Hello! So, here's another story/character study. Contains wayyy too many metaphors.
Currently unbetaed (how do you spell that?)
Anyway, enjoy.
Disclaimer: Nothing is mine. All is J.K Rowling's.
Regulus Black is sixteen, and his left forearm is bare. Not many other Slytherin sixth-years can say the same.
Bella is 20. She flaunts her Mark as he does his name.
(in the worst possible ways. in blood and screams and everything he had once feared)
(once) (before it became a part of his life)
Narcissa is 19. Not many know whether or not she had taken the Mark; she either takes care to hide it or has nothing to show.
Andromeda is also 19. She married a Mudblood, and has been disowned. She is a Tonks, not a Black, and good riddance.
(how could she? how could she abandon everything she knew, throw it all away for love?)
(somedays, Regulus wonders what that freedom would feel like)
Walburga and Orion cannot take the Mark, but support everything it stands for.
(support meant Galleons, of course.)
There is one other Black. One who will never, ever, take the Mark and despises those who took it. One who consorts with Mudbloods and blood-traitors alike.
He does not say his name.
It was not out respect or fear the way it was for the Dark Lord.
(who made him Lord?)
As far as everyone was concerned, he is no Black, and definitely not the ex-heir.
Definitely not Regulus's brother.
Idly, Regulus wonders how he is. He has to remind himself that he does not care.
(does he?)
(would he approve of what his little brother was planning to do?)
But it doesn't matter whether he would approve. He, Regulus, is a Black-a true Black-and this is what is expected of him.
He is a Black.
But what is Black?
Black is nothing. Black is the color that's not even a color. When something is not red or green or yellow, it is black. Black lacks the bold red, the innocent yellow, the bright blue.
White, on the other hand, is the color of everything, every color mashed together to make one. The darkest of shades and the lightest of tints combined.
It's funny how even the darker aspects of the rainbow can comprise something so light.
His brother is White, he decides. He has all the Blacker aspects: cunning and ambition and haughty disinterest (that came from his darker upbringing.) But he also has the lighter aspects: selflessness and bravery (almost to the point of recklessness) and a desire to do what's right (from something within himself, something Regulus and Bella and Narcissa lack.)
White is what makes a Gryffindor.
(What does Black make?)
But Black can have shades, too. He has seen Andromeda, whose Black was almost but not quite. Her Black mingled perfectly with the Mudblood's yellow. A beautiful contrast that never fails to draw attention.
Regulus wonders what his Black is. Almost grey, because Black never doubts (but Regulus doubts.)
He doubts. Doubts whether this is the right thing to do. Doubts whether he can change his mind. Doubts he has a choice.
And for a moment he resents his brother. He had a choice. He was the heir, the one who was supposed to do it right. But he was selfish. He left and ran off to his blood-traitor friend, and took Regulus's choices with him.
So yes, Regulus has no choice. He must compensate for his brother's follies, and be the true Black heir. The one that does it right. He must stifle every part of him that says otherwise.
After all, Black is the darkest color, but not a color of all. The absence of color, of morals, of feelings.
He is a Black.