Night of the Living Dead
The Dark Lord was always an example for me. A model of purpose, strength, bravery and de Pure Blood's fight for what my parents and me called "keeping the wizard's blood tradition from scum". No mud bloods.
In my opinion, he did one single mistake in his life. One mistake that I hope that will end his life, with Merlin's blessing.
When He came saying he wanted an elf, I did not hesitate. Kretcher was more than my elf, he was my friend. He left with the Lord. They took a long time to come back. I sent Kretcher because I wanted to be big. Bigger than anyone else. Bigger than the Lestranges, bigger than Grayback. I was born to be big.
Once, Sirius came visiting me. Father had died a couple weeks before.
"Regulus" he said.
"What are you doing here?"
He stared at me. For the first time, I looked right in the eyes' of who lived at the same house with me for years. He looked serious and strange. I came to know, from some colleagues, that he was in a kind of group that was trying to fight the Dark Lord, and his friend, Potter, had ruined his life by marrying a mud blood.
"I came here to warn you. Get off it, Regulus."
"What?"
"Voldemort will fall." He said, and I got up from the chair, ready to curse him for saying his name
"I doubt it. You came because you're in the wrong side, brother. You're gonna die, like all your stupid friends."
"Whatever. I just came, Regulus, because after all you're still family, and I don't want you to die for a worthless cause. But I see that I'm going to lose this. Good bye, brother."
And he left.
When the Dark Lord left with Kretcher, I waited for hours. My mother screamed and yelled after him, but I ignored it. After midnight, thought, I called him. I thought he would come back proud of serving my master. But no.
He looked nervous, scared. I've never seen Kretcher like that. With some effort I made him tell me. My master went with him to a cave by the sea, made him give some blood and drink a weird potion. I asked where the potion was. He said it was inside a caldron. I searched in my thoughts.
"What the potion was for?"
"It made Kretcher see things, master. Horrible things, master. Kretcher was afraid, master."
The anger started to flow in my veins. I thought the Dark Lord wanted an Elf to serve him like a house elf, not a puppet.
"Then the Dark Lord put something like a medallion inside it, sir, and…."
"What?"
"A medallion, sir. Kretcher heard the Dark Lord saying it was very important, because it was a piece of him. And needed protection, sir."
Protection, protection, protection. Revenge. I piece of him.
Horcrux was a subject that Hogwarts avoided to speak about, thought I knew something about it from other people. It was a thing that required extreme madness or evilness to do. But one thing I knew. To destroy its creator, you needed to destroy it. And I would do that, at any cost.
Now, I am in the beginning of the cave, with Kretcher by my side. We got to a stone wall.
"Now, my master, you must give some blood to the wall, so you can pass. If you want to, Kretcher can…"
"No. I'll do it myself."
My anger is rising. I grab a knife that I stole from my house's kitchen and make a cut on the palm of my hand. A weird and hysteric thought come to my head, as I see the fresh and red blood hit the wall. That blood was one of the purest bloods in entire England. The blood of one of the most traditional wizard family. And I don't caring. My worry right now is destroying the thing that makes my master alive.
When the stone is satisfied, I heal the cut with my wand, but I do not clean my robes. Later I will keep them, for a trophy. I enter the place. It's big, with a kind of island on the middle of the lake. There's a boat.
I realize it's not a simple boat, but I can't guess what kind of magic is in it, so I get in. Kretcher follows me.
"What's on the lake?" I ask, staring to the dark waters that are around me. I touch the water. Something touches my finger back. I don't know why, but there's something about this touch. I ignore it, but I keep my arms inside the boat, just in case.
When we stop, I get off the boat and go see the caldron. I order Kretcher to pick up the medallion, and put the fake one attached with a note. My orders are clear. Destroy it, if I can't.
The potion is clear and has no smell. The first sip burned my throat, and a scene came in my head.
I could see my mother, screaming, right in front of me.
"GO AWAY FROM MY HOUSE!" I turn around, staring. Is this happening or not?
