Archive of Our Own

Fippy is the calmest, most sedate house-elf Evan has ever met. And life at his townhouse is supposed to be equally calm and sedate, practically a retirement for her after a long life of dealing with elaborate events at Rosier Manor. She raised Evan, did about half the work when it came to raising his older sister Katherine, and grew up alongside Father and his explosive accidental magic. She does not frighten easily.

So when she shrieks "MASTER EVAN!" from somewhere downstairs, Evan does not walk.

He sprints.

What the fuck could scare Fippy? There are too many answers, all of them along the lines of the war finally coming to House Rosier. Evan isn't a Death Eater—not yet, at least. He can feel the ultimatum approaching like a storm, making the air heavy and ominous.

He's one of the lucky ones. The Dark Lord thinks he's a bit silly, a bit frivolous. He wasn't a priority to recruit.

Not everyone is so fortunate.

But he gets to the ground floor and there's no sound of explosions, of destruction, of Death Eaters making their power known.

It's... quiet, actually.

Quiet, except for the sound of Evan's heartbeat, and Fippy's murmuring, and someone breathing hard, sucking in air like they think it's the last inhale they'll ever get.

Evan follows the sound.

It takes him through the foyer, where wet footprints stagger out of the fireplace and point towards the parlor. Fippy is inside, pale green pillowcase dampened a little, speaking softly to someone.

He steps into the parlor, but his mouth catches up to the situation faster than his brain does. "Fuck."

Regulus, soaking wet and huddled on the sofa, looks up with wild eyes.

This is why Fippy called for him. This is why she sounded so upset. Because Regulus doesn't look like that. In all the years that Evan has known him, he has never, ever seen Regulus so...

Haunted.

And he looks at Evan, and something in his face crumples in pain or in relief, and a sob shudders out.

"It is alright," Fippy says soothingly. "Just keep breathing. Master Evan is here." (The look she gives Evan, while Regulus's eyes are squeezed shut, says He's your problem now so clearly that Evan feels the urge to laugh bubbling in his throat.)

(He doesn't.)

He approaches Regulus the way he would a kneazle on the skittish side, slowly, setting his feet down lightly on the floor, but he's always been taller than Regulus and he towers over him when he's standing and Regulus is hunched on the sofa, so Evan kneels. He kneels, and he says, as softly as he can, trying not to startle Regulus with the sound of his voice, "Hey."

Regulus swipes tears away with the heels of his hands. He doesn't look at Evan, stares into his lap instead, eyelashes clumped together from the saltwater. The little mother-of-pearl buttons down the front of his black robes glimmer in the light as he breathes, deep enough that he must be forcing the air in. But he's breathing, and it evens out, and his hands settle in his lap, fingers curled in slightly, limp, as if he'd simply let everything fall where it would. Nothing like how Regulus normally sits, arranged almost to the point of being posed, practically bleeding nobility.

His fingernails are purple, nearing blue, and Evan reaches out slowly and touches his left hand and discovers it's corpse-cold, even in the comfortably warm parlor. No wonder he's shivering.

"Fippy," Evan says as calmly as he can. "Could you please draw a bath in my rooms?" She nods and Apparates away. Evan holds out his other hand to Regulus, who cautiously lays his right hand in it, just as icy as the left. He doesn't attempt to hold Evan's hand, doesn't tighten his grip at all, and so Evan doesn't either, no matter how much he wants to grab Regulus's hands in both of his and force them to warm up. "You're cold. Were you swimming? Fully dressed?"

It has to be that. It has to be swimming in his clothes, for some stupid, convoluted reason only Regulus would come up with. Evan can think of just one other reason for someone to be soaked to the bone and freezing cold in black velvet robes not meant to get this wet, and it starts and ends with drowning.

Maybe a bath isn't such a good idea after all, but it's the only one Evan has. Warming Charms aren't perfect. He casts one anyway, lifts his hand away from Regulus's as lightly as he can to get his wand to do it, and maybe Regulus's lips are a little less blue or maybe it's Evan's imagination, wishful thinking, desperate hope.

"I had to," Regulus says finally, hoarsely, barely above a whisper.

Well.

That's better than I tried to drown myself.

"Alright," Evan says, because what else can he possibly say? "Let's get you warmed up."

Evan gets Regulus up the stairs to his rooms, into the bathroom where there's a bath ready and smelling faintly of lavender. The room is a bit warmer than the parlor was, too, and Fippy's left out a stack of towels, a bathrobe, spare sweatpants and a jumper of Evan's, and a rack, presumably for Regulus's wet clothes. And Regulus stares at the whole room, but mostly the bath, as if he's never seen one before, and he croaks, "Don't leave me alone. Please."

