Chapter Text
The spell was meant to be simple.
That was the first warning, really.
Nothing at Hogwarts that began with a professor saying, “This should be perfectly safe,” had ever, in the long and blood-splattered history of wizarding education, remained perfectly safe for more than twelve seconds. There were entire hospital wing shelves devoted to that phrase. Madam Pomfrey probably had it embroidered on a pillow somewhere, right beside I told you so and stop touching magical objects with your bare hands.
Still, the assignment had sounded almost exciting at first.
A practical field project. A controlled bit of temporal displacement. A week in the past, close enough to their own time that nobody could accidentally assassinate an ancestor or invent indoor plumbing too early, but far enough that they would have to adapt.
The purpose was educational.
They were meant to demonstrate practical transfiguration, language adaptation charms, historical blending, concealment under pressure, money conversion theory, social observation, group survival, and general common sense.
Which, Sirius had said, meant they were absolutely doomed.
They were grouped in a clearing outside the castle just after dawn, breath fogging in the cold air, robes pulled tight, school bags packed with the approved list of supplies, and one small circular device resting in Professor McGonagall’s hand like a pocket watch made by someone with trust issues.
The Gryffindors stood together in a loose, noisy cluster.
Sirius Black lounged with both hands in his pockets, looking far too pleased with the idea of legally causing trouble in the past. James Potter stood beside him, glasses slightly crooked, hair already wind-mussed despite there being very little wind. Peter Pettigrew had his bag hugged to his chest and kept looking at the device as though it might bite him. Remus Lupin looked half-interested, half-resigned, the way he always did when he knew perfectly well something idiotic was about to happen but had not yet decided whether stopping it was worth the effort.
Lily Evans stood with her arms crossed, listening carefully because someone in the group had to absorb instructions. Mary Macdonald was bouncing slightly on her heels, eyes bright. Marlene McKinnon looked ready to wrestle history itself. Alice Fortescue had already checked her wand three times, practical and calm. Frank Longbottom stood beside her, broad-shouldered and quietly delighted, trying and failing not to look like someone who had been waiting all his life for an assignment involving survival in the past.
Fabian and Gideon Prewett were whispering to each other with the identical expressions of men about to do something punishable.
Across from them, Regulus Black and his friends made an entirely different sort of cluster.
Regulus stood straight-backed and dark-eyed, polished even in school robes, expression cool enough to frost the grass beneath his boots. Beside him, Barty Crouch Jr. looked as if the entire project had been invented for his personal entertainment. Evan Rosier had his arms folded, beautiful and unimpressed. Pandora Rosier was staring at the device with unsettling fascination, as if wondering what it would sound like if opened. Dorcas Meadowes looked sharp, watchful, and deeply unwilling to trust anyone with authority over time itself.
“This is a supervised academic exercise,” McGonagall said, in the tone she used when she sensed chaos gathering like weather. “You will be sent back no more than five years.”
“Five years,” James muttered. “That’s barely even history.”
“It is still history, Potter,” McGonagall said without looking at him.
Sirius grinned. “Can we warn ourselves about exams?”
“No.”
“Can we warn ourselves about haircuts?”
“No.”
“Can I warn myself not to be born into my family?”
Regulus’s eyes flicked sideways.
Sirius’s grin sharpened.
McGonagall’s mouth flattened. “Mr Black.”
Both Sirius and Regulus replied at once, “Yes, Professor?”
The air went poisonous.
James covered a laugh with a cough. Mary made a tiny squeaking noise. Evan looked faintly amused despite himself. Barty smiled like someone watching a match being struck in a room full of curtains.
McGonagall shut her eyes for one brief, pained second.
“The device,” she continued, “will anchor you to the correct return point. In the unlikely event of difficulty, activate the emergency rune.”
“Unlikely,” Remus repeated softly.
Lily glanced at him. “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You thought something.”
“I’m frequently guilty of that.”
Frank leaned toward Regulus slightly. “Do you reckon it’ll actually only be five years?”
Regulus did not look at him. “It is a school-made time displacement device being operated by adults who believe seventh-years should be trusted in groups.”
Frank nodded once. “So no.”
“Almost certainly no.”
Alice turned her head slowly. “Frank.”
“What?”
“Do not sound excited.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m academically alert.”
“You wanted to be a gladiator until you were eleven.”
“I was eight.”
“You were eleven.”
Frank opened his mouth, then closed it.
Regulus’s expression barely changed, but there was the faintest curve at the corner of his mouth.
Sirius saw it immediately, because of course he did.
“Regulus smiling?” Sirius said loudly. “Someone mark the date.”
Regulus looked at him. “Try not to embarrass yourself in another century.”
“Try not to bore one to death.”
“Boys,” Lily snapped.
“We’re not boys,” Sirius said.
“You are absolutely boys.”
“I’m offended.”
“You should be.”
Barty leaned toward Pandora. “This is going to be better than exams.”
Pandora hummed. “Unless we dissolve.”
Peter went pale. “Can we dissolve?”
“No,” Remus said.
Pandora tilted her head. “Not usually.”
“Pandora,” Evan said.
“What? I was being reassuring.”
“You said not usually.”
“That is more reassuring than always.”
Dorcas rubbed her forehead. “I hate all of you.”
“No, you don’t,” Barty said.
“I hate you most specifically.”
He beamed. “That’s almost affection.”
The professors began the final incantation.
The device rose from McGonagall’s palm, spinning slowly, rings of gold and silver opening around its centre like petals. Runes burned blue across the metal. The air thickened. Grass bent outward in a circle. The world grew strangely quiet, the sort of quiet that seemed to press fingers against every ear and hush the inside of every skull.
Regulus’s attention snapped to the device.
Frank’s did too.
Something in the magic was wrong.
It wasn’t smooth. It wasn’t a clean pull.
It lurched.
The blue runes flashed white.
Lily stepped back. “Professor?”
McGonagall’s eyes widened.
The device screamed.
Not like metal.
Like a living thing.
Then the world broke open.