"I'M FULL OF YOU! GO TO HELL, STUPID WITCH!"
Sirius was being kicked off from home, I remember well. Behind the stairs, a twelve old boy stare at them, shaking. I was there. Not really sad for Sirius, but once he was away from home, all the responsibility was mine.
I fear responsibility. Really. The scene changes and I can see clearly myself, on the quidditch field. The Carrows spotted me on the dressing room, because I told they looked like trolls with the quidditch bats. I think I screamed, when I saw the first stroke hit my stomach. But that doesn't matter. I'm seeing myself, with fourteen years old, with the Carrows hitting me. They were way too strong, beaters, comparing to a mere seeker, like me.
"STOP" I scream, desperate, when Alecto's bat hit me in the nose.
I'm going to die, I think. I'm seeing myself dying. My body aches. It seems that I am being hurt by every move. They're hitting me, or the image of a skinny boy, too short, that can fly in circles, trying to catch the snitch before James Potter, while Gryffindor laughed? Or the boy less handsome, less charming than his older brother? Less, that's what a girl was saying to her friend, when I heard her talking on the bathroom in front of the door I was walking.
The scene changed again. I could feel the potion working on my body.
"Hey, Sirius!" A very beautiful girl yelled, smiling. I loved her. Marlene Mckinnon.
"Hey yourself, Marlene!" he answered, with a charming gaze. She smiled again, and I felt my face hot and my arms shaking with anger.
He drove away, after kissing her cheek, and I got closer to her.
"Mckinnon"
She stared at me. Behind her, I could see Evans and Meadowes, two of her friends, talking happily. Vance wasn't there, probably snogging with one of the Prewetts.
"Black?"
I tried to make the same charming smile Sirius used to do to the girls.
"You can call me Regulus."
She raised one eyebrow.
"Erm… Ok."
"So… How are you?"
Her eyebrows raised more. She looked at me quite ironic.
"Why you're not with the slytherins? Or with one of your relatives from the seventh year?"
"Sirius is their relative too." I answered, my voice sounding more bitter and cold than I expected. She gave me a strange smile.
"Well… Sirius is nice."
I felt everything break inside me. Her face was never pink, or red. I knew that. I spied her. At the corridors, classes, breakfast, lunch and dinner. Even in her free time, I was there. She had always ignored my brother, and that was the reason why she was different for me.
But that was gone. He did it. And me, poor and less handsome Regulus, had to just walk away, red from shame and anger. The thing changed again, quickly. Sirius and Marlene were kissing on an empty corridor, his hands inside her shirt, with luxury. She smiled, like she never did to me.
The same tears that were falling through the fifteen Regulus' face in front of me fell on my face. My heart broke again. Maybe I would see another thing, but the potion's effect was over.
I saw myself, my robes full of dirt from kneeling of the floor, tears on my face, my hands on the floor, probably looking miserable. My throat was aching, like if I screamed for hours. Kretcher was staring at me, terrified. He was holding the medallion. It's over.
I went to the lake, and I put my hands inside it, to throw some water on my face. Suddenly, the black lake turns red. Like blood, and my hand seems to be stuck inside. I pull my hand out strongly, trying to escape from whatever was in that lake.
A hand, white and dead, comes out with mine. And then came an arm, a shoulder. And then a woman, holding my hand, comes out. Her red hair was tied up, like a ballet dancer one, and a piece of white tissue was on her left shoulder, covering her body to her knees.
She would be beautiful. If she was alive. Behind her, the lake is moving.
My arms turn around, and I try to escape from them, but my fingers bleed on the floor, scratching it. My blood reaches the water, and I wonder how all those people died.
Maybe like me. Fools. Stupid for believing. Deaf and stupid. Proud.
But I got no time to think about this. It's over. Water is on my lungs, and I fell the dark.
Now I am one of them. Another one on the night of the living dead.
Especial thanks for Jules, who corrected! Reviews, please!