Prologue
They say that blood is thicker than water. I suppose I am a testament to the contrary. I am a blood traitor. I did not betray my parents, or the hundreds of years of dark magic that has been the tradition of the most noble house of black. I did exactly what they wanted, at least initially. No, I did something much more profound, that cut much deeper. I betrayed a blood brother who loved me.
I am Regulus Magnus Black.
I'm not brave or witty like my beloved brother Sirius. I usually take the path of least resistance and bend to other people's wills. I bent to my mother, the crazy hag, and I later bent to the Dark Lord himself, but something was different with the Dark Lord. I had yielded, bent, avoided and stepped down so many times that the feeling the came over me on a raid, one of hundreds I had gone on, when I saw a family burnt alive in their house, the father pathetically trying to beat out the flames, while the mother cried and held her baby tightly to her breast, was utterly foreign to me. What was it? Fear? Yes, probably. I had always been afraid, even when with "friends" for who when they might be enemies and leek information to my mother. No it wasn't fear, at least not at the core. Was it guilt? No, guilt was present, but it wasn't at the core either. I remember as the flames consumed the house a little white face peering out from the window. It was the little boy. Roger, I remembered, from the pictures tacked to the frig when we had raided the home. The boy's face was so cool and calm, artistically at odds with the roaring fire around him. While his countenance was cool, it was not devoid of emotion. What shocked me was the utter lack of fear his face held. Surely he must have realized that he and his family would die. His eyes were trained on the Dark Lord and instead of fear there was defiance. Perhaps it was just the effect of the shadow and flames. Perhaps he did not realize the power the Dark Lord possessed. But his gaze told otherwise. He understood perfectly. After all, hadn't he watched as his older brother was killed with a simple flash of green? How could he comprehend and still not be afraid? It was then that I understood my feeling. It was determination. I would end this. I would get out. I would defy. I looked at the Dark Lord and for the first time saw him stripped of his power, impressive robes and frightening countenance. I saw the calculation the cruelty. I saw in his gaze that he understood as well, what was happening, and he basked in it.
Shredding all that had characterized me a Regulus, I impulsively leapt toward the house. I didn't know what I going to do, other than somehow help them. I got no more than several steps when the boy's eyes turned to me. I realized then that he was blind, but that something was off, something I had missed. I heard the Dark Lord behind me start from my surprising stunt. I felt him burrowing at the edges of my mind. Then he stopped. He had found, gotten a whiff of defiance. I felt the spell hurdling toward me before it even left his lips. My eyes connected with the boy's in front of me and as the spell hit me, the boy's eye's turned to liquid silver and he muttered some latin phrase and suddenly I was thrown forward.
My head connected with a stone floor and all went dark. When I gained consciousness it was to a pair of brown eyes. These eyes were large and fixed intently on my face, almost as if he recognized me. Upon closer inspection I saw that his eyes were somewhat faded and the light lines around them were more pronounce then they should have been on someone his age. Exhausted was the word that described him. My eyes traveled down from his tired face and intense eyes to his clothes. That was when I got a shock. There, displayed proudly on his left breast was the hogwarts emblem with a lion behind it. What had happened? I was at Hogwarts.