Chapter 204 - R.A.B — Tears Unshed

Harry suddenly understood why Dumbledore trusted Winnie so completely. Because Voldemort would never risk a chance at resurrection just to plant a mole.

Praeris opened the door and strode out. Harry hurried after her.

The first-floor sitting room held only Fleur, canoodling with Bill.

Harry asked, "Have you seen Winnie?"

Fleur pointed toward the kitchen, then mentioned in passing that she hoped Praeris would find time to look in on Bill's recovery. Praeris gave a quick no-problem gesture, and the two of them headed into the kitchen.

Inside, Ms. Prim and Winnie were making a cake with a lethal quantity of cream. The sight made Harry's scalp prickle. Praeris called Winnie out.

"R.A.B.?" Winnie's expression was strange. "Why are you asking me about that?"

Praeris caught something in the way Winnie said it. The weight wasn't on "why", it was on "me." As if she felt that someone else in this house was better placed to answer.

"This is important to us!" Harry said.

Winnie still looked uncomprehending. "Then why don't you ask your godfather? A Death Eater with the initials R.A.B. — isn't that Regulus Arcturus Black?"

Pure-bloods had a natural talent for names, especially the endlessly elaborate names of their own relatives. The Blacks were easy enough once you knew the pattern. Regulus Black: the brightest star in Leo, plus Arcturus, plus the surname.

Praeris had no memory of the name. She had barely heard of the person. But Harry's mouth dropped open, like something had just clicked into place.

Last Christmas, Harry and Sirius Black had been lying on the same bed when Sirius Black mentioned that name in passing, said it was his fool of a brother.

"Thank you, Winnie!" Harry turned to Praeris. "Let's go find Sirius Black!"

Sirius Black was still sitting in front of the same trunk, turning some piece of Quidditch team merchandise over in his hands. It looked old, the little Beater figure inside could barely move anymore.

"Harry?" Sirius Black grinned. "Running a maze?"

He had been sitting there, watching Harry dash down the stairs and back up again, round and round.

He found himself thinking of something Lily Potter once said, that when she was small, her family had a puppy that would chase its own tail in circles. Adorable, she'd called it.

James had thrown both hands up at once: "I can do that too!"

Lily Potter had nearly fallen over laughing. "But you're not a dog!"

James had been genuinely devastated. Couldn't even beat a dog. A stag's tail was far too short for that sort of thing.

"Oi!" Sirius Black had said gleefully. "Don't be too jealous, mate!"

"Why are you two actually competing with a real dog?!"

Lily Potter had truly despaired of boys and their need to win everything.

To Sirius Black, those days felt like yesterday. But today wasn't bad either, not really. Harry was still beside him. He wasn't alone.

"Sirius Black." Harry dropped cross-legged onto the floor next to him. "Tell me about..."

Sirius Black pulled his gaze from Praeris, who was inexplicably casting spells at the door, and looked at Harry.

"Regulus," Harry said.

Regulus.

That name was even further away than James and Lily Potter.

In Sirius Black's mind, Regulus was oddly similar, in some vague way, to Narcissa's boy, except he had black hair.

Sirius Black's parents were devoted to pure-blood supremacy, proud of it, convinced that half-bloods and Muggles deserved to die. Sirius Black had found it contemptible from the start. Regulus had believed every word. Whatever Walburga said, Regulus accepted without question, certain that Mother would never lead him wrong. That mama's boy.

So the entire Black family decided Sirius Black was a lost cause, and pinned everything on Regulus to carry on the family legacy.

Regulus was obedient. He became a Slytherin, obediently. He stayed loyal to the family, obediently. He followed every ancient rule that should have been buried long ago, obediently.

"I only have a photo of him from when he was small," Sirius Black said. "Don't get the wrong idea, everything here is stuff I left behind."

In the photo, a black-haired, slightly slight boy half-blocked Sirius Black from view. Sirius Black stood at a crooked angle, impatience written all over his face. Regulus stood properly at the front, his gaze carrying the same arrogance as every other Black.