"I won't." Evan would seize Regulus in his arms, hold him as tightly as he could to chase away whatever put that look in his eyes, but he can't bear the thought of startling him right now. He settles for brushing the backs of their hands together and hoping it's enough. "I'll stay right here as long as you want me to."

Regulus takes a long, shaky breath and shuts his eyes, then nods and opens them. "Thank you. Could you..."

And Evan thinks he's going to ask Evan to face away so he can get in, but instead Regulus holds out his wrists, more tiny mother-of-pearl buttons down the tight cuffs glistening in the light. They're nice robes, not quite dress robes but nice, and Evan can't help wondering why on earth Regulus is wearing them. Why he'd choose something so impractical to go swimming.

"My fingers," Regulus says, eyes fixed carefully on those buttons. "I can't undo these."

"Of course," Evan says.

The buttons are fiddly, small and round and still damp, but he gets one cuff unbuttoned and it sags, dragged down by its own waterlogged weight, exposing Regulus's wrist.

And Evan stops.

He has seen Regulus's wrists before, pale, slender bordering on bony, deceptively, elegantly delicate-looking. But he has never seen them this pale, never this thin.

Never this bruised.

Fingerprints in an ugly, stark purple splay across his wrist. A row of tiny circles pressed into his skin show where the buttons were. And now that Evan is looking properly, he sees other things too. The jut of Regulus's knuckles. The skin scraped raw on the palm of his hand. The two broken fingernails, with jagged edges like he'd scrabbled at something.

He went swimming. Fully dressed.

He said he had to.

There is more to the story.

Evan will wait to ask.

"Do you want some dittany for your hand?" he says instead, using every trick he has to keep his voice calm and steady. "I don't think we have any bruise paste."

"Later."

"Alright."

Evan moves onto the other cuff. He hopes. He isn't surprised, though, when the same fingerprints reveal themselves on Regulus's other wrist. If anything, they're larger, as if two different people grabbed him at once.

Regulus reacts so little to these marks that he might as well not have even looked at them. Instead, he lifts a hand, traces a finger down the first few buttons from his neck to his collarbone. "And these."

So many fucking buttons. It's as if he hadn't anticipated needing to undo them. And Regulus never fails to anticipate anything.

"Sorry," Regulus adds, small and raspy, less apologetic and more ashamed, and Evan feels that first bloom of angry fear melt away. No matter what stupid thing Regulus has done now, intentionally stupid thing at that, he's here. He's here and he's safe and he's letting Evan help him. Things could be much worse.

But Evan's getting answers later.

"You have nothing to be sorry for," he says quietly.

Regulus lets out a breath that might be a halfhearted scoff and looks away.

Evan focuses on the buttons.

They go quicker now, maybe because he's figured out the fastest way to undo them, maybe because he's willing himself not to look, not to see whatever will litter the skin being revealed, inch by inch.

He fails.

There aren't many bruises, and Evan thinks this is better, but then he gets further down the line of buttons and the high collar gapes wider and he sees the way Regulus's ribs protrude, gaunt, sickly, and he knows: this is much worse.

Evan wills himself to breathe. This, at least, he can do. He's a decent Occlumens, decent enough to maintain his family's cover, and that means he's good at managing his breathing. Regulus is too. Regulus is one of the best. Maybe the best. Evan is not as good as him, but Evan is good enough, and he pushes air steadily in and out and undoes the last button and says, "There you go."

The fabric is heavy, sodden, dragging off Regulus's shoulder now that the buttons aren't holding it in place, and he lets it slide and says, "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

It feels inadequate.

Evan averts his eyes as Regulus pushes off the rest of his clothes and steps into the bath. It's too much, too intimate, too... invasive, and his mind is still whirling over those bruises, bruises and scrapes on too-taut, too-pale skin. How Regulus had looked unsurprised, resigned even, at the sight of those handprints on his wrists.

The water swirls, a milky lavender, and Regulus hugs his knees to his chest and takes a deep breath. He doesn't look so wild as he did when Evan first saw him, but his eyes are still hollow, pale and distant as he settles his chin on his knees and stares, looking at the gold-plated taps on the bathtub but not really seeing them.

Evan turns his back and busies himself hanging Regulus's clothes on the rack, to give him some space without leaving him alone, but all the pretending to look busy in the world wouldn't prevent him from hearing Regulus whisper, "I thought I was going to die."

There it is.

