Fifteen-year-old Regulus Black couldn't believe sometimes the things he would do to save his older brother's ungrateful neck. Here he was, in front of a muggle's home, about to ring the door bell to drag his brother back home – before their mother decided to do it.

There are a couple of things that are impossible for you to do together and not become good friends; stealing a doll from a poor seven-year-old girl is probably one of them. Since the day Regulus's brother and Alfred had tortured that young girl, Sirius would find any opportunity to escape from the Black household and run straightway to the White's place where Alfred and his two sisters lived. As ironic as it all was, the White boy and his brother had become as close as flesh and blood brothers. This isolated Regulus even more, leaving him only Kreacher, whom he would beg to play with him. Granted, Sirius had invited him to be a part of their 'muggle' games, but Regulus had refused to give his parents even more distress than they already had. Furthermore, play with muggles? Only his brother Sirius could come up with such nonsense like that!

Regulus used his pocket handkerchief to avoiding touching the muggle's door's bell ringer. He waited until a girl one head shorter than he was opened the door. She had her hair tied up in a ballerina's bun, and her facial features appeared to be extremely delicate. She was wearing a ballet skirt and a muggle jumper over her suit, hiding her body shape. Regulus would deny it even under torture, but the fact was that the girl had made his heart beat faster.

"Are you one of Sirius's stupid friends?" she asked, analysing him from head to toe. "They are all in the basement. Second door past the stairs," she said, opening the door for him and moving aside to let him in.

But Regulus didn't move; he stayed where he was, trying to find the right words to speak to her.

"I'm sorry, but I'm not Sirius's friend. I'm his brother. Could you please inform him that our mother is looking for him, quite desperately, and that I would urgently advise him to come back home immediately."

The girl looked at him carefully as if she was expecting him to pull a prank on her at any second, but then she realised whom he was.

"Yes, of course! I know you! You are the boy who saved my doll ages ago. I haven't seen you around since that day. If Helen and Miss Morgan hadn't seen you as well, I would have probably believed that I had imagined you," the girl said, giving him a large grin. "Nice to meet you again; my name is Annabelle, but you may call me Belle." The girl extended her hand as if waiting for him to shake it and introduce himself.

However, the only thing that Regulus could think about was how he could manage to get out of that situation. Even though his mother's voice was shouting in his head that he shouldn't touch her dirty muggle skin, his body screamed, begging for her touch. He ended up taking her hand, covering his hand with his ever-trusted handkerchief.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Belle. I'm Regulus," he said, letting her shake his hand the muggle way. Regulus had never greeted any woman like this before, as he had learned from his mother that the correct way to greet a woman would be to give a soft kiss to the back of their hand.

"Regulus. Would you like to come in?"

"I'm sorry if I sound impolite, but I must refuse the invitation." Regulus stopped for a second before answering her, choosing his words very carefully. "I'm in a bit of a hurry, and I would be eternally grateful if you would please fetch brother for me."

"Well, why don't you go down and talk to him yourself? The distance between here and our basement is the same for both of us," she answered, looking deeply into his eyes. Regulus caught himself wondering what kind of muggle spell that girl could possibly be using on him to make him feel so hypnotized by her appearance. "Come on; you needn't be scared of my house!"

Regulus remained still while he considered the implications of this invitation. He was extremely proud that he had never stepped into a muggle household in his life. What would his parents say to him if they knew that he had gone willingly into one? What would his favourite cousin, Bellatrix, say when she found about the situation that he had gotten himself into? The girl's charming face was enough to point out to him that the only thing he could get out of this situation was trouble.

"I'm sorry, Miss White, but I must insist that I stay outside."

The girl opened her eyes widely, making them even bigger than they normally were. "May I dare ask you the reason for this unreasonable invitation refusal?"

"I'm sorry, Miss White, but as much an exuberantly charming young lady as you are, there's no way of denying that some bloodlines are simply superior to others. Ignoring this fact would be to deny my natural superiority, a sad fact that unfortunately goes beyond things that you could possibly understand."

Regulus finished this sentence, looking down his shoes, hoping that her small muggle brain wouldn't be able to fully understand all the facts that he had harshly told her. However, her face showed that she had more than understood exactly what he had meant.

"Mr. Black, are you trying to say that you consider yourself better than me and my family? Because if you are, I believe that I might have misjudged you. For a moment, I thought you were different than your brother, but now can I see that you are as much of a jerk as he is."

It was Regulus's turn to look at her with shock. People usually told him how different the two Black brothers were. Sirius was a Gryffindor while Regulus was a Slytherin; Sirius was a bully while Regulus was a geek. Regulus did anything possible to please their parents while Sirius would do anything he could to make them feel annoyed.