Later, Regulus followed the pattern of other young pure-bloods and worshipped Voldemort. The year after Sirius Black left home, he became a Death Eater. In the eyes of every Black except Sirius Black, Regulus had brought honor to the family.

Sirius Black said, with a short laugh at his own expense, "At the time, I actually thought about taking him with me."

He had believed, back then, that the reason Regulus was the way he was came down to environment. The Black household was all he had ever known. Pure-blood supremacy turned people into something less than human.

If Regulus could just get out, meet some half-blood wizards, some Muggle-borns, he would see how ridiculous the whole thing truly was.

But Regulus refused. He even tried to talk Sirius Black out of leaving. "Sirius, if you go, Mother will be heartbroken."

"She'll be heartbroken? Then I'll be delighted!" Sirius Black looked as if he had just heard the most absurd joke ever told. "Believe me, if I walked out that door right now and got eaten by a Quintaped, she'd invite the whole family round to celebrate!"

Regulus frowned. "If only you didn't always say things she doesn't want to hear..."

"Give me a break! She's the one always saying things I don't want to hear!" Sirius Black said, impatient now. "What do you expect, that I'll become her puppet, like you?"

"I'm not—"

"Are you coming or not? Because if not, I'm leaving."

"I can't go. Mother needs me." Regulus said it slowly, like he was working through a list. "And if you leave, where will you live? You've never earned a single Galleon, what will you live on? Where are next year's book fees coming from..."

Sirius Black waved a hand. "I've got James."

"You're going to live off your friend?" Regulus looked genuinely stunned. "That won't last. How is that any different from being here?"

"It's completely different. James is my brother." Sirius Black's voice sharpened. "He's not going to look down on me. He's certainly not going to breathe those moldy old ideas in my ear every day."

"You're really leaving?"

"What do you think? Is today April Fools'?"

Regulus walked to the wardrobe, pulled open a drawer, and dumped a pile of jingling jewelry onto the table. He lifted his chin. "Take these with you, then. Don't go spending other people's money and disgracing the Black name."

"I'm running away from home, not embezzling funds!" Sirius Black stared at him. "I'm leaving to be completely done with this place, if I take those with me, what exactly is 'completely done' about that?"

He was drawing a line between himself and this rotten family. Taking Black family property would just make him a thief.

"But you are a Black!" Regulus said, as though stating something obvious. "You were born a Black, you'll die a Black, you're a Black from head to toe... How do you sever yourself from this family completely?"

Those words made Sirius Black furious in the way only the truth can. He knew. He carried Black blood, it was a part of him he could never escape, never throw away.

"My brain must have been smashed by a troll for me to even bother asking if you'd come!" Sirius Black snapped. "You stay here, then. Rot and fester with this old house!"

He stomped up to the attic, slung his bag onto his back, kicked off, and was gone on his broom, and earned himself a warning for flying over London at night where Muggles could see.

James had told him: you can't control what other people think.

Lupin had offered a gentler take: maybe Regulus had only been worried Sirius Black wouldn't manage out there on his own. And besides, if Sirius Black had actually brought Regulus along, Mrs. Black would never have let Sirius Black off for "abducting" her younger son.

"True enough!" Sirius Black had sprawled across the entire Potters' sofa and laughed. "That was her precious baby boy, after all."

Later, word came that Regulus had become a Death Eater. Then word came that he had disappeared.

In wartime, a missing person wasn't remarkable. But Sirius Black still remembered the way Regulus had upended that drawer and tipped the jewelry onto the table.

He hesitated a long time, then decided to look for the soft fool anyway, and, incidentally, let him see firsthand where listening to Mother had gotten him.

He never found Regulus. The investigation turned up rumors: how Regulus had become a Death Eater the year after Sirius Black left, at only sixteen; how frightened he had been of the work; how he had wanted out.

Sirius Black had nearly laughed himself sick. Did Regulus think this was a job? That he could hand in a resignation letter and walk away?

