History will not remember them.
Time may recall names, bare shading, a locket and a photograph. But it cannot capture the essence of now, these two not-quite-adults hardened and tough and scared.
Between them, they ended many lives. Yet, through their actions, more were spared. It was a brutal war, a dirty war and it was not fought in one battle. Theirs is an untold story, a mere footnote amongst the epics of heroes.
History will not remember the boy and the girl who stared out over London, faces blank and hands clasped tight.
But they were there.
Marlene thinks to herself, and not for the first time, that Regulus is too damn pretty for his own good. The Black family breeds for looks as much as blood, and the stamp is evident in his aristocratic features, the proud nose and deep, dark eyes silvered by moonlight. She doesn't look straight at him- never does, not when they're out here, perched precariously on roof ledges- but drinks in the subtle glances out of the corner of her eye as she looks out over the city. Behind them, in the cheap flat that is too big for one and too cluttered for two, the heater is kicking on in a series of clicks and rumbles. She steals another glance at his hawklike profile, the curtain-fall of his hair, and smiles.
He watches her, too.
The darkness changes her, softens edges, turns harsh lines into sweet curves. Marlene is too harsh for her own good; the war has changed them, the both of them, and while he has become ice she is fire. Volatile, passionate, consuming. Greedy for the time they spend together, he basks in the warmth even though it will leave nothing but scars. Her bright red hair, once her only vanity, is chopped short and sharp like a bird's crest; the freckles he is so fond of lend her a kind of innocence she has long since lost. Once again, the newly-proclaimed heir to the Black family wonders why it is her that has caught his attention, she the boyish goddess. He is besotted with this girl- this woman- with battle-won muscles and scars on her hands. How his brother would laugh. How he would laugh, if the entire weren't so damnably tragic. Regulus tightens his grip on Marlene thoughtlessly, a wordless seeking of comfort.
He waits for the inevitable comment, but it does not come.
She knows she ought to say something, a jibe, an insult, but her sharp tongue stays silent. On any other day, at any other time, Marlene might speak. I thought I was the girl in the relationship, then? She is known to quip, or perhaps Is my dear Reggie frightened?
But tonight, on this night, when the Prewitts are dead and Regulus' arm is burning and she doesn't know when all this madness will end, Marlene keeps her big mouth shut. Lips painted a vulgar red are tightly pressed together, and she only leans into her lover's touch.
The night is cold, but their bodies are warm where they are together.