Hearing him say it doesn't hurt as much as Evan thought it might—he's too unsurprised for that—but it settles like a ball of ice in his chest. He forces himself to turn around slowly, to sit down cross-legged on the cool marble floor next to the bathtub instead of shaking Regulus by the shoulders and demanding to know what the fuck happened.

Regulus is alive. Whatever happened, he made it.

But Regulus is... is Regulus, smart and cunning and raised to believe in his own invincibility. He thinks any problem can be solved with the right information and always lands on his feet. Yes, he's faced loss, and yes, sometimes he gets too absorbed in hunting down that perfect scrap of knowledge and forgets to eat or sleep or breathe, but Evan has never seen Regulus ready to give up. Not once. He's given in—to Sirius when he demanded to leave, to Barty and Evan when they dragged him to the kitchens every time he missed dinner at school, to the Dark Lord when he expressed a desire to have Regulus, specifically, in his ranks. But every time Regulus has given in, he has done so with a plan in mind, ready to turn it to his benefit. He is always thinking ahead. He is always preparing for what will happen next. The idea of Regulus being dead, Regulus giving up whatever spark of life keeps him going, just doesn't fit.

It doesn't.

Regulus has lifted one arm out of the water, his left, and he's considering the marks on his arm as if he's evaluating their aesthetic value. He turns his wrist, studies the Dark Mark inked into his inner forearm with all the detachment of a scholar. Or someone in shock. It's with some dark, sour amusement that he adds, "It would have been simpler that way."

"Dying is always simpler." Evan is careful not to let the ice in his chest turn the words sharp or bitter. Regulus is here. Regulus is alive. Regulus is safe. He has to keep remembering that. Regulus has to keep remembering that. "That doesn't make it the better option."

That morbid amusement is still there, tingeing Regulus's words with inevitability. "I suppose I'll find out." Then he slides Evan a look with such composed dignity that Evan can almost, almost forget about the bruises and the jutting ribs and the shadows under his eyes. "Are you really not going to ask?"

"Are you going to tell me if I do?" Evan counters.

"Yes," Regulus says, all cool certainty and inevitability and simplicity. "If you ask. I won't inflict it on someone who doesn't want to know."

Evan does want to know. There's something deep inside of him, sharp-clawed and angry and eager, that needs to.

He's not sure the rest of him is ready to hear it.

So he says, "Later. Once you've eaten something and slept for at least four hours."

Regulus looks vaguely incredulous. He doesn't say anything, but he doesn't have to. Evan adds, "Yes, that's more important. You shouldn't have come here if you didn't want to be forced into taking better care of yourself."

"Not that I need to," Regulus says wryly, and he pulls his knees a little tighter against his chest and looks deep into the water, and he sounds tired and a little sad when he says, "You seem fully prepared to do it for me."

"Is that such a surprise?" He immediately regrets it—not the asking itself, but the way the words come out, abrupt, searching, and he forces himself to settle, lower his hackles and say more softly, "Of course I will. I wish you'd care enough about your own health to do it yourself, though."

"Some things are more important." It's quiet, without inflection, and he stares into the water and does not meet Evan's eyes.

"That," Evan says, with as much gentleness as he can muster, "has never been true."

Regulus looks up, sharp and quick and suddenly, inexplicably angry, and his gaze bores into Evan, dangerous as quicksilver. "Ask me what happened."

"Regulus—"

"Ask me." When Evan doesn't say anything, Regulus snaps, "You want to know, don't you? You're afraid for me. You're worried about what could have driven me to this point. You're being patient so you don't scare me. You're trying to ease into it. Just ask me."

He swallows hard.

"Evan," Regulus says, a touch less angry, just as insistent. "You are the only person I can tell."

Well.

That settles it.

He takes a breath, centers himself, prepares for the horrible truth that is about to come, whatever it might be.

And he asks.

And Regulus tells him.

Regulus has always thought Evan does not quite belong here.

What he means by here depends on the day, but it tends to come back to a few things. In this world, gray and dreary and bloodied. In the war, brutal and blunt, chilly and unhappy and dreadful. In Regulus's life, by his side as if he cannot even imagine a reason why he should be anywhere else.

Regulus can.

Regulus can think of quite a few.

But Regulus is selfish, and so he does not express them.

Kreacher hadn't let him die. Regulus had choked out Go and Kreacher had snapped back You is going with me and he'd Apparated Regulus back to Grimmauld Place and given him something that made him throw up in glittering emerald green and then Regulus had regained enough of his wits to have a proper panic attack because the dark walls of Grimmauld Place were closing in and making it hard to breathe and Kreacher had dragged him to the Floo and called out Rosier townhouse and pushed him through.

