Being Brothers
The houses competition:
House: Gryffindor
Year: seventh
Category: standard
Prompt: Azure
Words: 769
The Golden Snitch:
Anime Week:
Write about loyalty between brothers.
The Golden Snitch;
Ollivander's wand shop:
Rougaruo hair; write about a dark character
The Golden Snitch;
Through the universe:
Planemo-Regulus Black
Centaurus, Aurora.
Words: 769
Huge thank you to Tiggs for beta'ing at such short notice! I am forever in your debt and if I ever find out your address I will send you a year's supply of choclate.
AU alert. An idea of what Sirius and Regulus' relationship could have been like.
Regulus and Sirius Black were brothers, and close ones at that. For the first seven years of their lives, they had shared a room and refused to be separated, and even when they did get their own rooms, it took a threat of their mother's scorn for them to accept the change. They did make sure their rooms were the same colour, though: azure.
Azure was the Black brothers' favourite colour, and if they got the chance, they would get everything in azure. That did not happen very often though, as their mother either hated the colour or did not think it was befitting (Sirius and Regulus were not sure which) of someone from the Black family to wear it.
The next Christmas, their father brought them two matching pocket watches, the idea being that when they checked the time they could see how their brother was doing. The colour of the inside of the pocket watch would tell them how the other was doing: green for sick, red for in mortal danger, azure for perfectly fine, sepia for dead, and black for dying.
However, the only thing that ever divided the two brothers was the fact that Sirius was completely different from the rest of them while Regulus was perfectly like the rest of the family. That was the only thing that brought any angst between them.
As they went through Hogwarts, they slowly drifted with the azure inside their watches being the only teller of how the other was doing. Sirius went to Gryffindor and basically was unwelcome in his home, and Regulus went to Slytherin and continued to be the perfect child. However, every night, both the brothers would check their pocket watches to see how the other was doing.
That kept happening even after they left school. They kept checking their watches just to make sure the other was still all right, and their loyalty still stayed. Despite the fact Sirius had been asked to spy on the Death Eaters through his brother, he said no. He could not betray his brother like that, it was just wrong.
########
Regulus missed his brother, but he understood they had chosen their separate paths and now their lives did not cross. All Regulus knew was that his brother was alive; his pocket watch told him so. These days, that shade of azure was his main source of comfort.
Like Sirius, Regulus was extremely loyal to his brother. He defended his brother when his parents were criticizing Sirius, and he defended him when anyone else bagged him too. It would have been very easy just to forget the ten eleven years of friendship and loyalty they had developed, but he couldn't. Something stopped him every time he thought of it.
As the Dark Lord got stronger and started killing more, Regulus started to regret his life decisions. He had finally realised he did not want to serve the Dark Lord, but there was nothing he could do about it now.
Or so he thought until Kreacher told him about the special locket the Dark Lord had hidden in a cave near the coast. Regulus made a copy of it from what Kreacher could remember, and then they both went to the cave together. After Regulus had drunk all the potion, with Kreacher forcing him to drink it, he quickly swapped the lockets around and took a drink from the lake: he was proud of himself to be able to make the switch.
However, he soon discovered there were Inferi in the lake that rose as soon as the water was touched, and they came to drag Regulus down.
"Kreacher! Go!" Regulus called as the Inferi started to dragged him off.
The House-elf nodded and left the cave. He didn't want to but he had no choice in the matter. As Regulus was dragged under the surface of the water, he thought, 'Make sure your side wins this, Sirius.'
The last thing Regulus remembered before he died was a flash of azure, and then he faded from existence.
Meanwhile, Sirius looked at his pocket watch and saw the colouring go from azure blue to black, to sepia. Sirius began to cry, realising his brother had died. Despite it all, he had always loved his brother and had always kept some kind of loyalty to him.
From that day, Sirius never let go of his pocket watch; it was always with him. It also brought him a few good memories in those endless days where he was stuck in Azkaban: that and Harry was how he managed to stay sane.