For one terrible second, there was no ground, no sky, no air, no body. Only spinning light and the sensation of being yanked through the throat of the universe by something enormous and careless. Sirius swore. James shouted. Someone grabbed someone else. Someone screamed. Robes snapped like sails. Magic cracked around them in hot, bright lashes.
Then they hit the ground.
Hard.
Dust exploded around them.
Sirius landed flat on his back with a noise like all the dignity leaving his body at once.
James crashed beside him, rolled, and came up spluttering.
Peter landed on top of Fabian, who made a strangled noise and shouted, “I have been betrayed by mass!”
“Get off me,” Fabian wheezed.
“I’m trying!”
Gideon landed in a thorn bush.
Marlene hit the ground on one knee, wand already out. Lily stumbled but kept upright, hair flying across her face. Remus went down on one hand and stayed very still for a moment, breathing through pain. Mary rolled into Alice, who caught her by the shoulders before she could tumble into a ditch.
Frank landed heavily, immediately scanning the surroundings.
Regulus landed in a crouch.
Of course he did.
Barty landed on his arse and laughed once, high and breathless. Evan hit the ground beside Pandora and grabbed her before she could fall backward. Dorcas landed cleanly, wand raised, eyes already sharp.
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
The air was hot.
Not summer-in-Scotland warm. Not greenhouse warm. Not even June-after-Quidditch warm.
This was baked-stone heat. Dry, bright, golden heat. The kind that lay over the skin like a hand. The kind that carried dust and sweat and animals and smoke and something oily frying somewhere nearby.
A shout rose in the distance.
Not English.
Another shout answered it.
Then came the rumble of wheels. Hooves. Voices. A market’s roar.
Slowly, very slowly, James sat up.
“That,” he said, “did not feel like five years.”
Sirius lifted his head, hair full of dust. “Maybe Scotland got hotter.”
Lily turned in a circle.
They were crouched behind a broken stretch of wall near a narrow alley. Beyond it, through a gap between sun-bleached buildings, a street blazed white beneath the sun. People moved past in tunics and sandals. Men with shaved faces and dark curls. Women with pinned hair and draped fabric. Children darting barefoot between baskets. Traders shouting from stalls. Donkeys hauling carts. The smell of bread, fish, wine, sweat, dung, incense, and smoke hit them all at once.
Mary’s mouth fell open.
Peter made a tiny, terrified sound.
Frank whispered, reverent and horrified, “Oh.”
Regulus stood slowly.
His face had gone very still.
Remus looked between him and Frank. “That ‘oh’ sounded bad.”
Frank swallowed. “It’s Rome.”
No one spoke.
Then Sirius laughed once. “Sorry, what?”
Frank turned, eyes wide and bright with a terror that looked dangerously close to joy. “Rome.”
James blinked. “As in…”
“Ancient Rome,” Regulus said quietly.
The alley seemed to narrow around them.
Lily stared at him. “No.”
Regulus looked toward the street, listening.
A man walked past beyond the wall, speaking rapidly to another man beside him. Regulus’s head turned slightly, following the words.
“Yes,” he said.
Marlene’s wand tightened in her grip. “No, absolutely not. We were meant to go back a few years.”
Barty sat up properly, dust clinging to his robes. “Well, we’ve exceeded expectations.”
Dorcas rounded on him. “Do not start.”
“I’m merely recognising academic excellence.”
“We are in ancient Rome,” Peter said faintly.
Pandora looked delighted in a distant, alarming way. “Temporal overreach.”
“Pandora,” Evan said.
“What?”
“Not the time.”
“It is exactly the time. Several centuries too much of it.”
Mary laughed because the alternative was screaming. “We are going to die.”
“We are not going to die,” Alice said immediately, though her voice had sharpened.
Sirius rolled to his feet. “Right. Fine. Minor detour. Frank knows gladiators, Regulus knows whatever posh little corpse language that is, we’ve got wands, and McGonagall will pull us back in a week.”
Regulus looked at the device.
It lay in the dust near Lily’s shoe.
Cracked straight through the centre.
The runes were dark.
Lily bent and picked it up with both hands, careful as though lifting a wounded bird. She pressed the emergency rune.
Nothing happened.
She pressed it again.
Nothing.
James stepped closer. “Evans?”
Lily’s face had gone pale under her freckles. “It’s broken.”
Silence dropped.
Sirius’s humour vanished first.
“What do you mean broken?”
“I mean broken, Sirius.”
“Broken as in inconvenient, or broken as in…”
“As in the rune circuit is dead,” Lily said, voice tight. “The anchor’s cracked.”
Remus came to her side, examining it. “Can you repair it?”
“Maybe if I had the right tools, books, a professor, and wasn’t in ancient Rome.”
Barty pushed himself up, suddenly less amused. “So the emergency rune won’t alert them.”
“No.”
Fabian’s expression shifted. “And if the week ends…”
Gideon finished for him, voice quiet. “They won’t know where we are.”
Peter’s breathing went thin.
James looked at the wall, at the street beyond, then back at Lily. “They’ll look.”
“Where?” Dorcas asked sharply. “In every year that has ever happened?”
“They’ll figure it out,” Sirius said.
Regulus turned to him. “How?”
Sirius glared. “Don’t.”
“How will they figure it out? The device was meant to record a controlled displacement of five years at most. The anchor is broken. The emergency rune is dead. The return window will open at the intended point. We are not at the intended point.”
“Regulus,” Mary said softly.
He looked away.
Frank dragged both hands over his face. “We need to hide properly.”
That cut through the panic better than comfort would have.
A group of men passed close to the alley mouth. One glanced in.
Frank grabbed Peter by the collar and yanked him down behind the broken wall.
“Down,” he hissed.
They all ducked.
The men moved on.
For a moment, the only sound was everyone breathing.
Regulus crouched beside Frank. “We cannot stand here dressed like this.”
“No,” Frank agreed. “We look mad.”
“We look worse than mad,” Regulus said. “We look expensive, foreign, armed, and impossible.”