It was a master stroke.

Because everyone Regulus knows— everyone— has been swallowed up by the Death Eaters, except for the one person clever enough and powerful enough and deceptive enough to stay out.

And that one person also happens to be the only person in the world, save one, who would find Regulus in his house, half-drowned, struggling to breathe properly, covered in bruises shaped like hands, and have the audacity to insist on Regulus warming up and getting something to eat before telling him how it happened.

Evan and Kreacher have a lot in common.

Regulus meant to indulge him, because there's still a shakiness in his heart and his mind that tells him that a bit of rest might not be such a bad idea. And he knows that fingers turning purple from cold aren't good.

But Evan does not belong in this war, or he never would have said what he did. There are things more important than Regulus's health. Much more important. And Evan pushed him, and Regulus pushed back and started talking and found that he couldn't stop. That he didn't want to stop.

So, yes. He is selfish, because he knows Evan does not belong in this war and he pulls him into it anyway.

Evan listens to him the whole way through, still as a statue, with gilded hair and eyes of cut sapphire to match. Inhuman, a painting of a fairytale prince or an ancient hero who never existed, sitting on the cold stone floor of his bathroom in a t-shirt and sweatpants. (He doesn't need long sleeves. No Dark Mark to cover up. No scars, either.) It's nighttime. Evan always changes into his pajamas around the same time every night, even if he knows he's not going to bed for a while yet. Regulus's arrival might not have woken him up.

The bathwater was warm, not hot, when Regulus got in, and it cools more as he talks. He skips the things Evan doesn't need to know about—the sleepless nights, the effects of the potion, choosing his favorite robes for tonight because he didn't want to die in something unfortunate-looking. He thinks the hard line of Evan's mouth, the clenched jaw he's forgotten to keep relaxing, mean that maybe Evan has put those pieces together already.

The story is shorter when Regulus has cut out so much of the pain.

He finishes it, or maybe he just stops talking, and the water is lukewarm. It'll get cold soon. The lake was cold, so cold that one of Regulus's few thoughts as he was pulled under was wonder at the fact that it wasn't frozen. Evan's townhouse—well, the Rosiers', technically, but he lives here by himself, his parents live at Rosier Manor and his sister lives with her husband, so Evan's—is too warm for the bathwater to get that cold. Regulus thinks maybe he should get out soon anyway. He was only under for a few seconds before Kreacher pulled him out, barely long enough for the water to close over his head, but a few seconds were enough. Regulus felt that cold in his bones. He'll remember it for the rest of his life, however long that ends up being.

It's funny. Regulus had accepted his approaching death in the cave with a grace borne of a sense of inevitability, which he thinks was actually a sense that dying in the cave was... the right thing to do. Poetic, in a way. Regulus, who the Dark Lord wants alive, dying. Kreacher, who the Dark Lord assumed would die, living.

But being here now, in Evan's house full of light and warmth and everything Evan, is reminding Regulus that he's not in the habit of doing penance.

He doesn't want to die.

Maybe he did, a little bit. But he got the locket. He wrote in that note that he'd face death, not allow it. He has done that. And he saw how Evan looked at his wrists, how hard he's been working to treat Regulus with a gentleness not out of place with baby animals, how he's still in a way that he only ever is when he's storming inside.

Evan does not know that Regulus has been quietly forming the Dark Lord's opinion of him, making sure the Dark Lord thinks of him as someone too absorbed in frivolities and champagne and the Rosiers' renowned parties to be a useful Death Eater. Regulus did not set out to do this. But the Dark Lord asked for more potential recruits, and Barty put Evan's name forward, and it was the only choice Regulus had. It wouldn't have worked if Evan had been even the tiniest bit less committed to his family's image, if he'd ever dared to let it crack around someone other than Regulus.

Regulus cannot end the war himself.

He can do his best to keep it from ever hurting Evan, though.

And as arrogant as it feels to admit, Regulus's death would do just that.

So he asks Evan to pass him one of the towels and Evan's eyes soften from chips of sapphire back to the way he normally looks at Regulus, open, clear, steady. Regulus draws more comfort from that look than he should, from how Evan, for all his whims and impulses and fun, is a rock when he wants to be.

How Evan can hear about Kreacher and the Horcrux and Regulus's mission to destroy it and look at him just as he did before, with a bit of sadness, but not a wisp of pity.

The towel is warm, and so are the clothes and the bathrobe, and they smell like Evan, some scent Regulus can't put into words that makes him want to bury his nose in the fluffy lapels of the bathrobe.

