Liars
Life is like a chess match, a constant game of chance; the never-ending converging of roads and choices that will eventually set you on the path that will lead to your ending destination. The deciding play can happen so fast you could blink and miss it, and just like that you would know who you want to be and where you want to end up. Or, it can happen gradually, like watching a match in slow motion through a pair of ominoculars.
For you, in particular, the path that life sets you on is determined by a series of little decisions and questions, irrelevant at first glance, but so much more when added together. And it starts with just a simple question. One question, one answer, and that's all it takes.
You were always the less thought-of child (though your brother will argue differently), the less relevant son, and you grow up knowing this. You are the younger brother, the second son. You're the understudy, the back-up, the replacement should anything happen to the rightful Black heir. This, as well, never bothered you. You hero-worshipped your older brother like a god, and your only strife in life was to please your parents and make them proud, even if they rarely spared anything you did a second glance.
When you are five, Cousin Bella explains to you, in grand gestures and prideful expressions, the legacy of purebloods like yourself, and more specifically, that of the Blacks'. She explains to you about the Mudbloods and the blood traitors, and about the filth that is threatening to take over the rest of wizarding society. There is disdain on her face as she rants about the things her parents have taught her; you don't understand most of her words, child that you are, but you listen avidly as she describes the valiant goal this family is working towards: a community that is free of the impure scum that continues to contaminate the rest.
"And soon only pure blood will remain," she tells you. There is reverence in her voice. "Our family are heroes for this, Regulus. It's our job to follow in their footsteps."
You feel pride for your parents blossom in your chest at the words. Because as young as you are – as ignorant, as naïve – you believe her when she says this. Your parents are heroes.
That's the day you decide you want to be just like them when you grow up. Maybe then they'll finally be proud, finally notice.
"Mummy? What does it feel like to kill?"
You ask the question, and it's the first time in your five years that you can ever remember your mother seeming caught off guard. Walburga Black is a concrete wall of stone, imposing and unshakable, and impossible to budge. But the unexpected inquiry coming from your lips manages to actually startle her, if only briefly.
"Whatever do you mean, darling?" she asks, somewhat sharply, somewhat bewildered. You have never asked or spoken of anything like this to her before. The subject being brought up must be of complete surprise, especially coming from a young child such as yourself.
"I saw you yesterday," you tell her, and as you do, you flash back to yesterday, to the moment that you're speaking of; you remember seeing the man – the Muggle, for that must be what he was, in such strange clothes – enter the room, and you remember your mother closing the front door behind him. You hid behind the stairwell, because you knew instinctively that this wasn't something you are meant to witness.
You saw the wand clutched in her hand, and you saw the man fall, topple like a puppet whose stings had been cut. You saw the light leave his eyes, and you watched through the gap in the railing, heart pounding. You felt afraid… but also in awe. In awe that a life could be snuffed out so easily, with just the flick of a wand and the mutter of a few words.
"That man," you say to her now. Your eyes are wide with curiosity, and are so very hopelessly naïve. "He looked scared."
Walburga takes a breath. Her eyes are dark, and very serious. You look up at her, a child-like innocence gleaming in your eyes.
She crouches down, so she is now at your level, and you can look at her face without looking up. She takes a firm grip on either of your shoulders. Looks you in the eyes.
"This is a very grown-up conversation we are having right now," she informs you. You nod. You know this.
"I'll need to know," you say, "If I am to grow up and do what you do." You jut your chin out stubbornly. "Bella says it's our job, when we're older, to preserve the pureblood lineage, so that's what I'm going to do."
There is pride in your voice. Walburga looks surprised, but also very pleased, by this declaration.
"And she's quite right, my little king," she says. The nickname, stemming directly from the meaning of the star you're named after, makes you beam in happiness. She rarely uses it anymore. "You will grow up and make the House of Black proud. Just as your cousins will. Just as your brother will."
There's something in her voice when she speaks of Sirius. You know about how Sirius has been acting out recently, and straying from the family's path. You wonder what your mother thinks of this, and what will happen when Sirius becomes the heir of the Black family's fortune and estate. To Walburga, image is everything. A less than perfect son is completely unacceptable. That's why you strive each day to meet her expectations.
"So you want to know, do you?" she asks, after a moment. "What it feels to kill?"
You nod, eagerly.
"Nothing," she responds. "You don't feel a thing."