"Right. So that's what you think of me?" Regulus asked her, outraged by her comparison.

"That's exactly how you are portraying yourself to be."

At this moment, a second girl appeared at the door. She was clearly Belle's twin sister, but instead of a ballet costume, she was wearing a fighting kimono, a green belt tight around her waist. Instead of a ballet hair bun, she had opted to tie her hair into a neat ponytail.

"Who is this?" Belle's twin asked.

"Black's jerk brother," Belle answered her sister.

Her sister's sighed. "Second door after the stairs. Try not to break anything, okay?" said the unknown twin.

Regulus was about to open his mouth to protest and tell her sister that he couldn't come in when an older woman appeared at the doorway.

"Lovely! You both are ready. Come on; let's go. We don't want to be late for your classes." Only when the woman was outside did she notice Regulus standing in front of the house. "Hello, young man; how can I help you?"

He was about to answer the woman, but he was cut off by Belle's twin sister. "He is here for Alfred's stupid gathering."

The old woman gave her a severe glare, but it was to Regulus whom she was looking at when she opened her mouth. "Second door after the stairs," she said, holding the door widely open for him to pass. "Come on in, boy; we don't have the whole day!"

Regulus looked to the woman; she had that severe glare in her eyes, which were enhanced by her square glasses.

"Shall I lock you in, or shall I lock you out?"

Regulus didn't answer her question. Instead he took a deep breath and entered the White's house for the very first time.

The first thing that Regulus noticed were pictures on the wall that didn't move; the second thing were some very weird muggle-looking machines that he had never seen before in his life. After using his hankie to open the door that the three women had indicated, he went down the stairs to the basement. When he arrived, he saw a group of about ten teenagers, the majority of them boys. There was a band playing some music, and it was with complete shock that Regulus realised that his brother was the vocalist of the band.

He was even more astonished when he realised that he actually knew two other people there from Hogwarts – the Potter boy and the little one who looked like a rat. Potter was the first one to notice Regulus's presence in the room.

"WOW, SIRIUS! LOOK AT WHO IS HERE!" James Potter shouted to his best friend.

"REGULUS? What are you doing here?" Sirius answered, completely shocked. "No, don't tell me! You realized that this thing about blood supremacy is a bollocks myth, right? Come join the good lads club!"

A small group of teenage girls that were there cheered at what he said. Regulus felt a huge wave of nausea when the youngest of the girls approached him, touching his arm.

"Are you going to introduce your friend to us, Snuffles?" the girl asked Sirius while trying to keep holding on to Regulus, who was trying to avoid touching her at all costs.

"Amy, this is my baby brother, Regulus, aren't you, little Reggy?"

Regulus looked as if he were being forced to smell something extremely disgusting. "Sirius, we need to talk. Privately," Regulus said to his brother and walked up the stairs.

Sirius exchanged curious glances with the other marauders before following his brother up.

"This had better be important, Reggy. As you could see, I was in middle of something…"

Regulus shook his head in disbelief before speaking to his brother. "How can you do that?! Be surrounded by muggles like that!"

"If you are here to badmouth my friends, I think I can classify this as an unimportant reason," Sirius said, turning his back to his brother.

"Mother is looking for you. It's only a matter of time until she realises where you are. You need came back home, Sirius; Bella's wedding is tomorrow, and we need to be at the Lestrange's manor by noon!"

"I'm not coming! I refuse to attend a Death Eater's wedding. You can tell that to her."

"Sirius, you need to be more reasonable! Bella is our cousin. Our parents are going to be very embarrassed if you are not present!"

"I couldn't care less for what the Wizarding High Society thinks about me! Tell them that I'm staying at James's house until the first of September."

"Sirius! You can't do that to our mother! She is going to die of disgust! She might even disown you!"

"Well, I'm not going to be there. She's going to have to deal with it! If she wants to disown me because of that, so be it then. I don't want any part of a family who supports Death Eaters breeding anyway. Now, if you don't mind, I need to practice. We have a show tomorrow."

"You're so selfish, Sirius! You don't even care about how other people feel."

"And you are naïve for eating up all this rubbish our parents have thrown at our heads! For Merlin's sake, Regulus! Don't tell me you don't know about all the things that Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange are involved in?"

"They are fighting for an honourable cause, Sirius!"

"Regulus, are you insane? Since when is killing innocent people an honourable cause?" Sirius said, completely astonished. "You know what, Reggy? Stay there with our parents and the rest of our family at that despicable wedding! You guys deserve each other!"

After saying this, Sirius slammed the door in Regulus face, leaving his younger brother completely lost in his deep thoughts.