Sirius stared at him. “That’s your professional assessment?”
“Yes.”
“Lovely.”
Alice swallowed, then squared her shoulders. “What do we do?”
Regulus looked to Frank.
Frank looked back.
For once, neither of them seemed interested in arguing over who knew more.
“We blend,” Frank said. “Fast.”
Regulus nodded. “Clothes first. Shoes. Hair where possible. Jewellery only if it makes sense. No robes. No obvious wands.”
James gestured at the street. “And the language?”
Regulus said something in a smooth, clipped flow of Latin.
Everyone stared.
Sirius’s face did something complicated.
Barty’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, that is unfairly attractive.”
Evan looked at him. “Must you?”
“Yes.”
Lily blinked at Regulus. “You speak it?”
“Yes.”
“Of course you do,” Sirius muttered. “You would.”
Regulus’s eyes cut to him. “Some of us read.”
“I read.”
“Motorcycle catalogues and obscene graffiti do not count.”
James made a strangled noise.
Marlene grinned despite everything. “That one landed.”
Sirius pointed at her. “Do not encourage him.”
Frank shifted closer to the group. “Language charms might work, but we need to do them carefully. Latin from our books isn’t exactly spoken Latin from here. Regulus can listen and correct the structure.”
Regulus nodded. “Until then, no one speaks to locals unless I do it for you.”
Barty lifted a hand. “What if I’m charming?”
“You are not.”
“I am deeply charming.”
“You are a legal incident waiting for witnesses.”
Dorcas murmured, “Accurate.”
Peter looked miserably at the street. “What about money?”
“We have galleons,” James said.
Regulus shook his head. “Not here.”
“We can transfigure them,” Lily said, already thinking. “But not in the open.”
“Later,” Frank agreed. “When we’re somewhere hidden. Roman coins. We’ll need enough for food and lodging.”
“Lodging where?” Mary asked.
Frank hesitated.
Regulus answered instead. “Somewhere cheap enough not to ask too many questions but safe enough not to have our throats cut.”
“Comforting,” Peter whispered.
Alice touched his arm. “We’ll manage.”
“We need roles,” Frank said.
“Roles?” Fabian asked.
“You don’t just walk through Rome as a group this big with no explanation,” Frank said. “People will ask. People always ask. We need a reason to be together.”
Regulus glanced around at them, assessing with cold, rapid precision. “Household. Travelling household, perhaps. Or dependents attached to a minor foreign family.”
Sirius snorted. “You’re making yourself the family, aren’t you?”
“I was going to make you the mule,” Regulus said. “But you lack the discipline.”
James coughed into his fist. “Sorry. Sorry. Horrible situation. Very serious. Continue.”
Frank pointed at him. “You’ll stand out differently.”
James blinked. “Because?”
“Because Rome is full of people from everywhere,” Regulus said before Frank could answer. “But how people read you matters. Your features, your hair, your complexion, the way you carry yourself. People here will make assumptions faster than they ask questions.”
James’s jaw shifted slightly. “Right.”
Lily glanced at him, then at Regulus. “So what should he wear?”
Frank looked him over. “Something practical but good quality. Traveller. Maybe connected to trade. Not Roman citizen elite, not slave, not soldier.”
Regulus nodded. “A tunic with a cloak suited for the street. Sandals. Hair left as it is; it does not need to look local, only plausible. You can be from the western provinces or from a family connected through trade.”
James looked faintly unsettled but nodded. “Fine.”
Peter cleared his throat. “And me?”
Frank softened slightly, practical but kind. “You’ll want a looser tunic. Belted differently. Better fabric than a labourer but not attention-grabbing. People here aren’t all statues. You’ll be fine if you stop looking like someone who just stole bread.”
Peter’s eyes widened. “I always look like that?”
Sirius opened his mouth.
Lily pointed at him. “Don’t.”
Sirius closed his mouth, offended by prevention.
Regulus looked at the girls next. “Stola and palla for some of you, but not all. Depends on the role. Hair pinned, covered where useful. You must not move like schoolgirls in robes.”
Marlene arched a brow. “How exactly do schoolgirls move?”
“Like people used to floors that are clean.”
Mary looked down at the dusty ground. “Fair.”
Alice nodded. “Women’s clothing will make wand access harder.”
“Hide them in folds,” Dorcas said. “Or hair if short enough. Sleeves where possible.”
Pandora looked thoughtful. “I could make mine look like a hairpin.”
“No obvious magic,” Evan warned.
“I said look like.”
Mary glanced between Frank and Regulus. “What about us?”
Regulus considered her, Evan, Pandora, and Dorcas together. He spoke carefully, not like he was softening the truth, but like he knew the truth had edges. “Rome is not only pale men in marble. There are Africans here. Traders, freed people, enslaved people, citizens, soldiers, attendants, aristocrats from provinces, performers, scholars, servants. People from everywhere. But again, assumptions matter. The wrong clothing on the wrong body draws attention.”
Dorcas’s eyes narrowed. “So don’t dress us like your attendants unless that is the plan.”
Regulus met her gaze. “Precisely.”
Evan’s mouth curved slightly, approving despite himself.
Frank nodded quickly. “Better to make the group look like a mixed travelling household with money but not too much. Some of you could pass as connected to trade networks. Some as free companions. Some as relatives through provincial lines, depending on who asks.”
“Depending on who asks,” Lily repeated grimly.
“Which is why,” Regulus said, “no one asks us anything.”
Barty smiled. “Optimistic.”
“I said what should happen, not what will.”
Sirius looked at Regulus for a long moment. “And you?”
Regulus’s face closed slightly.
Frank looked him over too. “You and Sirius are a problem.”
Sirius threw up his hands. “Brilliant.”
“You’re both pale,” Frank said. “Dark hair. Aristocratic posture. You both look…”
“Like insufferable rich boys?” Marlene offered.
“Yes,” Frank said.
“Oi,” Sirius said.
Regulus did not object.
