought he fought hard not to let his worry show through to ever-patient wandmaker.
Ollivander may be ever-patient, but Regulus easily picked up on the apprehensiveness and growing impatience of his family. He could hear the occasional rustling of his parents' cloaks as they began to tire of standing ever-tall and proud, waiting for him to hurry up and find his wand.
Sirius, by some miracle, had managed to resist causing any more reason for his parents to scold him - likely having wisely taken his mother's threat to take him home early to heart.
"Aha!" came the triumphant voice of Ollivander from within the midst of the wand shelves, as confident on this, the twelfth wand test, as he had been on the first. "Here we have it. I knew it was buried in here somewhere..."
He hurried to the shop front and dusted off a rather aged-looking wand box, its detailing faded in the years since it had been made. The wand inside it, however, shielded from the years' of dust, remained as gleaming and new as if it had been forged yesterday.
"Now, then. I have confidence in this choice" Ollivander held out the dark brown wand to Regulus. "Dragon heartstring core, eleven inches, and cypress wood"
Regulus wrapped his fingers around the handle, finding the strategically placed grooves in the wood to give it a snug and comfortable hold. Instantly, he felt a pleasant surge of warmth travel up the length of his arm. It was not overpowering, nor too weak. In fact, it felt as though the wand itself were trying to coax his magic forward to join forces with it.
"Now, Regulus" said Ollivander. "This time, I would like to you simply wave the wand and ask it to perform whichever task you feel appropriate"
Had the wandsmith asked such a request of him an hour ago, Regulus felt that he would have shaken with panic at the fear of what could happen if he attempted something so foolhardy with a potentially dangerous magical implement. But with this wand, with its encouraging warmth and perfect hold, he found the confidence to do as he was asked.
Taking a deep breath, Regulus waved the wand, grasped the concept of what he was asking lightly in his head, and waved it.
Suddenly, with a strong hissing noise, the entire shop filled with an enormous cloud of thick, forest-green smoke. The room filled the the surprised gasps and coughs of its occupants.
"I'm sorry!" Regulus cried out in panic into the dense, green fog of his own creation. He could scarcely see the hand in front of his face, let alone the wandmaker or his family, somewhere across the room.
"Not to worry, lad, don't panic!" called the voice of Ollivander, wheezing slightly from the smoke but nevertheless cheerful as ever. "Now, listen to me, I want you to remove this smoke!"
"But- I can't!"
"Yes, you can! This is your wand, Regulus, I'm most certain. Give it a wave, tell it what you want, and see what happens!"
Though not dangerous, the smoke was most annoying and inconvenient, not to mention likely to cause such a mess to the wands and their clothes, such was the richness of its emerald hue. Regulus needed it gone.
Taking as deep a breath as he dared in the dense air, he waved his wand and commanded the smoke to be gone.
And, in mere seconds, so it was. Sucked back into the tip of his wand quicker than water down a plughole.
Regulus glanced around at the shop, taken aback by how clean everything was. Not one surface was left with a green smudge. He glanced down at his own robes a split second ahead of his mother reaching him to examine him herself and found that his black robes and cloak were spotless, not a hint of a stain to be seen.
He glanced up his mother, and couldn't help but feel a sense of pride as she nodded approvingly at his pristine condition.
He'd done it. He'd asked his wand to remove the mess he had made and it had obeyed him.
He gripped the wand tighter in his fingertips and the warmth in his arm increased, like receiving a high-five from a friend.
But his moment of triumph was tarnished by a sudden, curious question from Ollivander.
"I say, where did young Sirius go?"
The heads of all three Blacks whipped round frantically in search of their missing fourth member, but Sirius was indeed nowhere to be seen.
"Sirius Orion Black!" called Walburga, her voice dangerously sharp. "Come out here at once!"
If Sirius was hiding anywhere within the shop, he chose not to obey his mother's command. Or else, perhaps he wasn't in the shop at all.
"Oh dear" tutted Ollivander with a shake of his head, before lifting a hand in sudden thought. "Ah, I wonder, perhaps, if he's stolen off to the joke shop?"
"And why would be do that?" asked Orion, scarcely attempting to hide the irritation in his voice.
"Why, for the demonstration, of course" replied Ollivander cheerfully, unaffected by the superior tone of the wizard before him. "There's to be a great demonstration of their new products this afternoon, I'm told. In fact, it's-"
He glanced across the room at the dusty old grandfather clock, which, as though to emphasise his point, struck three o'clock.
"-now, actually! Your son must have sized the opportunity in that cloud of smoke to steal away and join the other children for the show, I imagine. Just about every child I've served this past week has been buzzing with excitement about it! I'm quite sure your son will return soon, no harm done. Kids will be kids, after all"
The amused chuckle he flourished the end of his sentence with was neither returned, nor appreciated by either Orion or Walburga.