He doesn't. That would be difficult to hide and even more difficult to explain away.

Evan disappears into his bedroom, and Regulus doesn't think much of it until he reappears in the doorway holding socks. Socks which he offers to Regulus with an air of expectation.

Regulus raises an eyebrow. "Yes?"

"Socks," Evan says commandingly. "You're not walking around barefoot."

"You're barefoot," Regulus points out.

"I haven't been in the water."

"With a statement like that, you're practically begging for me to throw you into this bathtub."

He spreads his arms. "Try me."

And Regulus does strongly consider it, but the bathtub is a relatively small target and he doesn't have as much muscle as he did in his quidditch days. Even back then, picking Evan up was a bit of a struggle. Now, it would be an embarrassment.

"That's what I thought," Evan says. "Socks. Put those ones on. I'm going to call Fippy and ask her to bring some food up here."

"I can walk downstairs. I'm not an invalid."

The quelling look he gets in response is so fierce that Regulus almost wishes he hadn't said it. "You can do a lot of things. And right now, what you can do is put those socks on."

Regulus puts the socks on.

They're soft, like all of Evan's clothes. Evan has strong feelings about acceptable fabrics, including extremely high standards that they must meet in order to be considered neither rough nor itchy. It's why nearly all of his dress robes are silk. Evan has never seen the point of letting himself suffer. Regulus sees the point maybe a little too much.

"Wonderful," Evan says. "I'll call Fippy."

They sit on the floor, because Evan doesn't keep a desk in his bedroom (because he is not addicted to working like some people). Regulus, for all his bravado about being capable of going downstairs, seems relieved to be staying in here after all.

Evan can understand that. With the curtains drawn, the door closed, the night quiet outside, the room feels like a piece of the world that's been carved out from the rest, suspended in time while everyone else keeps spinning.

Although to be perfectly honest, Evan's mind is spinning too. Everything Regulus has told him—Kreacher, the cave, the potion, the Horcrux— it sounds like something out of a storybook, a tale of magic from long ago, not something that could possibly be happening today. People don't make Horcruxes. People barely know about Horcruxes, and the few who do are warned strongly against creating them—not that it's easy to figure out how to do so, anyway. It's old knowledge that has been passed down as a cautionary tale, not an inspiring one.

But Regulus wouldn't have said it if he didn't believe it. And the Blacks have been collecting information on old Dark Arts for longer than almost everyone else. They have knowledge of things other people can't even imagine. Detailed research on Horcruxes would be child's play for them. That means that it is almost certainly true.

The Dark Lord is a politician. Or, no, Evan has always thought of him as a politician. Magically powerful enough to garner respect from the old families, shrewd about his platform and who he recruits, waging quiet war on the structure of British magical society while distracting the Ministry with reports of Death Eater attacks on innocent families. Yes, Regulus has mentioned that there is something inhuman about him, but Evan had assumed that was a simple result of being the kind of person who could send his followers to torture and murder children. Not literal soullessness. Not the kind of reckless ambition that would drive someone to make a Horcrux, to create an entire army of Inferi to defend it, to seek to become a kind of crudely created god on earth.

A storybook villain, but he's real, and his ambition has almost killed Regulus.

Might still kill him, if the Dark Lord finds out who took his Horcrux.

That cannot happen.

Evan has no idea what he'll be able to do about it. He's better at slithering out of fights than he is at winning them, and he's not a Death Eater, so he doesn't have the kind of information that Regulus does. But he does know that if the Dark Lord kills Regulus without Evan having lifted a finger to stop it, Evan won't be able to live with himself.

That's all he really needs to know. He'll figure out the details along the way. The important thing is that he can't just watch Regulus put himself through more of this—and if what happened at the cave is the sort of ordeal that must be undergone in order to defeat the Dark Lord, so be it. They'll make it work. But Evan refuses to repeat the events of tonight. He won't sit around cheerfully clueless while Regulus suffers.

It's not much of a plan, but that's okay. Right now, it's enough to promise himself in his head as he sits with Regulus on the floor and watch for every miniscule indication of how he might be feeling behind his impassive exterior.

Regulus picks at the soup (mostly broth, really—Evan asked Fippy for something very simple), but he does finish it all. Evan wonders, but doesn't ask, when the last time was that he ate. Hopefully Kreacher's been keeping track of that. Lord and Lady Black definitely wouldn't. His consolation, at least, is that Regulus wasn't trying to starve himself to death.

Wasn't trying to starve himself. Wasn't trying to exhaust himself. Was prepared (didn't have to try) to drown himself. Somehow, what Regulus was and was not trying to do doesn't seem that important.

