Chapter Text
He's more myself than I. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.
Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
Cornwall, 1971
The garden was filled with the rich odor of lily of the valley, and when the late summer wind stirred through the tall reeds Regulus Black knelt in, it brought the scent of the sea. The garden of the Black family seaside home was kept in pristine condition for the ten months of the year leading up to the family’s removal from their ancestral home at 12 Grimmauld Place to the sequestered one in Cornwall. A charm allowed flowers that normally could not survive England’s southwestern climate to exist all year long.
Many of the resident house elves preceded the Black family in order to get the house in working order once more. This meant stripping the furniture of protective coverings, chasing out any dust that had accumulated since the prior summer, and opening up the windows to allow air to circulate throughout the home. Walburga Black, his mother, insisted on keeping several house elves behind in order to help the family close up 12 Grimmauld Place and, as everyone knew, to take her wrath out on when the stress of preparation got to her. Better the house elves than Sirius or himself, Regulus reasoned.
Regulus was appreciating the sullen murmur of distant waves and the seabirds circling with monotonous insistence when he heard his own name.
“Regulus?” Sirius yelled tentatively.
Regulus retreated further into his hiding spot, monitoring his breathing. He could see his brother approaching, his eyes slowly scanning the expanse of the garden.
“You can come out now Reg,” Sirius said as he suddenly pulled back the curtain covering the outside divan.
Regulus was gifted at hiding—better than his brother. He had had a lot of practice being that Walburga’s fits were not restricted to house elves. Also, Sirius never hid. His older brother always had to be in the center of things, even if it cost him.
“You win,” Sirius said, defeated.
A smile formed on Regulus’ face as he sprang up from his hiding position.
“Have you been there this whole time?” Sirius asked in disbelief. “I went over this area three times.”
“Four times by my counting,” Regulus said, practically beaming.
In the interim, Sirius had closed the distance between the two. With one swift move, Sirius had his brother in his arms and was spinning him around at an increasingly unstable pace.
“Admit it, you used a cloaking charm,” Sirius said.
He had begun to laugh.
“They’ve sent wizards to Azkaban for less,” Sirius said, quickly running out of breath to finish his mock threat.
Spinning out, both boys laid splayed on the ground. An eruption of joint laughter followed.
In the next moment, the lean shadow of Walburga Black descended on them and sent both brothers scrambling to upright themselves.
Her eyes darted from her eldest to her youngest before fixating on Regulus. She knelt down in front of him, eyes level, before running her finger across a spot of dirt on his shirt. Regulus looked to his brother, unsure of how his mother would react. After a few tense moments, she took her wand out and the spot was gone.
With disdain, she directed her departing comment at Sirius, “Do try not to get your brother dirty.”
Sirius was in a sour mood for the rest of the day, he spoke in monosyllables and left his brother at a loss for what to do. He tried to entice his brother by describing the elaborate pranks they might play on the locals, and, eventually, tried picking fights with him over nothing. Even an irate Sirius was better than a silent one.
When Regulus shut his eyes that night he had long ago resigned himself to the fact that his brother needed a day to himself. Which was why he was surprised when he woke to find Sirius’ hand over his mouth and his index pressed close to his own, indicating him to be quiet. No explanation needed, Regulus followed his brother out the bedroom window he had entered.
His heart was racing. He focused on Sirius’ and how his hair was so black that it blended into the darkness around them. Climbing down the outside trellis’, Sirius waited to make sure he found his footing.
“Run!,” he said in the next moment. Regulus knew where to.
He raced against his beating heart, the burning that consumed his lungs, and the pull of the sand, all in his effort to stay side by side with his brother.
Finally, Sirius came to a stop and fell to the sand in a mixture of exhaustion, nervousness, and rebellion. Beads of perspiration formed along his hairline.
Looking out, Regulus watched the moonlight refracting off the small crests of the waves. The strain of his lungs became a dull inconvenience.
“I thought you were upset,” Regulus said, continuing to look out at the sea.
“I was, but I was also planning.” Sirius had dug his hands into the sand beside him and felt it run in and out of his fingers.
“You got in trouble because of me-,”
Sirius cut him off, “Don’t give her power out here too.”