"He will return now" said Orion plainly as he marched towards the door, before his wife had time to take more than a step towards the door herself.
"Walburga, stay here with Regulus. I shan't be long"
Despite her obvious urge to follow, Walburga stayed put, her tightly-clenched jaw and tense posture giving away her obvious fury at this entire debacle.
Regulus watched as his father left the shop, striding quickly, yet gracefully, down the Alley and out of sight, towards the joke shop they had passed on their earlier travels, and which, now he thought about it, Sirius's head had perked up particularly at, like a dog caught onto the scent of a rabbit.
Regulus stood, amidst the awkward silence that remained in the absence of his father and brother. He observed his mother, stood at the shop window, arms folded, her foot tapping impatiently, not unlike the way her firstborn had been scolded by herself for doing not so long ago.
He clutched his new wand awkwardly, its tingling warmth still evident. His feelings of triumph and relief may have been short-lived, but at least the task was now complete. He had his wand.
Regulus smiled fondly down at the carved cypress wood.
"That is a particularly loyal wand you have been chosen by" came the kind voice of the wand's creator.
Regulus looked up to see the old man's ice-blue eyes smiling at his wand fondly, before looking up to meet his own grey gaze.
"Cypress wands favour those of nobility" Ollivander explained, leaning on the shop counter, relaxed now that his task of uniting wizard and wand was complete.
"Oh no, I don't mean your bloodline-" he held his hand up to half Regulus's reply, as though guessing his words (correctly). "-I mean nobility of character. It is indeed a happy day for me to match a wizard with a wand of cypress wood. It is truly a compliment to yourself that you are the owner of one, young Regulus"
The wandsmith nodded thoughtfully, staring into mid-air for a moment. Regulus didn't see fit to interrupt his thoughts with a reply.
"Yes, indeed..." Ollivander continued, with a sigh. "I'm sure this wand will aid you in your academic endeavours, my boy. As well as the challenges to come"
"Challenges?" Regulus asked, tilting his head questioningly.
"Oh, I mean only to say, that is, the challenges you will one day be faced with" Ollivander explained, vaguely, waving his hand airily. "You see, cypress wands are often seen as a sign of some... shall we say, task, to be completed by the wizard who owns it. This wand's choosing of yourself as its partner may suggest that you are indeed destined to fulfil some great and noble task. Though what that may be, of course, I cannot say"
Ollivander's words did little to reassure Regulus. He didn't quite like the sound of that. He didn't want to fulfil "some great and noble task". He wanted to go to school, learn his lessons, make the right friends and earn the approval of his parents and live up to his name as a Black.
But, who knew, perhaps that was the task?
The wandmaker's words still swimming through his mind, Regulus handed back his wand to its craftier to be boxed and wrapped, feeling rather a sense of sadness at the loss of its lively tingling in his fingertips.
As Ollivander was placing the final knot in the parcel string, the bell of the shop door tinkled merrily and Regulus whipped his head round to be greeted by the decidedly un-merrily scowling face of his elder brother, who was being hauled into the shop front by their father, gripping his son by the back of his robes, like a wriggling lion cub caught by the scruff of its neck.
"Sirius Orion!" hissed their mother, stepping forward to snatch her son from her husband, who gave up his hold on the boy willingly. "What in Merlin's name did you think you were doing?!"
"Get off!" Sirius snapped, pulling himself free of his mother's hold and hunching over sulkily. "Bloody hell, I was only at the joke shop a few doors down for the product demonstration"
"Do not use such crude language" Walburga snapped, giving her elder son a warning shake of the shoulder. "We did not give you permission to leave this shop, nor would we, to go to something so- so vulgar and childish"
"Exactly, so why do you think I didn't bother asking?" Sirius snapped back boldly, matching his mother's fury word for word.
Before a full-scale argument could occur in this most public of settings, Orion Black held up a silencing hand and ordered firmly "Enough" before rounding on his son.
"Sirius, you've made quite enough of a scene for one day. You will be quiet the remainder of this trip"
Sirius opened his mouth to argue back but was cut off.
"I have not finished" said Orion.
Unbeknown to him, the angry flare in his steel gaze sent a shiver down his younger son's spine. Regulus always felt an identical surge of gratitude whenever he saw that look in his father's eyes that his wrath was not directed at him.
"Now" Orion continued. "I will pay for Regulus's wand, after which we will return, directly, to the Leaky Cauldron and journey home. Once inside the house, you will stay there for the remainder of the summer, unless accompanied by either myself or your mother. Is that understood?"
"But you can't!" Sirius protested, balling his fists in frustration, his eyes widening with sudden alarm. "You said I could stay with James next weekend! That's why I had to go and meet him at the joke shop today, we had to discuss the arrangements!"