The search went nowhere. Then came the prophecy about Voldemort's enemy, and Sirius Black had no more energy left for it. He set it aside, and then things moved fast, and then Sirius Black was in Azkaban.

"That's how it was." Sirius Black dropped the photo frame into the trunk. "He probably gave his life for his great pure-blood supremacy ideals. That madwoman would be proud of him."

Harry and Praeris looked at each other, then back at Sirius Black. Both of them wore the expression of someone who had something to say and couldn't quite get it out.

Sirius Black scratched his head. "Harry, why are you so curious about Regulus? You both look like you're trying to pass a stone."

The words were out before he remembered the person across from him wasn't one of his foul-mouthed mates. This was his godson, and the daughter of that swindler witch, Sylvia's girl. Damn it. All that work maintaining a respectable godfather image.

Harry looked at Praeris. "Praeris — can I tell him?"

He couldn't make up his mind about the Horcruxes. He kept thinking that if only Dumbledore were here, but there were no ifs anymore.

Praeris said, evenly, "It's your matter. Make your own call."

Harry sat with it for a moment. Whatever he was turning over in his head, he eventually reached into his things and pulled out Regulus's final note. He held it out to Sirius Black.

Sirius Black didn't know what he was looking at. Then he opened it, and went completely still.

He read it once. Then again. Then again. He was absolutely certain it was Regulus's handwriting. Thunder rolled through his skull, loud enough to drown out everything else.

"This is... a method Voldemort used to come back," Harry said haltingly. "I think Regulus stole the real locket. To stop him."

Sirius Black kept reading the slip of paper as if he had forgotten how words worked.

He had never truly hated Regulus. What he hated was the Black family, the ideology, the ancient rotting rules that had pinned him down. Regulus was just the lamb who had accepted all of it without a fight, stretching his neck out willingly before Walburga's madness, swallowing ideas that should have died a century ago. It had made Sirius Black furious in a way that went beyond anger. Furious at the waste of him.

And Regulus's obedience had a way of becoming a weapon against Sirius Black, too. Everyone made the comparison. Regulus was the devoted one, the proper one, the Black who had it right. Sirius Black didn't want any of those labels. But it had still felt like something being taken from him, some wordless betrayal, and the two of them had grown further apart until the distance felt uncrossable.

Sirius Black hadn't liked Regulus, that passionless block of wood who couldn't feel anything. He hadn't needed a brother who would side against him. But on the day he left, he had still made one last attempt, hoping Regulus might find the courage to break free.

He had been the fool. Expecting a lamb tied up its whole life to simply walk out of the pen.

After that, he stopped thinking about Regulus. Until Regulus disappeared.

He had never imagined that Regulus died fighting Voldemort.

I am the false brave one. You are the true hero.

That brother he had written off, the one he had thought all bluster and arrogance on the outside, spineless underneath, had been somewhere Sirius Black couldn't see, enduring terror alone, and had found the courage to break free after all. Had struck at Voldemort in a way Sirius Black never had.

"Ha. Haha. Hahaha!"

Sirius Black laughed. Loud and full. But his eyes were red, and the tears came anyway, sliding from the corners without him stopping them. His face held pain and laughter at the same time, twisted into something that didn't belong in ordinary life.

The slip of paper fell from his hands. He clapped, hard, and raised his voice: "Good! Too good! Reg — my brother — this is the best prank I have ever seen. You tricked the most evil dark wizard in history. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you..."

He had been gone so long. Regulus almost certainly hadn't survived. It was only that without news, without certainty, Sirius Black had always carried the quiet feeling that he might still be out there somewhere.

He thought suddenly of Barty Crouch Jr. being thrown into Azkaban, screaming for his mother. A few days later, no more sound.

If Reg had really died, in those last moments, would he have called for Mother? Or would he have thought, even for a second, of his rebellious older brother?

Sirius Black didn't know.

He only knew that all these years, he hadn't managed to do anything that truly mattered. But Regulus had done the one thing Sirius Black never could.

He had struck back at Voldemort.

➤ Next: Sirius's Remorse — Heartbreak