Regulus looked at his brother, comprehending. He knew what this was about: Sirius was leaving for his first year at Hogwarts in two weeks—leaving him.
A silence overtook them before Sirius jumped up. “She said not to,” he started, talking through the fabric of his sweatshirt as he removed it, “get you dirty.” “Nothing about water though,” he said.
He smiled at his brother’s cleverness. “How right you are.”
In this moment, an onlooker would see two shadowy figures bounding toward the sea. They would not know that the Black brothers felt like the only two people in existence.
Regulus inhaled sharply as he collided with the cold water. He felt the sand under his feet move with the currents. He edged closer and closer to where the sandbank dropped off into the water. He looked out at his brother who timed his emergence from the water with each wave. His feet slipped out from under him and he found himself fully submerged, the rays of pale moonlight piercing through its surface. Regulus held his breath, felt the waves crash one after the other above him. His body was weightless and he thought that, this time, he would not need to come back up to the surface for air. He would continue to breathe and live in a time suspended world. A dull strain on his lungs made it hard for him to finish his thoughts and he felt himself violently pull to the surface.
He gasped for air. Sirius had his arms around him.
His brother had to shout to be heard over the waves. “I was worried you weren’t coming back up.” He played it off, but only to hide his genuine concern. “I would never hear the end of it if I let my little brother drown just to spite her.”
Regulus couldn’t explain it either. When he was done there he knew he passed the critical points to come up. It felt like the middle of the world.
Five days later, the summer house was closed up and would not see human inhabitants until next year.
Regulus had his ear pressed against his bedroom door listening for any sound that would imply the outside corridor on the other side was not as empty as he thought it was.
His mother had checked if he was sleeping nearly an hour ago and the footsteps from his parent’s bedroom upstairs had ceased.
He turned the doorknob and opened the door in increments so as not to create more noise than necessary. Having made the journey from his own room to Sirius’ many a night, Regulus knew the exact floorboards to step on. The house seemed to actively work against any one who sought to do that which they were not supposed to.
Slowly, he opened and closed the door to his brother’s room. Regulus approached his brother’s sleeping figure.
“Sirius,” he called out softly. He began to fear that his brother had forgotten the late night rendezvous they had agreed upon.
“Sirius,” he called again.
This time, his brother rolled over to face him. He had obviously never gone to bed.
“Say it a little louder if you want to wake up the whole house.” He sat up and propped up his blanket to form a fort for his brother to enter. “Enter, Master Regulus,” his brother intoned, imitating the many house elves who shared their space.
Regulus clamored underneath the blanket until he was sitting across from his brother. Sirius reached under his bed and produced an assortment of sweets that he had swiped from the kitchen.
“And that’s not all,” he said, holding a piece of paper in front of him.
Regulus’ eyes doubled in size.
“Roderick Plumpton,” the Black brothers said in unison.
Star seeker for the Tutshill Tornados, Plumpton’s card was impossible to find. The golden - haired player flew around the card after an equally golden snitch.
Regulus handled it with the utmost care. “How’d you get this?”
“There’s more than one black market in Knockturn Alley,” Sirius said, obviously reveling in the moment.
Regulus’ silence was his way of not inflating his brother’s ego.
After a moment, Sirius spoke, assuming an all knowing tone, “I think they should trade Plumpton for Vettel.”
Regulus’ eyes flared. He had studied Quidditch, knew everyone’s seasons average, who they were, both on and off the pitch, and knew that he had never wholeheartedly disagreed with his brother as much as he did now.
“Only a complete idiot would think Vettel is a superior seeker. He’s sloppy and cares more about how he looks than team practices.”
Sirius popped a candy in his mouth, said another incendiary comment that set Regulus off and smiled to himself. Sirius doubted that he would ever find someone as invested in Quidditch as his brother was.
The Black brothers continued on for most of the night, arguing in whispears, pausing in between bites of sweets.
It was almost enough to distract Regulus from the fact that come tomorrow, his brother would no longer be one door down from his own.
“Back straight Regulus,” his mother said, placing a hand on his spine. It had the desired effect, he immediately straightened to his full height.