His frantic pleading was destined to fail from the beginning, and so, it did. Their parents were never ones to be negotiated with, only obeyed, or else.
"Don't talk rubbish, Sirius" Orion retorted, un-phased by his son's panicked expression. "You have a perfectly capable owl to deliver such correspondence. Merlin knows she's had enough letters to deliver to that Potter boy this summer already, I'm quite sure she'd have managed a few more to arrange this visit. Thankfully for her, those are trips she won't now have to make. You are staying home and that is final"
"But that's not fair, you said I could go!" Sirius whined, stamping his foot and appearing far less like the moody teenager he'd spent all summer pretending to prematurely be and far more like the insolent, scolded child his parents clearly still viewed him as.
"And now I am withdrawing that permission" Orion replied, simply. "You have clearly demonstrated today that you are incapable of behaving in an appropriate and respectful manner and I will not allow you to behave so atrociously in the house of another family, even if it is the Potters"
Sirius scowled indignantly at the jibe of his best friend's family, but before he could fire back whatever undoubtedly unwise remark he had planned, he was cut off once more.
"Is that understood, Sirius?" asked Orion, in a dangerously calm voice that was so rarely used but which both of his sons knew meant that the matter at hand was firmly and finally closed.
"Yes, Father" Sirius muttered bitterly, his eyes glaring daggers down at the floor, his fists balled so tightly that his knuckles whitened.
"Good" said Orion, before turning to the rather taken-aback Ollivander behind the desk. "The usual seven galleons, I assume?"
He pulled out the elegant, black velvet pouch of gold he always carried within the inside pocket of his robes and counted out the prescribed number of coins, which Ollivander took, silently, with a nod of thanks.
The wandmaker was clearly startled by the handling of the wayward elder son of the Blacks.
You get used to it, Regulus thought in his head, though of course, he would never dare to utter such a remark. He was not his brother.
With his wand bought and paid for, Regulus watched as his mother ushered Sirius out of the shop, her hand maintaining a firm grip on his shoulder that was unlikely to be released until they arrived back at the fireplace in the drawing room back at Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place.
"Regulus, come, we're leaving" Orion called to his younger son, his voice notably softer than when he'd scolded Sirius. "Mr Ollivander, good day to you"
"Good day, good day, all" Ollivander bade them farewell with a light wave, his cheery tone evidently more muted following the display of Black parenting he had witnessed.
"Goodbye, sir. Thank you for the wand" Regulus said, nodding politely.
Ollivander smiled down at him, his eyes suddenly much warmer, even fond as they gazed down at the eleven-year-old before him.
"Goodbye, my boy. And good luck!"
"I think I'll need it" Regulus murmured quietly, fiddling with the edge of his sleeve anxiously.
"Oh, I don't know about that" Ollivander said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "However, if I could offer a word of advice, I would tell you to take care to follow your own path, this year, at school"
Regulus's lack of understanding must have been evident in his expression, for the wandsmith leaned over his counter further and continued.
"Your wand is an encouraging one. Take heed and carve out your own way forward. Your brother will have his own battles to fight - don't allow his rather formidable current to pull you along with him. You may be bound by blood, but, I rather sense, not quite so bound by fate"
Before Regulus could utter a reply, not that he quite knew what words to reply to such a curious foreshadowing with, he was distracted by the voice of his father once more.
"Regulus, come along, now"
Though a tad firmer than before, his father's command was still softer than that of the ones Sirius usually received.
"Goodbye, sir. I'll remember" Regulus promised, as he hurried out of the shop door and after his family.
Ollivander's words played over and over again in Regulus's mind as he walked along the Alley beside his father and behind his mother, who's nails still dug firmly into Sirius's shoulder, with the ever-faithful Kreacher scurrying along beside them, his arms drooping heavily under the weight of his many parcels.
He mulled over the decided change in Sirius this summer; the constant, deliberate battle of wills with their parents, the locking himself away in his room writing to his new school friends, the shunning of his brother in favour of their clearly more amusing, written conversations...
Perhaps Ollivander was right. Sirius had changed since he'd been to school. Gone was the enthusiastic elder brother who had reassured him that it was only one more year until they'd both be at school, together. And in his place was this unfamiliar boy who gave off none of the protective elder sibling energy that Regulus had been so reassured by for as long as he could remember.
If Regulus needed any more proof that Sirius had chosen his path, his actions today, sneaking away from his brother's wand-choosing, a moment that was supposed to be one of shared excitement between them both, had proven it to him.
Regulus realised, miserably, as he left Diagon Alley behind for the dark, stuffy bar of the Leaky Cauldron, that his brother had indeed gone charging ahead along his own chosen path, unwilling, or unable, to wait for his little brother to catch up to him.
And so, it seemed, he must indeed begin to forge his own path ahead, or run the risk of getting lost.