"You and Kreacher," Regulus mutters. "Constantly shoving food at me."

"I'm glad," Evan says. "I wondered what would happen without me and Barty around to drag you to the kitchens."

"I did survive eleven years of life without you looking after me."

Evan just shrugs, because the fact of the matter is that he will keep looking after Regulus for as long as Regulus lets him. And Regulus at eleven, precariously balanced on the knife's edge of his family's expectations but unafraid to keep walking, didn't require quite so much looking after as Regulus now. It was after Sirius's disownment that he started to crack, hairline fissures that could only be seen in the dim candlelight of lonely midnights. Evan thinks that up until that point, Regulus really believed that everything would become okay between the two of them again.

"Whatever," Regulus says, the soft elegance of his voice making it graceful. "Neither of you will be deterred. I can accept reality."

If he couldn't, maybe they wouldn't be having this conversation.

"That's nice to know," Evan says. "While you're in such an accepting mood, I have a demand you're not going to like."

He sighs. "Do your worst."

Evan points at his bed. "Four hours of sleep. Uninterrupted if possible."

"I'm starting to wonder if you know me at all," Regulus says drily.

"I'll knock you out if I have to, but you are sleeping." Left to his own devices, Regulus will rush back to Grimmauld Place to destroy the Horcrux. Evan's not stupid. That will be a long, frustrating process, and he's not letting Regulus attempt to get started before he's even gotten his head on straight again. (Yes, he seems normal now, but he's Regulus. Pretending to be fine is what he's good at.) Also, Regulus will rebel if Evan attempts to feed him again in the next few hours, and he's not leaving Evan's house until Evan has stood over him and made sure he eats a vegetable, so Evan's going to use sleep to fill the time.

"I'd like to see you try," Regulus says. Considering he's currently being swallowed up in a mint green jumper of Evan's that makes him the opposite of imposing, it is not an intimidating response, despite the crossed arms.

So Evan raises an eyebrow. "You'd rather make me Stun you than just go to bed?"

Regulus's chin juts out. He doesn't reply.

"Sleep," Evan says. "Unless Kreacher manages a miracle, that Horcrux will be just as un-destroyed tomorrow morning as it is tonight. You'll be useless trying to figure it out now."

"I'm not tired."

"Yes, you are. You're running on fumes. I'm surprised you haven't crashed already, to be honest."

The only response Evan gets from that is a vague glare, probably because Regulus knows he's right but doesn't want to admit it. If Evan knows him at all, he's worried about nightmares but too proud to accept Dreamless Sleep, were it offered.

He tries a different tactic. "Regulus, you know you're going to fall asleep sooner or later. I am asking you to let it happen here. If you want me to go, I'll do it, but stay here. Please."

Regulus's face goes very still. His voice is carefully controlled when he says, "Why?"

Because Regulus just went through something Evan can barely imagine. Because he's about to plunge into a journey Evan can support him on, but can't join him on, not really, not without a Dark Mark on his arm. Because he will never stop unless Evan makes him. Because Evan wants him nearby, even knowing his mind is miles away in that cave.

Because Evan can't bear to let him walk away just yet.

He puts the words in order with as much care as he's ever done anything. "You're safe here."

It's even the truth.

He is safe here. No parents. No Death Eaters. No Dark Lord. No Inferi. No Horcrux. And here he has Evan.

Regulus swallows hard and looks down at his hands. Those broken nails are still jagged. Evan doesn't know the spell to fix that off the top of his head. (He used to, but after graduating Hogwarts and thus ending his amateur quidditch career, he stopped breaking nails quite so often.) Fippy would. He'll call her if Regulus asks.

But it's not Regulus's nails that he's looking at. He studies the raw, scraped skin on his palm, maybe just as a way of avoiding Evan's eyes, maybe not. "Don't go, then."

"I won't."

"Right." Regulus takes a deep breath, then gets to his feet. "To bed. Let's see how this goes."

The thing is, Regulus is still cold.

Not much. Just a little. But there is a part of him that is cold that only warmed up when Evan forgot that careful distance earlier, touched his fingertips, the back of his hand, made something inside Regulus crane towards him like a plant towards sunlight.

Regulus thinks maybe this part of himself is called loneliness.

Kreacher is the best part of the House of Black, he really is, but he's still magically bound to follow Regulus's every order. All the loopholes in the world can't change that. Regulus is his favorite. It's not difficult. Regulus just has to be kind to him. And Kreacher will side with him if it's at all possible, but a direct order from either one of Regulus's parents will still supercede one from Regulus himself. Regulus can trust him with the Dark Arts and the plotting and the danger. He can't trust Kreacher with the fragile parts of himself.