Of his two parents, Regulus was told he looked the most like his mother. Her face was all angles. Her deep-set eyes and their piercing slate blue were made for scrutinizing others. Her hair and its silken blackness was a trait held in common by many members of the Black family. She styled it with the surety of someone who knew they would be looked at. His mother was a presence to be seen as much as felt.
Walburga Black did not spare her sons so much as a look as she disappeared along with their father, Orion Black, behind Platform 9 ¾.
Sirius looked down at him. Every piece of his luggage was imprinted with the family crest and its moto “Toujours Pur”—“Always Pure.”
“Together?” Sirius said, starring at the wall in front of him.
Together, both brothers ran through the wall that only one of them would be exiting.
When they emerged on the other side, a surge of activity greeted them. Overlapping voices at various stages of the farewell process filled the platform. It filled Regulus with envy that his brother would become part of this world a whole year before he would.
Soon their mother and father were at their side again as the family made their way closer to the train. It was not lost on Regulus that they were beginning to garner indiscreet stares and whispers. It filled him with a sense a pride that people knew who he was without having to introduce himself. Since their cousins had graduated Hogwarts, a few years had passed since a Black had walked the halls of the wizarding school. He knew his brother would not disappoint.
If Sirius was nervous, he didn’t show it. He walked with such confidence that all Regulus could do was marvel at him.
Once near the train, Orion, always the stoic, gestured to his eldest son. Regulus, more out of nature than need, began to follow his brother. For the second time that day, his mother laid a hand on him to remind him of who he was and his place in the family. He watched from afar as his father pressed something into Sirius’ hands.
By Black family tradition, the eldest born was always the subject of greater attention. From one first born son to another, Orion knew the unique position, and privilege, Sirius had found himself in. His inheritance ensured, Sirius would be the one to set the example, carve out the legacy, and continue the bloodline. All Regulus had to do was follow.
“You’ll have your turn, my darling boy,” his mother assured him.
When his father and Sirius returned to them, a marked change had overcome his brother. Sirius’ smile faltered as the final whistle sounded from the train. It was then too that Regulus realized just how little time they had left together.
Sirius formed a circle with him to prevent their parents from seeing the tears that were welling in Regulus’ eyes.
“Never knew you loved me this much,” Sirius said in his characteristic sarcastic tone.
Regulus knew it well and how to outmaneuver him. “Your soaked pillow last night tells a different story.”
Sirius pulled back before smirking. “Such a nosey child.”
Sirius’ tone dropped again.
“I’ll be home for Christmas, less than four months,” he said.
“What happens in the meantime?”
Sirius considered this carefully.
“We’ll do all the things we’ll tell each other when we meet again,” he said. Sirius followed this up quickly. “I’ll write plenty too.”
Regulus nodded. He knew what would happen if he attempted to respond.
“Write to me if anything, anything happens,” Sirius said.
Sirius moved to board the train before turning around one more.
“Remember what I said on the beach,” he said.
Regulus retreated from the platform. His father and mother stood behind him like dividers of time affirming that he was no longer part of Sirius’ present but his past.
When the Hogwarts Express began to move, a moment of indecision gripped Regulus before he broke from his parent’s side and raced alongside the train. He found Sirius’ compartment and, though he knew his brother was on the other side, all he could see was his own face reflected back at him.
His parents’ lecture had stopped just as they entered their home on 12 Grimmauld Place. The lack of propriety he displayed at the platform did not just reflect poorly on him but the Black name. It was not enough to inherit the name, he had to upkeep it. He had to be worthy of such a name.
The Black family had no issue with removing those from its genealogy it considered unworthy as evidenced by the scorch marks on the family tapestry.
Sirius could do such a good impression of their parents that Regulus smiled unwittingly at the memory.
As soon as his parents had entered the house they were gone again leaving Regulus alone in the vast expanse of the Black home. There was a preternatural silence that defined its existence that he had never heard before because Sirius’ voice had always been there to fill it.
He walked into the family library. Though many of the books had never been moved, no dust particles could be found. His parents rarely moved things; the Black’s were never much of a family for restlessness and stirring. They dusted and swept, but they left things where they were. Black’s had always lived in the home, and kept their things in order; as soon as a new Black wife or husband moved in, a place was found for their belongings, and so the house was built with layers of Black property weighing it down, and keeping it steady against the world.
