Disclaimer: I don't own Hogwarts, magic, the Blacks, Mulciber, Rosier or Avery.

Chapter Eleven: Crucio

I couldn't believe the others had stuck up for me. I could maybe see that Avery had been shy before and had grown a bit more of a backbone. He was my friend after all and friends were supposed to stick up for one another. But Evan and Mulciber were a different story. Given last year's "Aw, does Reggiekins not like seeing his blood-traitor brother get what he deserves? Pity that. I thought it was funny," comment and that the two of them had both laughed at my reaction to the boggart that year, I wasn't sure what to think. Evan been absolutely horrible to me last year and now it seemed like he was trying to help me. Maybe last year had all been an act: maybe this year was too. Or maybe he'd decided to switch sides.

The other Slytherins, however, were of course extremely reluctant to talk about any of it, especially concerning their reasons. Evan Rosier wasn't talking at all and for that I didn't blame him – he was still shaking from earlier. I didn't know what curse had hit him, but it looked bad: if it hadn't been for the lack of screaming I would have thought it was the torture curse.

I did know Damian's main reason for attacking me though. I was pretty sure it tied in with the incident with Sirius this morning. I remembered his brother had accused him of putting polyjuice potion in Sirius's drink, which he hadn't done and couldn't deny doing either. Since I was Sirius's brother and had probably been seen going out of the Great Hall with Sirius, that meant it would most likely have been me who had accused him. If you looked at it from the Quidditch Captain's point of view, it made perfect sense to confront me: I would have been pretty livid if it had been the other way around – I just probably wouldn't have wanted to attack someone that much older than me. What I didn't understand was how he gone from "if you hurt my baby brother again" you will 'insert horrible incident here', to openly cursing him. It didn't make sense and I had to find out why.

"Do any of you know what that curse actually was?" asked Avery.

Since Evan still wasn't talking and I had no clue whatsoever, Mulciber answered for us. "It's a spell my brother and Evan's brothers were working on last summer. I think the basic idea of it is to make it look as if you've cast the Cruciatus Curse on someone without it actually hurting them."

"But Evan looks hurt anyway," said Avery, at the same time as I also asked: "Why would they want to do that?"

Mulciber looked quickly around the Great Hall, which was rapidly filling up with people, as if worried people might overhear. "Look, I can't tell you here. Let's go outside."

"Bu'wha'abou'unch?" asked Avery, his mouth filled with food. It was a wonder it didn't all spill out everywhere.

"Just eat up quickly."

...


Ten minutes later the four of us were standing in the same small space I had been standing with the Marauders in earlier. I wondered how it was that both Slytherins and Gryffindors were able to use the same hiding spot and still have their secrets remain a secret. Maybe it was partly to do with the fact that it had been me that had chosen the location before.

"Now can you tell us?" I asked impatiently, after doing about fifty checks to make sure absolutely no one was around to overhear.

"Stop being impatient! I have to answer your question first anyway, I think. What was it again?"

"Why would they want to create a spell that looked like Crucio?" I reiterated.

"Oh yeah. Do you promise not to tell anyone? I mean anyone: not your parents, or Narcissa, or any of those stupid Hufflepuffs," said Mulciber. I nodded despite the fact he'd just insulted half my friends. "Okay then. It's because Evan's brother is going to join the Death Eaters."

That wasn't exactly very helpful. I already suspected that the oldest Rosier would do that since he seemed to like cursing people and was nearly seventeen (if not seventeen already).

"But I thought Tristan and Henry were against the Death Eaters now, 'cos of what happened at Easter," said Avery. (Henry was Mulciber's brother.)

"Th-they, uh, we are," said Evan, quietly. It was the first time he'd said anything since getting cursed, and he sounded hurt. If the curse really was meant to mimic the effects of the Cruciatus Curse it had certainly done a good job. Evan Rosier looked as jittery and shaky as I remembered being after being with Rodolphus. In fact I wasn't at all convinced that it hadn't actually been Crucio that his brother had cast at him. That is, if it hadn't been for the light and the throwing backwards part, which were definitely not characteristic of Crucio.

"If you're against them, what's the point in helping them?" I asked.

"Well to be honest I think it's a bit of a stupid plan, but I'll try and explain it anyway. When you join the Death Eaters they make you do a task, like an initiation thing, to prove how loyal you are, and from what we've heard, it usually involves using Unforgivables," explained Mulciber. "And if you don't do it, or you can't do it, then," he mimed slitting his throat.

"So is all this in case he gets scared or doesn't want to do any Unforgivables?" asked Avery.

"Yeah, pretty much," said Mulciber. To me it seemed like a long-winded and not very safe plan, but then I remembered that Evan's brothers, particularly the middle one, often came up with far-fetched ridiculous ideas anyway. I remembered a few days before the Quidditch try-outs Evan and Tristan had been discussing something called 'Operation Befriend a Gryffindork' – I had no idea what they could possibly achieve by doing that or how they would have any success whatsoever. What idiot in Gryffindor would ever want to be friends with them? I'd decided not to pursue it. There had also been last year's "let's steal Regulus's fluffy toy and give it to James Potter", and "let's invite Sirius to the party even though we hate him, he hates us, and Father hates him too," and a whole load of other random things.