At first, Regulus didn't trust Evan with these parts either. But Evan stood by him and waited, and Regulus gave into the urge to have faith.

And he's still cold.

So he pulls back the heavy covers on the bed, which is larger than the ones at Hogwarts or the one in Regulus's room—it makes sense, this is the master bedroom of the townhouse, it's meant for two people—and he says, "You need to sleep too."

"I suppose it would be hypocritical of me to suggest otherwise," Evan says, and he gets up too, and he says, "Which side do you want?"

"This one," Regulus says, because he doesn't care.

"Lights on or off?"

He shrugs, because he doesn't know which to pick.

"Off," Evan decides. "There's a reading lamp on your side. You can turn that on if you want."

His side.

Regulus locates the reading lamp, built into the wall. There's another one on the other side. Evan's side.

He debates turning his own on, but decides against it. The cave was dark. So what? It got very bright when Kreacher threw a fireball at the Inferius with the grip on Regulus's other wrist. Much of Regulus's life has been spent in the dark. He's not about to let one cave make him sleep with the lights on like a baby.

He'll have a lot more reasons to sleep with the lights on by the time the war ends, he thinks.

Once Evan turns the lights off, the room is dark but not pitch black. Moonlight creeps in around the edges of the curtains, paints Evan's outline in pearl. There is no ominous green glow, no orange blaze, no tiny, insufficient Lumos. Less light than there was in the cave, and yet this darkness is soft where that was hungry, leeching, waiting greedily for Regulus to misstep so it could claim him.

The bed is comfortable. Of course it is. Everything in this house is. The Rosiers act as if they have never heard of self-denial, of temperance, of abstention. Not that Regulus's bed at home is uncomfortable, but it's perfunctory, a place to sleep. The Blacks are gilt over hard stone where the Rosiers are heaps of silk and velvet. Regulus has always felt like a crow among doves when he spends time at a Rosier property.

But he has never felt so out of place as he does now, an interloper, Evan's covers on Evan's bed pulled up to his neck, warm on the outside and cold on the inside and fighting the urge to blow on his fingertips to drive out the memory of the lake.

The mattress dips slightly as Evan gets in, curls on his side, and Regulus doesn't have to look to know that Evan is watching him. Evan has barely stopped watching him since he arrived at the townhouse. Carefully, as if he doesn't want to spook Regulus but he's worried that if he looks away Regulus will disappear. As if he's not so sure Regulus made it out of the cave after all. As if he's reassuring himself.

Or maybe that's why Regulus wants him to be doing it.

Because Regulus is not so sure he made it out.

He can feel the sheets around him, smell Evan's clothes and the lavender still clinging to him from the bath, see the pale outlines of the curtains and the bed and Evan himself. In comparison, the cave feels like a distant dream, a memory of pain and horror far removed. Regulus felt that way the morning after Sirius left, like he'd dreamed it. All he had to do was cross the hallway and knock on Sirius's door and wait for him to open it. But the door had been wide open, the room ransacked, the bed empty.

Not a dream.

Not a dream, no matter how much he wanted it to be.

Maybe Regulus won't wake up. Maybe this is just a kind deception his imagination has supplied to ease the pain of his last moments. Warm, comfortable, there are worse ways to go, but he doesn't want to go.

"Hey," Evan says, softly enough that Regulus thinks he's imagined it. "Regulus. Listen to me. You're okay. You can relax."

This is when Regulus discovers he's been holding his breath.

For how long, he doesn't know. Long enough that his throat aches, long enough that letting it out now feels wrong.

"Listen to me," Evan says again. "You made it. You're safe."

Evan knows that's not true. Once the Dark Lord finds out what Regulus has done, Regulus won't be safe anywhere. He has not made it. He won't have made it until Voldemort is dead, every last piece of him.

"You are safe," Evan repeats. "You're alive, and you're safe. He won't be able to get to you. I'll make sure of it."

Evan knows Regulus isn't safe.

But he's willing to try to change that.

Evan, who didn't bat an eyelash when Regulus explained his discovery of the Horcrux, who has looked the likes of Bellatrix in the eye and asked her inane questions about her haircare routine, who has a gift for walking away from fights unscathed. (Or at least, he did in school. He hasn't been involved in many fights recently.) Evan, who Regulus never asked for, who Regulus never deserved, but who decided to stick around anyway.