Frank continued, “That can help if used properly, but it also attracts attention. Fine fabric, clean lines. Not too decorative in public. You look like young men from a wealthy household.”
Sirius smirked. “Born for it.”
Regulus gave him a flat look. “You look like a wealthy household’s public scandal.”
James clapped Sirius on the shoulder. “Also born for it.”
“We need transfiguration,” Lily said before Sirius could respond. “Now.”
They worked crouched behind the wall, hidden by dust, shadow, and panic.
It was not elegant magic. It was hurried, whispered, layered. Robes shortened, reshaped, bleached and dyed by wandtip into rougher textures or richer drapes. Shoes softened into sandals. Bags became wrapped bundles. Ties vanished. Shirts became tunics. Cloaks formed from robe hems. Sleeves loosened. Belts appeared from straps. School badges dissolved into plain metal clasps.
Frank and Regulus corrected constantly.
“No, not that length.”
“That colour is too bright.”
“Lily, pin it higher.”
“James, your cloak needs to sit differently.”
“Peter, stop tugging at it.”
“I feel exposed!”
“You were wearing robes, not armour.”
“Sirius, for Merlin’s sake, less dramatic.”
“I am doing exactly what Roman nobility would do.”
“You are doing what you think Roman nobility would do after seducing a senator’s wife.”
“Still nobility.”
“Mary, yours is good. Dorcas, hide the wand deeper.”
“I know how to hide a wand.”
“I am aware. I am still saying it.”
“Barty, absolutely not.”
“What?”
“You look like a cult leader.”
“I thought that was the point of Rome.”
“No.”
Pandora spun once in place after transfiguring her clothes, layers of soft fabric shifting around her, hair pinned with something that had once been a quill. “I like this century.”
Evan stared at her. “Do not get attached.”
“It has excellent light.”
“It has disease.”
“All centuries have disease.”
“This one has it enthusiastically.”
Mary looked down at herself, smoothing the fabric with both hands. “Do I look right?”
Frank glanced at Regulus.
Regulus studied her with the distant eye of someone mentally rearranging history. “You look plausible.”
Mary made a face. “That sounds awful.”
“It is the highest compliment available.”
“I’ll take it.”
Alice adjusted her palla, expression focused. “How do I walk?”
Frank demonstrated awkwardly.
Alice stared.
Marlene burst out laughing. “That is the worst thing I’ve ever seen.”
“I was showing the clothes,” Frank said, flushing. “Not modelling.”
Gideon leaned toward Fabian. “He absolutely wanted to model.”
“He’s waited years for this,” Fabian murmured. “Let him have Rome.”
Frank ignored them with dignity that lasted almost three seconds.
Regulus moved between them like a commander with no army he respected but every intention of keeping it alive.
He corrected Peter’s belt, slapped Barty’s hand away from an overly ornate clasp, told James to stop trying to make his clothing look heroic, told Mary she could keep the jewellery if she made it duller, told Marlene she could not carry a visible knife because she did not have one five minutes ago and this was not theatre, told Pandora that no, she could not wear something “slightly prophetic,” and told Sirius, with deep exhaustion, that ancient Rome was not improved by eyeliner.
“I didn’t even ask,” Sirius said.
“You were thinking it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know you.”
That landed in the air between them harder than either seemed to expect.
Sirius looked away first.
Regulus did too.
Remus watched them both, quiet and tired-eyed.
Once they were changed, Lily held up the broken device again. “We should keep this hidden.”
“I’ll take it,” James said.
“No,” Regulus and Lily said together.
James blinked. “Rude.”
Lily tucked it into the folds of her clothing. “I can examine it later.”
“Somewhere safe,” Alice said.
Frank looked toward the street again. “First we find somewhere to stay.”
“And food,” Peter whispered.
“Priorities,” Sirius said.
Peter looked wounded. “I’m frightened.”
“You’re always frightened.”
“And yet I am always correct to be.”
Remus sighed. “He has a point.”
The first step out of the alley felt worse than the time spell.
At least the spell had been chaos. This required control.
They moved together into the Roman street, sixteen Hogwarts students wrapped in transfigured fabric and borrowed confidence, trying not to look like sixteen Hogwarts students wrapped in transfigured fabric and borrowed confidence.
Rome swallowed them whole.
The street was alive in a way none of them were ready for.
Heat rose from stone. Carts creaked. Donkeys brayed. Men shouted prices from stalls loaded with olives, figs, onions, bread, fish, cheap pottery, oil lamps, dyed cloth, and strange little charms that made Pandora slow down until Evan grabbed her wrist and pulled her along. Women moved in pairs or with children at their sides. A man carried cages of birds. Another stood behind strings of sausages. A boy darted past with a tray and nearly collided with Gideon, who stepped aside too late and received a stream of furious Latin.
Gideon froze.
Regulus turned smoothly and answered.
The boy spat something else, then hurried on.
“What did he say?” Gideon whispered.
“That you walk like a drunk goat.”
Fabian inhaled sharply. “He read you instantly.”
Gideon looked offended. “I do not walk like a drunk goat.”
“You sort of do,” Marlene said.
“Et tu, McKinnon?”
Frank groaned. “Do not say that here.”
“Why?”
“Just don’t.”
James leaned close to Frank. “So, gladiator boy, where are we?”
Frank’s eyes kept moving, hungry despite the danger. “City centre, maybe. Hard to tell from here. Market district. Could be near the Forum depending on the route.”
Regulus listened to the street, to the accents, the calls, the rhythm of it all. “We are not in the Republic.”
Frank looked at him sharply. “No?”
“No. The references are imperial. The coin images I’ve glimpsed, the dress, the soldiers. Empire.”
Sirius stared. “You got that from walking twenty feet?”
Regulus did not look at him. “Some of us pay attention.”
“Some of us are busy not being kidnapped by history.”
Regulus’s mouth tightened. “Then do so quietly.”
They moved deeper into the market.
Frank and Regulus spoke in low voices at the front, forming the only thread of order in the noise.
“Don’t stare at soldiers,” Frank murmured.