Regulus loved the library with the shifting hues of its African Blackwood bookcases. The warmth from the setback fire place in the room, perpetually sustained in the later months of the year by a charm, had lulled Regulus to sleep more than once.
Regulus dragged his fingers across the spines of the books closest to him. They all credited one Black family member or another as their author. Knowledge had never been restricted in the house. Regulus could read whatever he wanted; however, he was expected to showcase it.
Without fail, his parents would quiz Sirius and him on the content of The Prophet at every family dinner. They were expected to stay informed on the affairs of the wizarding world and have an opinion on them. The recent addition of a “Muggle Affairs” section to The Prophet had been the cause of much dinner argumentation. Regulus personally had to write a letter of descent to the editor.
Nonetheless, the family library had always been a source of comfort for the youngest Black heir. Sirius found it stifling and could not sit still long enough to get pass a preface. Regulus slid a gilded embossed book out of the shelf: On the Origins of Magic.
He settled in his usual seat in the emerald green chair closest to the fire. His mother only worked with a select few British based designers. She insisted that British craftsmanship was unparalleled.
Regulus hugged one side of the chair so closely that there would be room for at least one other person. In a chair made for one, Regulus made it look as if it could seat two.
Regulus supplemented what he could not understand from reading alone with the moving diagrams found in the book. He found the book rather outdated in its approach to magic but he greatly admired the writing itself. It was written with a kind of intensity borderlining obsessiveness, two emotions he was familiar with.
He stretched after being in the same position for several hours only to realize he was hungry. He brought the book with him and proceeded down the long corridor to the kitchen. On either side of him, portraits of members of the Black family, past and present, adorned the walls. Most of them had never spoken to Regulus—they just starred. Their faces – poised and disinterested – blended into the shadows of the corridor.
The produced effect was a sense that the corridor itself was narrowing to a point that ended with the portrait of his mother. In all her painted majesty, she looked Regulus up and down before pronouncing her verdict. “Keep your hair out of your face.”
Pushing his already cropped hair back, he entered the dining room. The table was immensely long and when he took a seat he looked over to his right, half expecting to see Sirius.
Only a few minutes had lapsed when Regulus heard the familiar gait of Kreacher, the head house elf, come up behind him.
“Master Regulus,” he said as he bowed. The house elf removed a plate from his serving platter and placed it directly in front of Regulus. Efficiently, he arranged the silverware ensuring that he never met Regulus’ eyes. When the house elf had finished pouring water he began his backward retreat.
Regulus was biting his lip.
“Kreacher?” The house elf immediately returned to his side. “Would you care to dine with me?”
The air in the room seemed to change. Regulus kept his eyes fixated on a distant point across the dining table.
“House elves are only allowed to serve, Master Regulus,” Kreacher returned.
Regulus knew this but he thought an exception could be made this once. Having one house elf sit at the table was not going to cause an uprising and his parents would not be home until well after nightfall. Regulus pursed his lips in a way that mirrored his mother.
“And if I demand you dine with me?” he said, trying on a voice that was not quite his own.
Kreacher shifted. “Kreacher would have no choice but to do what his master demanded.”
“Dine with me Kreacher,” Regulus said, reframing his original invitation into a demand.
As Kreacher took a seat opposite of Regulus, he felt pride in that fact that he was able to find and exploit a loophole in pureblood decorum.
However, Regulus underestimated what an uncomfortable atmosphere a dinner guest who would not look him in the eyes would create. Every connection his silverware made with his plate seemed to echo for a painfully long time.
Channeling his inner Sirius, he decided to initiate a conversation.
“I read a book earlier today that was beautifully written. Do you enjoy reading?” he said.
It took Kreacher so long to respond that Regulus was about to voice the question again.
“Kreacher is not allowed to read, Master Regulus,” he said.
A flush of embarrassment overcame Regulus. Of course, Kreacher did not read, all house elves were prohibited from doing so. Regulus was searching for the words to cover up his own blunder when he felt the hard spine of the book he had brought with him from the library. Opening the book from where he had left off, his eyes panned over to Kreacher again.