Who decided, and who has never changed his mind, not when Regulus was swept into the Death Eaters, not when Regulus painted a target on his own back.

"Trust me," Evan says.

Regulus exhales.

And he says, "I do."

Evan is almost glad that Regulus has gotten upset again.

He's not really happy about it, of course, but watching Regulus pack away any hint at a deeper emotion, flatten it out in favor of cool reason, wasn't easy in fifth year and it hasn't gotten easier since. He'd felt, rather than heard, Regulus stop breathing. Maybe just anticipated it and gotten the timing right based on years of knowing him.

Still. Evan talks to him, says whatever comes to mind that seems like it might help, and Regulus says with all the unshakable certainty in the world that he trusts him.

The idea that Regulus could trust him is not a new one. It's not new at all. It's something that first occurred to Evan in November of their fifth year. As far as he's aware, he's still the only person who knows how upset Regulus was by the shenanigans Sirius's friends put on in honor of his birthday, the first birthday he had after his disownment. It wasn't the shenanigans themselves—those were nothing new—but the scale of them, impossible to ignore, as if there were more reason to celebrate that year than usual. (There was. It was Sirius's seventeenth birthday, after all. Evan does not think that is how Regulus interpreted it.) Regulus rolled his eyes in the Great Hall and made disparaging comments about Gryffindors when prompted. Evan hugged him for the first time late that night, over semi-forgotten Divination homework.

He hadn't asked for a hug. Evan, somewhat at a loss for what else to do, offered one, and Regulus practically dove into his arms. And after ten minutes of being emotional, he wiped his eyes and picked up his quill again.

Evan isn't sure how Regulus would feel about that now, with fresh bruises shaped like hands still marking him. So he stretches out a hand, rests it palm-up near Regulus, more an invitation than a suggestion.

And Regulus takes it, gripping Evan's hand, not tightly enough to hurt, but tightly enough that Evan thinks of pulling Regulus out of a hundred lakes. A lifetime's worth.

"I do," Regulus says again. "I trust you. I promise."

"I believe you," Evan says.

There's a soft laugh in the darkness, quiet like Regulus is making himself be amused. "That's always nice to hear."

"I mean it," Evan presses. "I know how easily you lie when you want to, Regulus. But I believe you now."

Regulus is silent for so long that Evan wonders if he's somehow managed to fall asleep.

Then—"I've never wanted to lie to you."

It's whispered, the sort of thing Regulus would never say out of the dark. The sort of thing Evan gathers up and holds close to himself when Regulus does say it. Proof of... something.

He squeezes Regulus's hand in response.

Regulus rolls onto his side, which shifts him a little closer. Evan can't tell if Regulus is looking him in the eye. Probably not. Regulus is best at eye contact when it's confrontational and worst at it when it's honest.

"And I'm sorry to drag you into this," he says quietly. "I'm the one with the Mark. It's my responsibility to stop him, not yours."

"It's no one's responsibility," Evan says. "We do it because the alternative is letting it go undone."

"We," Regulus says, "do nothing. I am doing something."

"We," Evan says, "are doing something. You're out of your mind if you think I'd be able to sit around at home knowing you were off risking your life to defeat the Dark Lord."

"It's not your fight."

"I know."

Another long silence, but Regulus's grip on Evan's hand only gets tighter, and his voice sounds strained when he says, "If Kreacher hadn't sent me here tonight—"

"Stop that train of thought," Evan says, more harshly than he means to. "If Kreacher hadn't sent you here, I wouldn't know how much danger you're putting yourself in. I'd have no idea until you told me or until you died. Do you think that would be better for me? Do you think I would be happier, knowing you put yourself at risk and I didn't help when I could have? No, Regulus. I would not."

Then all he hears is labored breathing, and Regulus's free hand comes up to swipe under his eyes, and guilt crashes in. Regulus has had a rough enough night (a rough enough month or two) without Evan taking his worry out on him, deserved though it may be.

"I'm sorry," he says. "I didn't mean to snap at you."

Regulus lets go of Evan's hand.

But then he moves closer, arms tucked into his chest like he's still cold, and when Evan lifts his arm, Regulus does not hesitate to huddle under it. He's nowhere near as cold as he was earlier, but his hands are still a little chilly where they brush against Evan's chest, and Evan pulls the blankets a little tighter around them both.

"Okay," he says, although he's not sure which of them he's saying it to. "Okay."

Ten minutes pass.

Then ten more.

And Regulus stops crying, but he doesn't move away, and it doesn't take long for him to fall asleep after that. Evan feels his breathing settle, deep, steady, reliable.

He falls asleep too.