“Don’t make eye contact too long,” Regulus added.
“Don’t touch goods unless you mean to buy.”
“Don’t speak.”
“That one mostly means Barty.”
Barty placed a hand over his chest. “I am being unfairly targeted.”
Dorcas said, “You tried to haggle with a statue once.”
“It looked smug.”
Lily stayed near the middle with the broken device hidden against her side. Mary and Marlene flanked her. Alice kept close to Frank but watched everyone behind her, counting heads without seeming to. Remus walked beside Peter, who kept drifting toward food stalls and then jerking back as if remembering they had no money. Fabian and Gideon followed with James and Sirius, whispering commentary under their breath until Lily shot them a look.
Pandora drifted too much.
Evan kept catching her sleeve.
“Stop wandering,” he hissed.
“I’m observing.”
“You’re sparkling.”
“I’m not sparkling.”
“You are spiritually sparkling. It draws attention.”
Mary glanced back. “Can someone spiritually sparkle?”
“With Pandora?” Dorcas said. “Yes.”
The market opened wider.
Sunlight burned against pale stone. Somewhere nearby, water splashed from a fountain. A vendor called out something about dates. Another shouted over him about wine. Two soldiers stood near a columned building, helmets gleaming, red cloaks bright as blood in the heat.
Regulus noticed them.
He noticed everything.
He noticed their armour first, then the way they were not casually watching the crowd. Their attention had sharpened.
Not alarmed. Interested.
He turned his head slightly.
One soldier spoke to another.
Regulus caught only part of it through the market noise.
White. Noble. Face. Look there.
His stomach tightened.
“Frank,” he murmured.
Frank looked without looking.
His shoulders stiffened. “Keep walking.”
“What?” James whispered.
“Nothing,” Frank said too quickly. “Keep walking.”
Sirius immediately looked.
“Sirius,” Remus hissed.
“What?”
“Do not look at the armed men.”
“I didn’t know which armed men until you said it.”
Regulus exhaled through his nose. “Idiot.”
“I’m not the one attracting legionaries.”
Regulus’s eyes cut toward him. “Not loudly.”
Sirius shut his mouth, but not because he had been told.
Because the soldiers were still watching.
The group pressed onward.
For several minutes, nothing happened.
The market noise folded around them again. The soldiers disappeared behind the shifting crowd. The others relaxed by inches, distracted by the impossible reality of where they were.
Frank began quietly explaining things as they walked, because his fear needed somewhere to go.
“That stall’s selling garum, probably. Fish sauce. Don’t smell it too closely.”
Peter immediately looked ill. “Why would you say that?”
“Because you were about to smell it.”
“I was not.”
“You leaned.”
Peter tucked his chin into his neck. “I’m curious when frightened.”
Regulus nodded toward a group of men in bordered togas. “Do not step in front of men dressed like that.”
James glanced. “Important?”
“Yes.”
“How important?”
“Important enough that if you trip one, I am pretending not to know you.”
Sirius smiled. “Finally, something in Rome I agree with.”
Lily frowned at the crowd. “Where are the women going?”
“Depends,” Regulus said. “Household errands. Markets. Visits. Religious duties. It is not as simple as staying indoors no matter what later people like to pretend, but we still need to be careful.”
Mary tugged at her palla. “Careful how?”
“Careful in every way,” Dorcas said.
Regulus nodded once. “Unfortunately, yes.”
Marlene’s eyes flashed. “I hate it here already.”
“You’ve been here twenty minutes,” Remus said.
“I’m efficient.”
Barty leaned toward Evan. “I think I could thrive here.”
“You would be executed by sunset.”
“For what?”
“Starting a cult, insulting a senator, seducing someone dangerous, stealing a horse, poisoning a priest, or attempting all five because you got bored.”
Barty considered. “That is hurtfully plausible.”
Pandora smiled softly. “You would look nice on a coin.”
“I would.”
“No,” Evan and Dorcas said together.
They passed a stall selling fine cloth.
Mary slowed, drawn by rich colours, then kept moving when Lily touched her elbow. Peter’s stomach growled audibly near a bread seller. James winced sympathetically. Fabian whispered something to Gideon, who whispered something back, and both nearly laughed until Alice glared.
Regulus moved a few paces ahead to listen to a heated exchange near a wine stall. The Latin flowed faster there. Local. Slang-heavy. Useful.
He caught words about a lodging house.
Cheap rooms. Poor beds. Foreign traders. Near a side street.
He turned to tell Frank.
A hand clamped over his mouth.
Another seized his arm.
Regulus’s eyes went wide.
For one instant, he saw the market continuing as if nothing had happened: Sirius half-turned toward James, laughing at something he had just said; Lily arguing in a low voice with Marlene; Frank pointing discreetly toward an alley; Pandora distracted by a tray of bronze pins; Barty watching a man juggle knives; Evan watching Barty; Dorcas watching everyone except the narrow gap behind Regulus.
Then Regulus was yanked backward into shadow.
His wand was pinned beneath fabric and grip. His mouth was covered too tightly to speak. He twisted hard, heel scraping stone, but the man behind him was strong and knew exactly how to drag someone without making a scene. Another body blocked him from view. A fold of cloth came up, hiding his face as if he were merely being guided through the crush.
Regulus drove his elbow back.
It connected.
The man grunted.
The grip did not loosen.
Regulus bit down.
The hand jerked but stayed.
A voice hissed in Latin against his ear, low and vicious. “Quiet.”
Regulus went still.
Not from obedience.
From calculation.
There were at least three of them. Maybe four. Soldiers or palace guards, not street thieves. Their clothing was plain enough to move through the market, but their grip and formation were trained. One had a hand near a blade. One watched the crowd. One had Regulus.
If he fought openly, the others might see.
Or the crowd might see first.
A pale foreign boy using a wandless-looking weapon or vanishing something with magic in the middle of Rome was not survival. It was spectacle.
Regulus made himself breathe through his nose.
The market swallowed the space where he had been.
Ahead, Sirius turned his head.
Not fully.