“Then you won’t mind if I do?” he said.
Kreacher kept his eyes lowered. “Kreacher would be honored.”
Regulus felt that some progress had been made. For the rest of dinner, his eyes moved from line to line with his voice occasionally faltering on unfamiliar words. Noticing his plate had been clear for some time, Regulus closed the book. He had subjected Kreacher to enough. As soon as he pushed his chair back to stand up, Kreacher wrapped around the table to clear the space.
Regulus had retreated into the corridor again when he stuck his head back into the dining room. “Thank you, Kreacher,” he said, a small smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.
The house elf, surprised, made eye contact with Regulus for the first time in his life. As soon as Kreacher had done it, his eyes refocused back to the floor. “Thank you, young master.”
Regulus wondered up to the fifth story of their home. Though from the outside 12 Grimmauld Place looked as if it had only three stories, charms concealed its seven-story design.
As Regulus walked to his own room, he abruptly stopped just outside of Sirius’. The door was shut but a faint light emanated from under it. His hand rested on the doorknob a whole minute before he pushed it open.
Sirius’ room was just as he left it, except sparser. Walburga did not let them share in the interior decorating process so it was impossible to distinguish the brother’s individual personalities from that of their mothers. They found little ways however. Underneath a loose floorboard in Regulus’ room was an assortment of Quidditch League memorabilia. Regulus knew where his brother’s spot was.
He walked up to the large dresser that dominated the corner of the room and cast a fugitive glace before opening the first draw that contained all of Sirius’ undergarments. Propriety was the only form of security Sirius felt he needed and he was right. Regulus felt his hand close upon a small box.
Sitting on his brother’s neatly made bed, Regulus unraveled the accompanying piece of parchment Sirius had left him. His eyes lingered on the concluding line: “A light to illuminate the darkness.”
When Regulus opened the box, the light spilled out across the entire room, granting everything a warm golden hue. A ring set with a rectangular emerald flanked by diamond baguettes was the source. He studied it, it was clearly charmed but Regulus didn’t know how his brother had managed it. They were not allowed to practice magic, especially magic this advanced, outside of Hogwarts. His parents, on the other hand, would hardly have been willing participants.
Regulus was so transfixed by his brother’s parting gift that he jumped when a house elf replenishing bedding startled him.
“I beg your apology Master Regulus, I didn’t see you in the dark.”
Regulus looked around the well-illuminated room and back to the house elf. Only he could see the light. His brother had ensured as much.
The house elf, with a snap of its fingers, illuminated the fixtures in Sirius’ room.
“May I change Master Sirius’ bedding?”
Regulus moved toward the door and took the bedding from the house elf.
“Let me,” he said.
Regulus gave the elf no time to protest, quickly closing the door. He observed the ring again before putting it on his index finger. The golden band shrank to fit it perfectly.
He proceeded to Sirius’ bed again. For the entirety of his young life, Regulus had gone to bed in the opposite room knowing that only a singular wall separated his brother and him. He rolled over on his side, catching the faint scent of the sweets they had eaten the other night and closed his eyes.
Regulus awoke to shattering glass the next morning. He listened, frozen, until he heard a light knock at his door.
Kreacher entered, “Mistress Walpurga, requests your presence.”
Regulus nodded and dressed slowly. He made his way down to the kitchen. When he entered, he saw what had been a fully set breakfast table in shambles at the end of it.
“Sit,” Walpurga said, not looking at him. His father was smoking.
An opened letter rested in front of her.
“Your brother was sorted into Gryffindor,” she said, immediately pushing back her chair and exiting the room.
Regulus looked to his father who seemed to disappear behind a haze of smoke.
A ringing filled his ears. He realized he had been expecting this. Leave it to his brother to do that which no one had imagined possible. Sirius had wanted to get out and now he had.
He saw his brother at the Sorting Ceremony and imagined the sorting hat asking him what was most important to him. He knew Sirius had not chosen family, had not chosen him. But as soon as he thought of it, he pushed it down.
His brother would be home in a few short months and everything would be the same between them.