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Sirius was right in the end.
Regulus was an idiot; he was too soft to really undertake everything that the Dark Lord asked. He’d signed up for this eagerly — vowed his life and soul to the Dark Lord’s service at the age of sixteen — without thinking of the way it might affect him. He couldn’t get through most raids without vomiting, and he didn’t have the stomach for torture at all.
For all he’d worshipped at the Dark Lord’s altar in Hogwarts — for all he still had a collage of the Dark Lord’s most vile crimes in pride of place above his bed — he didn’t know how much longer he’d have been able to handle the reality of the situation.
In a way, finding out about the Horcrux was a relief.
It gave him a way out.
It wasn’t as if he hadn’t been thinking of the easiest ways to die. He knew if he defected that his death would be as miserable as possible. He’d be tortured to the point of begging for death, and even then, he might not be granted that relief until he lost his mind. What was more, his friends would probably be forced to torture him themselves, to teach them a lesson.
He knew the responsible thing to do would be to find his brother; to get word to him somehow and have Dumbledore handle the whole thing. He could spare himself that way. He wouldn’t have to live through the horrors that Kreacher did.
He might not even have to die.
He wanted to die.
The idea of serving the Dark Lord indefinitely — because there would be no going into hiding that would save him; nowhere that the Dark Lord wouldn’t find him — made him feel such a bone-deep, existential dread that death was highly preferable.
If it weren’t for the Horcrux, he’d have probably provoked an auror into a fight; gotten it over with quickly. A Killing Curse wasn’t meant to hurt at all, right?
Was it absurd that he felt like he deserved so much more than that? Penance for what he’d done? Perhaps he deserved to suffer; to endure the same things that he’d done to others — without forcing his friends to participate.
Whatever horrors were to be found at the cave might not have been the same as what Regulus had done on raids and in the battlefield, but the overall suffering should be enough. It was hardly as if he had another choice — not one that resulted in his death.
He had little choice, really; he wanted to die, and he knew the best way to do it.
He had Kreacher take him back to the cave. Regulus wasn’t sure what to expect — Kreacher had been too shaken up to go into too much detail about how horrifying the landscape was, only that it was horrifying.
There was nothing but rock and water as far as Regulus could see. It was unnerving, and Regulus wondered how badly it would hurt if he were to fall (or jump). He couldn’t do that yet, though. He had to take care of the Horcrux before he died. He even had a decoy he’d made for when the Dark Lord found out. He had to finish what he came here for.
He looked at his watch one last time. It had been a gift for his seventeenth birthday, when he’d still been naïve enough to believe every word from the Dark Lord’s mouth. Now, it only reminded him of that naïvité.
“Come along, Kreacher. Show me how to get into the cave.” It was an order.
Kreacher was sobbing, but he said nothing. Good; Regulus didn’t need more guilt. He followed Kreacher down the cliffside to the water.
The water was as cold as ice, and Regulus had never been a strong swimmer, but he was a wizard, and surely that counted for something. He made his way to the cave’s face.
The inside of the cave looked unremarkable at first, but he had to trust Kreacher. Kreacher was bound by magic to obey Regulus’s orders, and while Regulus didn’t want it to happen like this… what choice did he have?
He cut his hand to gain access to the cave, and only at Kreacher’s insistence did he allow the elf to heal him.
They stepped forward into yet another cavern. This one was dominated by a black lake, with a green light far into the middle of the lake. That, Regulus knew, was where the Horcrux lay. There should also have been a boat. Kreacher led Regulus to it.
The moment Regulus settled into it, it moved on its own toward the light — toward the Horcrux. The Inferi in the water were disturbing, to say the least. Regulus wondered if the Dark Lord had killed them all himself; whether some of his own kills lay here, ready to attack once he freed the Horcrux from the basin.
Seeing the basin was different to hearing about it; he had his orders. Gazing upon the Horcrux, he made some slight modifications to his decoy, and turned to Kreacher.
“Kreacher, whatever I do or say after this, you are not to allow me to stop drinking the potion until there is nothing left. Then you are to take the locket, leave this fake in the basin, and destroy the true locket. You are to tell no one in the family anything about tonight, no matter how they ask or order you.”
It might not be ironclad, but it was as good as Regulus was going to get. Besides, he needed to make sure it was something Kreacher could follow.
“Yes, Master Regulus,” Kreacher sobbed out.
Regulus conjured a goblet and dipped it into the potion.
The first sip was not as horrible as he anticipated. The second, however…
Regulus knew what he was getting into; he knew what would happen. He knew he would see his own worst memories again — relive every horrible moment in his life. The problem with Regulus was that there was so much misery to choose from.
He tried his best not to think about it, but there was a clear difference between how his parents treated him and Sirius growing up to how some of his friends’ parents treated them. Most people weren’t terrified of stepping a toe out of line for how their parents would react.
That was to say nothing of all the things he’d done himself during the war. He’d been able to rationalize it away for the most part, but now…
Now, it all came flooding back.
Regulus scarcely knew what was happening, only that Kreacher had ceased feeding him the vile potion — only that he needed water.
He ordered Kreacher to give him some water. Kreacher held an empty goblet to his lips. It wasn’t the potion, but it wasn’t water, either. Regulus crawled to the edge of the island. Kreacher’s bony hand gripped his shoulder. Regulus shook him off.
“Go home,” he ordered. He knew he had to do that much, if nothing else.
“Master Regulus!” Kreacher cried.
“Now,” he managed. His head was swimming. He needed water.
There was a crack, and this time, when he went to the edge of the island, no one held him back.
The water was cool relief, and, as the horrors of the potion left his body, awareness of his situation flooded in; namely the slimy, decaying hands grabbing him. He had no strength with which to fight; he had no choice but to let them drag him under, clawing at his skin and leaving gashes.
He wondered whether he should have just asked Kreacher to kill him.
Drowning, as it turned out, was a painful way to die.
It was no less than he deserved.