"I don't want my brother to die, Death Eater or not," whimpered Evan. I didn't much like Evan but he was still trembling and shaking so much that I couldn't help but worry. What struck me was that he hadn't said anything, nor had anyone else noticed anything was wrong with him. Maybe they didn't know that much about the curse – I was pretty sure neither Mulciber nor Avery had ever been under it anyway. I was about to ask Evan if he was still hurt and if so why he hadn't said anything when Avery cut me off.

"But why did he cast it at Evan just now?" he asked. It was a good question because, really, if the curse didn't really do anything much, what was the point in casting it?

"Probably to scare you two to death," said Mulciber, looking at me in particular.

"But the spell doesn't work properly and Evan's hurt," I said.

"What do you mean it doesn't work?" asked Avery.

"Why in Merlin's name haven't you said anything, Evan?"

I explained how the curse didn't really look that much like the Cruciatus Curse was supposed to. The others were a bit confused about this, and I hoped it was because neither of them had seen it done before. Unfortunately, while I was in the middle of explaining what the curse looked like, Evan decided it would be a good time to interrupt:

"So my brother was doing it right then? The other time, during summer, I mean."

"What other time?" I wanted to ask. I really hoped they hadn't been practicing 'Unforgivables' like Crucio over the holidays, but some part of me was telling me that, yes they probably had – they'd practiced Imperio after all! I really really hoped it hadn't been doing it the time when Sirius had visited them and that they hadn't used Sirius as a test subject: surely Sirius would have said something if that'd been the case.

I started listing the signs you would expect to see if someone was being cursed. All the while Evan Rosier was looking increasingly panicked and Mulciber was looking increasingly flustered.

"But he said it didn't hurt – that he was acting!" cried Evan. I wasn't sure who he was talking about; hopefully not Sirius.

"I thought it was s'posed to make you go mad and put you in hospital for weeks!" said Mulciber. "He was much less jittery than how you are now and he certainly wasn't like he was when… you know… that incident tha-"

"What incident? What are you on about now?" I asked.

"Nothing to do with you, Regulus," was the answer I got. "We've told you enough already. Now go to the library and sit with the Ravenclaws or something."

"Yeah, go away, Regulus. And you, Avery," said Evan.

...


I headed off to the library but I didn't sit with the Ravenclaws because the Ravenclaws didn't have History of Magic with us. Instead, since all the Slytherins were sat in the Great Hall or were still arguing about some person that I didn't know who that had been hit with a curse, I sat with the Hufflepuffs.

"Where were you? I missed sitting next to someone else who actually listens to Professor Binns," said my friend Robert as I dumped my bag full of books on the table where he and Emily Cooper were sitting. Robert was one of my closet friends at Hogwarts, along with Stephannie and Rebecca. He wasn't particularly clever but always made an effort to take immaculate notes, pay attention in class and write extremely long, neat essays. Even in History of Magic, which hardly anyone seemed to like. Emily was a friend, but we weren't really that close. Last year she'd had a bit of crush on me because I'd 'saved' her. I hadn't really done much: just squirted the Rosiers with water and taken a curse for it.

"I had to take Sirius to the hospital wing," I explained. I didn't need to hide the fact that I was close to Sirius from them – they'd known more about how I felt about Sirius than Sirius had last year. "Could I borrow your notes?"

"Sure." He slid his notebook across to me, which he had already written up his notes into (for some reason he liked to scribble down as much as possible onto parchment during the lesson and then write it up neatly later). I copied them down as quickly as I could and then looked up.

Across the library I spotted Cissy. She looked lonely and was eyeing the advanced potions section sadly. I remembered Avery telling me that there was a fourth-year 'spells club' and a second-year 'potions club', and that Cissy would have been part of the potions club had she not fallen out with most of her friends. She glanced at me and then looked quickly away again. She hadn't glared; she just looked hurt.

I excused myself and started to walk over to where she was standing, still holding my quill. As I got closer, Cissy pretended to look a lot more interested in the book titles than she had previously.

"Cissy? You alright?" I asked. She continued to study the shelves intently. "Cissy, I'm sorry about what happened with Andromeda," I said quietly.

"No you're not! Go away!"

"But Cissy-"

"Don't 'but Cissy' me! You could have told me you know! I'm her sister! You knew she was with that stupid mudblood and you didn't even tell me anything!"

"She told me to keep it a secret," I said. "And I promised her I wouldn't tell."

"We promised one other we'd tell each other everything. Does that mean nothing to you?"

"No, I… I mean."

"Exactly. You chose her over me. Family are supposed to stick together and what happens? My sister goes and ruins everything and then you go and side with her about it!"

"Cissy-"

"I don't want to hear it, Reg. Just go and finish your homework or something."

With one last look at Cissy, who was now giving me the death glare, I trudged back over to the homework table and began working again. Eventually Cissy would come round – preferably before the Christmas holidays – but evidently not today. At least I knew what she was so annoyed with me about.

…..

AN: I hoped you liked it. Please tell me what you think by reviewing. Reviews do help because I like to know what parts were most enjoyable and how to improve my story. I also like to hear your predictions about what it to come.

I'll be doing another point of view soon. This time it will be Narcissa for Chapter 13.