Just a twitch.
As if something in him knew.
Then James shoved his shoulder with a grin, and the moment passed.
Regulus was dragged into a narrow passage between buildings, then through another, then beneath a shaded arch where the market noise dulled behind stone. His captors moved quickly. Too quickly. They had known where to go.
Regulus waited until the hand shifted half an inch.
Then he snapped his head back.
His skull cracked into someone’s nose.
The man cursed.
Regulus twisted, almost free—
A blade touched his ribs.
“Enough,” another voice said.
Regulus froze again.
The hand left his mouth.
He tasted blood where his teeth had cut the inside of his lip.
He lifted his chin.
“I have done nothing,” he said in Latin.
The men around him paused.
One of them, older, with a hard face and close-cropped hair, narrowed his eyes. “You speak.”
Regulus’s heart pounded. His face gave away nothing. “I speak.”
“Who are you?”
Regulus did not answer.
The blade pressed more firmly.
He looked down at it, then back up. “Someone your master wants alive, apparently.”
The older guard stared at him.
Then, unexpectedly, he smiled.
Not kindly.
“Clever.”
Regulus hated that more than if he had struck him.
They bound his hands beneath the drape of his cloak so it would not be obvious. Not rope. Cloth. Tight enough to restrict his fingers. Clever enough to stop wandwork if they had known what wandwork was, which made Regulus wonder if fear simply invented intelligence in enemies.
They moved him through shaded streets, past walls and courtyards, past glimpses of painted plaster and guarded gates. Rome shifted around him from market-crush to power. Wider roads. Cleaner stone. Men who stood straighter. Doorways that looked watched even when no one visibly watched them.
Regulus kept listening.
Every name. Every title. Every direction.
The emperor.
The word appeared first as a threat.
Then as a certainty.
Regulus’s blood went cold.
Not because he revered emperors.
Because he understood them.
Power did not need reason. Power only needed appetite.
And he had been noticed.
By the time they brought him through the guarded entrance, Regulus had pieced together enough to know exactly how bad this was.
He was not being arrested publicly. He was not being questioned in a market office. He was not being dragged before some minor magistrate.
He was being taken somewhere private.
Somewhere expensive.
Somewhere filled with men who did not look at him with curiosity, but recognition.
Not of him.
Of something they had been told to watch for.
Inside, the heat changed.
The floors were cool beneath his sandals. The air smelled of oil, flowers, wine, and polished stone. Light fell through courtyards in hard, white squares. Water moved somewhere nearby. Servants slipped past silently. Walls bloomed with painted scenes and red borders and gold details that made Regulus think, absurdly, of old Black family rooms pretending they had invented grandeur.
A guard shoved him forward.
Regulus stumbled once.
Only once.
Then he straightened before anyone could enjoy it.
He was brought into a chamber where the ceiling rose high and shadowed above him. Rich fabric moved softly in the warm air. A long table stood to one side. Bronze lamps gleamed. Men lingered along the walls: guards, attendants, officials, or creatures of court who had learned how to survive by having no expressions at all.
At the far end stood the emperor.
Regulus knew before anyone named him.
There was a kind of silence around certain people. Not peace. Not respect exactly.
Permission.
The room waited for him. Breathed when he breathed. Stilled when he moved.
He was not old, not the way Regulus had always imagined emperors in childhood books. He was dressed beautifully, richly, but not absurdly. His eyes were the worst part. Fixed. Hungry. Grief-bright.
Regulus was pushed to his knees.
He went down hard.
His bound hands clenched beneath his cloak.
The emperor came closer.
Slowly.
No one spoke.
Regulus lifted his head.
The emperor stopped in front of him.
For a long moment, he simply looked.
Regulus’s skin prickled under the attention.
Then the emperor reached out and touched his face.
Regulus went perfectly still.
Fingers brushed his cheek, his jaw, the line of his chin. Not rough. Not yet. Almost reverent, which was worse. The emperor tilted his face toward the light, studying the shape of him with an expression that moved between wonder and pain.
A murmur passed through the room.
The emperor silenced it by existing.
Regulus forced himself not to flinch.
“What is your name?” the emperor asked.
Regulus hesitated.
The guard behind him shifted.
Regulus said, “Regulus.”
The emperor’s eyes sharpened.
The name meant something here. Of course it did. Little king. Prince. Star. Every name in his family was a trap waiting for the right century.
The emperor repeated it softly. “Regulus.”
Regulus wished, with sudden vicious clarity, that Sirius were there to make a joke.
Then hated himself for wishing it.
The emperor’s thumb brushed the corner of his mouth where the blood had dried.
“You look like her,” he said.
Regulus did not answer.
The emperor’s expression changed.
Opened.
Broke, almost.
Then closed again into possession.
“A ghost,” the emperor murmured. “No. Better than a ghost.”
Regulus’s stomach turned.
“I am no one’s ghost,” he said carefully.
A guard struck him across the back of the shoulder.
Regulus pitched forward, caught himself, and lifted his head again with murder burning clean behind his eyes.
The emperor raised one hand.
The guard stepped back.
“No,” the emperor said quietly. “Do not bruise him.”
Him.
Not prisoner.
Not boy.
Not stranger.
Regulus understood then, fully and horribly, that he was not being treated as a threat.
He was being treated as something found.
The emperor crouched before him, fine fabric pooling over the floor. He studied Regulus again, almost tenderly.
“She had your eyes,” he said.
Regulus swallowed. “I am sorry for your loss.”
It was the correct answer.
It was also the worst answer.
The emperor smiled.
A soft, terrible smile.
“Beautiful manners,” he said. “Beautiful face. Beautiful omen.”
Regulus’s hands twisted against the binding.
The emperor rose.
The room rose with him.
“He will remain here,” the emperor said.
Regulus’s pulse slammed.
“My lord,” one of the officials began carefully.
The emperor did not look away from Regulus. “He will remain.”
The official lowered his eyes. “Of course.”
Regulus forced his voice steady. “I am travelling with companions.”
“Not now.”
