Chapter Text
From an early age, Regulus learned to hide his feelings.
The first time, he was five.
It was the morning of his birthday, he had woken with a smile on his face. He was excited to see what his parents had prepared for this special day.
Sirius was away for the first time, he had been sent away for a couple of months in a training camp to learn how to fight. It was hard without his big brother around but nothing could bring him down.
A servant came into his room to wake him up, helped him dress, fixed his hair so he could have breakfast with his parents.
Had they asked the cook to bake him a cake ? He wondered as he walked happily to the dining room.
When he entered, his parents didn’t spare a glance at him. He sat down and started eating silently.
That’s okay he thought, the cake is going to arrive at the end of the meal.
But then, they got up and he understood that they had forgotten his birthday, or maybe they didn’t care at all.
At that point he really wanted to cry, but his mother hated when he cried. So he held his back straight and smiled, even if it hurt, even if he wanted to scream.
After all, maybe they had prepared a surprise party for later.
~
The last time he let an emotion appear on his face, he was twelve.
He didn’t see his father much, but he admired him. He was the king. He was important, everyone respected him, feared him. And his mother always told him it was a good thing to be feared. He wanted to be like him when he grew up.
His favourite thing to was to sit outside the royal council’s door. Maybe one day, he could enter the room and learn all the important things. He knew that wasn’t really likely, he was the spare, and he would never be king. Sirius was the heir. He was the one who had been trained to fight, to give speeches, to do politics, to be a king.
And Regulus was so jealous.
Because Sirius hated all of this, he dismissed it all, acted as if it was a joke. And it angered him so much because his brother was mocking everything he ever hoped for.
So the day Sirius was let in the room where he so desperately dreamed to enter, his blood boiled.
He was pathetically sitting on the floor, seeking a glance from his father as he passed by him, followed by his brother. And Sirius smiled down at him. And as he was about to enter the room, he turned around winked at him.
He fucking winked at him.
The younger prince wasn’t able to hide the anger on his face.
~
The last time Regulus cried, he was fifteen.
It was his brother’s 18th birthday.
He entered the heir’s chambers when he was still sleeping. He walked slowly towards his bed and tried to wake him up.
“Siri”
“Hmmf”
“Happy birthday”
His brother opened his eyes and offered him a lazy smile.
“Thank you Reggie” Sirius grabbed him and forced him to lay down with him in his bed to cuddle.
“Siri stop” He was laughing and struggling against the longed haired prince. “You’re going to ruffle my clothes, mother will kill me”
“It’s my birthday, I do what i want and what I want is to hug my baby brother” They were now lying in the bed smiling at each other. Regulus got up and pulled something ou of his pocket .
“I got you something” He handed his gift to Sirius.
It was a gold sextant, with six small letters imprinted on it; R.A.B and S.O.B.
Regulus Arcturus Black and Sirius Orion Black
With it was a drawing, it represented the two of them, sailing across the sea, looking and pointing at the stars.
“Reggie this is…”
“You don’t like it? If you don’t I can get you something else I can…”
He was cut off by Sirius engulfing him in a tight hug.
“It’s perfect. Thank you”
Sirius always dreamt to be a sailor. When he was ten, he was sent two months with the royal navy as part of his training -another thing Regulus never got to do- and he came back with the biggest smile, a lot of stories to tell his brother and his head full of dreams.
It could never happen of course, but the two siblings sometimes talked of buying a small boat and sailing the world, discovering countries, making friends -they were never allowed to have friends- and just be free.
That was the last good memory Regulus had with his brother. The rest of the day was a blur, maybe he can’t remember because his brain usually blocks painful memories or just because it resembled any other day in this castle.
He recalls his mother and brother fighting but not the subject. Was it marriage? Or something he had done? Said?
He recalls it being a pretty big fight, bigger than usual.
Then Sirius being sent to his father’s study. That was never a good thing.
He was sent back to his wing by a guard. He didn’t protest, he knew not to.
His brother wasn’t at lunch, but neither were his parents so he guessed they were off doing something important like they were a lot recently.
But then, he wasn’t at dinner either and his parents were mad about that.
He snuck into his room but he wasn’t there. Maybe he had snuck out to the village to celebrate his birthday, he had done that a couple of times.
He was about to leave when he saw a small note folded on his desk. He carefully opened it.
I cannot live like this anymore
You will make a great king one day
Goodbye
It wasn’t signed but he knew.
So he climbed in his brother’s bed and sobbed, and cried and screamed until he fell asleep of exhaustion.
The next morning, he woke up with an enormous headache, but he got up, made his way to his room and got ready for breakfast.
He was now the heir, he could not let anything slip. He was going to be everything his brother couldn’t be.
~
One week later, the death of Sirius Orion Black was made public. He had died in a hunting accident.
Regulus found his funeral beautiful. He wishes to have a more beautiful one the day he dies.
Whenever may that be.