You believe her.
How foolish you were.
It's eleven years later, and you are no longer the innocent little boy you once were. You are just sixteen years old, and the dark mark is forever burned into the skin of your forearm, a constant reminder of your loyalties in this war. You have seen the evils of this world – and you have committed many of them.
Arm outstretched, your right hand is shaking and gripping your wand so tightly your knuckles are white and bone is visible through skin. A mudblood cowers before you, under the point of your wand. Tears spill down her dirtied face. Her blondish hair is tangled and bloody.
"Do it," she whispers coldly, shaking violently. She's scared, but strong, and she isn't pleading with you to please let her go, and somehow that makes it worse. "If you're going to kill me, then just get it over with, you sick bastard."
If you weren't so frozen with dread in this moment, you might find it in yourself to have some respect for her, despite her blood status. To have the type of bravery to stare Death straight in the face and say the equivalent of screw you? You could never bring yourself to do that, ever.
You aren't brave. You aren't Sirius. You're Regulus Black, and you're a coward. Always have been.
"Come on, Black!" The voice hissing impatiently in your ear belongs to Rodolphus, Bella's fiancé. He stands just behind you, Bellatrix clinging eagerly to his arm. "What the hell are you waiting for? Just kill her already!"
His face is hard and unfeeling, and he reminds you of your father, when Orion would punish you as a child. Bella is wrapped in her future husband's embrace, and her eyes look over your shoulder at the petrified mudblood, a gleeful smile stretched across her entire face. She's taking great delight in the woman's terror.
"Finish her, little cousin," she says, clapping her hands together. "Before I do it for you. And then the Dark Lord won't be pleased."
The arm you hold aloft is shaking violently, and you are deathly pale. Your mouth feels like sandpaper, and you can't get your tongue to work. It's only two words, but the thought of saying them makes your throat constrict. The two words wrap around your throat in an iron grip, choking the breath from your lungs. You've done awful things in your few months as a newly-marked Death Eater, horrible things, but this is one line you have yet to cross.
Beside him, Rodolphus' lips curl back to bare his teeth. "C'mon, Regulus!" he snarls. "Don't be a coward!"
Coward. It echoes in your head.
Cowardcowardcowardcoward.
Something inside you snaps, and the words are spat from your mouth before you even have time to think on them.
"Avada Kedavra!"
You don't even realize what's happened until the burst of green light erupts from your wand and hits its intended target in the chest. The woman's eyes go wide. Her body goes slack, as her face goes blank and the light leaves her eyes.
She's dead.
You killed her.
Bellatrix and Rodolphus are laughing, clapping you on the back and patting you on the shoulder. Congratulating you. It's a game for them, one big game. But you must not be playing it right, because you don't feel like laughing or celebrating at all. You don't even hear them; their voices are nothing but background noise. Your world is spinning and crashing and drowning all at once, and all you can see are her dead, vacant eyes. They're judging you, accusing you, condemning you. They scream in your head with the shrill volume of sirens.
Look what you did. Look what you did.
You feel faint. There's a sudden ringing in your ears, and you fight to push down the bile that rises in your throat. You wish you had something to hold onto, because the ground is unsteady beneath your feet and your body wavers like you're going to pitch forward to the cement.
You can't look away. Her face is burned into your memory like a brand. Like the way the Dark Lord seared the mark permanently into your skin.
You did your job, you tell yourself. That's all you were doing. You're a Death Eater, she was a mudblood. She was filth. She deserved what she got.
You almost believe that, but there's no arguing with this hallow, empty feeling filling up your chest. There's no convincing yourself of something when all you can think of is that fatal flash of green light, and the frozen look of terror on her face.
You remember what your mother said to you, so long ago. Her words echo in your head, taunting you, even eleven years later.
"Mummy? What does it feel like to kill?"
"Nothing. You don't feel a thing."
She lied. All these years, and she lied, they all did. Your entire life has been constructed by false-belief, with tiny bits of truth sprinkled in. And your mother lied to you. You are who you are today, because of her. She made you, and you went along with her fibs like a puppet controlled by a string.
Killing doesn't feel like nothing. How could he ever think it could be nothing? It is everything. He feels it. And it hurts.
She lied. She lied, they lied, all of them lied, and they'll continue doing so.
Because now you're a murderer, and all of them are liars.