The words were quiet.
Final.
Regulus’s mouth dried.
The emperor turned to the attendants. “Dress him properly.”
Regulus went cold.
“Gold,” the emperor continued, almost dreamily. “Pearls, if they suit him. The blue silk. No—white first. I want to see.”
Regulus’s throat tightened with fury sharp enough to choke him.
“I am not yours,” he said.
The room went lethal.
The emperor looked back.
For one long moment, Regulus thought he had miscalculated and would die in ancient Rome on a polished floor because a man with too much power disliked being told no.
Instead, the emperor smiled again.
“You will learn,” he said.
Then he gestured.
Attendants moved toward Regulus.
He jerked back, but the guards caught him immediately. One seized his shoulder. Another took his bound hands. He fought once, hard enough that the nearest attendant gasped, but the blade returned near his side.
Regulus froze.
Not surrender.
Storage.
Rage folded small. Fear folded smaller. Every thought put away where no one could touch it.
His face went blank.
Black family blank.
Survival blank.
The emperor watched with approval.
“Take care with him,” he said. “He is precious.”
Regulus was pulled from the chamber with his heart hammering like a fist against a locked door.
Behind him, the emperor spoke again to someone else, voice low.
Regulus caught only fragments.
The resemblance.
The gods.
A gift.
Consort.
The word struck like cold water.
Consort.
Regulus nearly stumbled.
The attendant nearest him mistook it for fear and murmured something meant to soothe.
Regulus turned his head slowly and looked at her.
She stopped speaking.
Good.
At least one person in Rome still had instincts.
They took him through another corridor, into a room bright with open air and polished bronze mirrors. Fabric lay folded over low benches. Jewellery rested in trays. Oils and combs and pins waited with the quiet menace of instruments.
The attendants untied his hands.
Regulus flexed his fingers once.
His wand was still hidden.
Not accessible.
Not yet.
Three guards remained by the door.
The oldest attendant bowed her head slightly, not quite meeting his eyes. “You will be dressed.”
“I can dress myself.”
She looked pained. “Not for him.”
Regulus stared at her.
She swallowed. “Please.”
That please stopped him more effectively than the blade had.
It was not for him. It was not kindness exactly.
It was fear.
Hers.
If he made this difficult, someone else would bleed for it.
Regulus knew households like that. Power like that. Rooms where one person’s disobedience became another person’s punishment.
He closed his eyes for half a second.
When he opened them, his face was smooth again.
“Fine,” he said.
The attendants moved carefully.
They stripped away the transfigured street clothing and replaced it with finery so soft it felt obscene against his skin. Layers of pale fabric. White first, as ordered. Then blue at the edges, deep as evening. Gold at his wrists. Gold at his throat. A fine chain laid across his collarbones. Rings offered and adjusted. A belt too delicate to be useful. Sandals that looked like they had never touched dirt.
One attendant reached for his hair.
Regulus caught her wrist.
The guards shifted.
The woman went still.
Regulus slowly released her.
She touched his hair with trembling fingers and arranged it away from his face.
In the bronze mirror, a stranger stared back.
Pale. Dark-haired. Fine-boned. Draped like a prize.
Aristocratic enough to be believed.
Beautiful enough to be trapped.
Regulus hated him on sight.
One attendant, younger than the others, looked at him with open pity before remembering herself and lowering her gaze.
Regulus looked away first.
Not because he could not bear pity.
Because he could.
And that was worse.
Back in the market, nobody noticed Regulus was missing for nearly ten minutes.
Later, every single one of them would hate that.
But at first, Rome was too loud.
Too bright.
Too much.
They were trying not to be seen while surrounded by thousands of people. Trying to listen to Frank without looking like students on a lecture. Trying to keep Barty from smiling at dangerous things. Trying to keep Pandora from touching cursed-looking trinkets. Trying to keep Peter from fainting near every butchered animal. Trying to keep Sirius and James from walking like they owned streets they did not understand.
Regulus had been quiet anyway.
Regulus was often quiet.
That became the terrible excuse.
The group turned down a side street Frank thought might lead toward cheaper lodging. Shade fell over them at last, and everyone exhaled.
“Right,” Frank said, voice low. “We need somewhere that takes travellers. Not too respectable, not too dangerous. If we can find a place with a back room or courtyard, Lily can look at the device and we can transfigure coins.”
“And eat,” Peter said weakly.
“And eat,” Alice agreed.
James turned, counting automatically. “Everyone still alive?”
“Unfortunately,” Barty said.
Lily frowned. “James.”
“What?”
“Count again.”
James blinked.
Then he counted.
Sirius. Peter. Remus. Lily. Mary. Marlene. Alice. Frank. Fabian. Gideon. Barty. Evan. Pandora. Dorcas.
James’s smile vanished.
He counted again.
Sirius saw his face before anyone spoke.
“What?”
James’s eyes moved across the group.
Once.
Twice.
“No,” Sirius said immediately.
The street seemed to drop away.
Lily turned sharply. “Where’s Regulus?”
No one answered.
Sirius moved so fast Remus had to grab his arm.
“Where is he?” Sirius snapped.
“He was just here,” Mary said, voice rising. “He was just—he was with Frank, wasn’t he?”
Frank went white. “He was behind me.”
“No,” Barty said, all humour gone. “He was near the cloth stall.”
“After that?” Dorcas demanded.
Evan turned in a full circle, eyes cutting through the street. “I thought he was behind Sirius.”
Sirius rounded on him. “You thought?”
“Do not,” Evan said, suddenly cold. “Not now.”
Pandora’s face had gone still in a way none of them liked. “He was taken.”
Mary’s hand flew to her mouth.
Peter whispered, “Taken?”
Marlene grabbed her wand beneath her clothes. “By who?”
Pandora looked back toward the market. “The street closed around him.”
“That is not an answer,” Dorcas said.
“It is the answer I have.”
Alice stepped between rising panic and rising violence. “Stop. Everyone stop. We go back the way we came.”
Frank nodded, jaw tight. “Carefully.”
Sirius yanked his arm free of Remus. “I’m not doing carefully.”
“Yes, you are,” Remus said, voice quiet but hard.
“My brother is missing.”
“And if you get yourself dragged off too, that helps him how?”
Sirius looked like he might hit him.
Remus did not move.
James stepped close to Sirius, lowering his voice. “Padfoot. We find him. We do it smart.”
Sirius’s breathing was harsh.
For one wild second he looked younger than all of them.
Not seventeen. Not reckless. Not funny.
Just a boy whose brother had vanished in a crowd thousands of years before either of them were meant to exist.
Then his face hardened.
“Fine,” he said. “Smart. Quickly.”
They moved back toward the market.
Every step felt longer.
The stall was still there. The cloth still rippled in the heat. The same vendor shouted prices. The same fountain splashed. The same crowds flowed like water around stone.
But Regulus was nowhere.
Barty shoved through two men too roughly and earned a furious shout. Dorcas caught his sleeve before he could respond.
“Don’t,” she hissed.
Barty’s eyes were flat. “I’m not in the mood.”
“Exactly.”
Frank approached the cloth stall, trying to look calm. He glanced at Regulus’s absence like it might have left a mark in the air.
“Regulus spoke Latin,” Lily whispered. “If someone asked him something—”
“He wouldn’t wander off,” Sirius said.
No one argued.
Regulus would not wander. Not here. Not when he knew more than all of them. Not when the device was broken. Not when survival depended on staying together.
Sirius looked at the ground, at the stalls, at the crowd.
“He was taken,” he said.
James’s jaw clenched.
“Maybe guards,” Frank said, barely audible.
Sirius turned on him. “Why?”
Frank looked sick. “Some were watching us.”
“You knew?”
“I saw them, Regulus saw them, we said keep walking.”
“You didn’t say they might take him!”
“I didn’t think they’d snatch someone in the middle of a market!”
“Why him?” Mary whispered.
No one answered at first.
Then Fabian said, very quietly, “Look at him.”
Everyone turned.
Fabian swallowed. “I mean—look at Regulus. Here. In this place. He stands out.”
Sirius’s face twisted. “Don’t.”
Fabian looked miserable. “I’m not blaming him.”
“Good.”
Frank’s voice went low. “Pale, aristocratic, pretty, foreign, young, dressed better than most people here even after trying not to be.”
“Pretty?” Sirius repeated dangerously.
Frank did not back down. “Yes. Pretty. Noticeable. Exactly the sort of person powerful men notice.”
Lily looked horrified.
Alice’s hand found Frank’s.
Marlene’s eyes burned. “Then we find the powerful men.”
Dorcas nodded once. “Guards first. Who were they?”
Frank scanned the crowd. “Two near the column. Red cloaks.”
“There are soldiers everywhere,” Peter whispered.
“Not like that,” Regulus would have said.
He was not there to say it.
The absence hit them again.
Sirius turned away sharply, hands shaking.
James saw and moved closer, blocking him from the street’s view.
“We’ll get him,” James said.
Sirius laughed once, ugly and breathless. “You don’t know that.”
“No,” James said. “But I’m saying it anyway.”
Barty had gone terrifyingly quiet.
Evan watched him with concern he did not voice.
Pandora stood in the sun, eyes unfocused, listening to something none of them could hear.
Dorcas stepped close to her. “Pandora.”
Pandora blinked.
“Can you focus?”
“I am.”
“On this century, please.”
Pandora’s gaze sharpened. “He is frightened.”
Sirius went still.
Barty’s face changed.
Evan said, “Pandora.”
“He is angry too,” she said softly. “Mostly angry.”
Sirius closed his eyes for one second.
That, somehow, helped.
Angry meant alive.
Angry meant Regulus.
Lily took out the broken device beneath the cover of her palla and looked at it again as though sheer will might resurrect it. “We need somewhere private. We can’t fix anything or plan in the open.”
Sirius stared at her. “We can’t leave.”
“We’re not leaving him,” Lily said fiercely. “But standing in the middle of the market looking panicked is going to get us all noticed.”
“She’s right,” Alice said. “We need a base. Somewhere to regroup. Then we search properly.”
Marlene looked ready to argue, then forced herself not to.
Frank nodded. “Regulus heard something about lodging before—”
He stopped.
The sentence collapsed under its own cruelty.
Before he vanished.
Remus picked it up gently. “Did you hear any of it?”
Frank swallowed. “Some. Side street. Cheap rooms. Foreign traders.”
“Then we use that,” Dorcas said. “We find the place he was trying to find. We make coins. We fix the language issue. Then we get him back.”
Barty smiled without warmth. “And if someone has touched him?”
Evan’s voice was quiet. “Then we get him back first.”
Barty’s smile widened slightly, worse than before. “Of course.”
Mary rubbed her arms. “This is a nightmare.”
“No,” Sirius said.
Everyone looked at him.
His eyes were fixed on the crowd where Regulus had disappeared.
“This is Rome,” he said. “Nightmares end.”
Far away, in a chamber of pale stone and bronze mirrors, Regulus Black stood dressed in silk and gold while attendants lowered their eyes and guards blocked the door.
The emperor had called him precious.
The word clung worse than chains.
Regulus looked at his reflection and thought of the market. Of Sirius’s stupid laugh. Of James’s loud voice. Of Lily’s steady hands. Of Frank’s eager explanations. Of Barty’s grin turning sharp. Of Evan’s watchful silence. Of Pandora’s strange, soft certainty. Of Dorcas, who would already be furious. Of all of them in the streets of Rome, finally realising he was gone.
He lifted one hand, heavy with gold, and touched the chain at his throat.
The metal was warm from his skin.
A gift, the emperor had said.
A ghost.
A consort.
Regulus looked into the bronze mirror until the stranger there disappeared and only his own eyes remained.
“No,” he whispered in Latin, soft enough that no guard could hear.
Then, in English, sharper than a blade tucked under silk:
“Absolutely fucking not.”