Chapter 2 - Lestrange Family and a Hysterical Goodbye
After being swallowed by the bright white light I fell asleep for a long time. I had no idea what was going on around me but recently I've been hearing muffled voices. I'm assuming I'm in my mother's stomach, that's the only explanation I can think of to explain my situation. The idea of being inside of Bellatrix is disturbing and as a fetus, I can cringe but my feet can definitely make her regret carrying me. My only entertainment is kicking her as many times as I can but I get so tired easily. Hopefully, I'm due sometime soon.
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I knew that I was due any minute now based on the extremely loud screeching noises coming from my mother and the panicking yelling of my father.
The process was unbearable and painful as fuck, so I'll try to describe it as best I can for you. It hurt life being chucked through a black hole except worse. Just try imagining that.
I couldn't see anything yet, my eyesight was too blurry as expected of a baby. But I could hear just fine. And what I was listening to made me realize just that the price my fifth wish cost me was to do with my appearance.
"He's pale, unnaturally pale." A man's voice cut through my cries and interrupted any gawking caused by my presence.
"Is this going to be a horrible problem? Is he going to die young? Tell me now!" Yep, that's my mother, even after giving birth she's yelling again.
"It seems he has a magical form of albinism. Very white skin was devoid of pigment, white hair and rare eyes. They seem to be white, we'll have to test his vision in the future to make sure that his white eyes aren't causing any blindness." The nurse calmly explained to my hysterical mother who was hugging me a little too tight.
"Leave." My father told the nurse. I heard the door shut before my father spoke again.
"Maybe we should get rid of him." He suggested.
WHAT! I was so scared I was powerless in this situation!
I heard a gasp that disrupted my panic, "He's changing colors!" My mother's voice again. Oh yeah my metamorphmagus abilities must be changing my color. I can hide the albinism. This caused my panicking to cease and start listening to my parents again.
"This is such a relief, now we know he has magic. We can train him to hide his lack of color." Damn you father, for trying to get rid of me before, so now that I have this ability you forgot your earlier suggestion. Hmph.
"The black family magicks have come back to our son. I thought that Andromeda had a girl with the ability too, it's great that the magic has blessed our pure child. We should name him properly. Regulus in accordance to both of our traditions."
Father finished by picking a middle name for me, "Regulus Xerxes Lestrange. A proper and noble name." I liked it, and I was happy that I retained the name that my original parents had given me in my first life.
"We'll present him to our lord in one year, but that time he'll have the metamorphmagus ability under control. I'll make sure of it." Oh shit, looks like my father's going to be more of an army general than anything.
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We left the hospital that same night and arrived back at Lestrange manor 6 months ago. I was introduced to my grandfather, and Zeke was right, he never held anything back when he was drunk. He even threw me one time and I had to use wandless magic to stop myself from hitting the ground. My cries got my father to find me floating above the ground and grandfather passed out in shock. My parents were so proud of my talents that they praised and bragged about me to anyone that would listen. I was actually extremely happy to get their praise, no matter what horrible crimes they committed. They are still my parents, I never had parents as an orphan in my first life but I can at least enjoy the love I receive from these murderers.
I had shown myself to be an extremely smart baby and my efforts were rewarded with meeting the dark lord much earlier than I was expecting… It's more like a punishment but I hadn't mastered talking yet so I couldn't tell anyone that.
He looked pale, I could see his veins from my place in my father's arms a few feet away. It was proven that I could indeed see but only in black and white. I couldn't change my eye color because it would only let me see the color that my eye had changed into. For example, right now I changed my eye color to red when I was passed into the dark lord's arms and now I could only see his red eyes, everything else became a light grey.
It was a fair price to pay for the ability to convince people through simple lies. My hair was always black now but when I was alone I would change everything back to my natural colors, simply because the hiding became tiresome after a long time.
Sitting in the dark lord's arms was nerve-wracking but luckily I was a baby and I could do whatever the fuck I wanted without consequences, so I wriggled and smiled, I caught some death eater's eyes and I could see that they thought I was asking for death. But nope! My ability was too important and rare to get rid of.
"He is a metamorphmagus, it is pleasing to see the Black family magicks back in the right hands." His voice scared me, to be honest, but I didn't let it show on the baby's expression, instead, I giggled.
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After that terrifying encounter, I decided that I should start displaying more wandless magic, at first it was incredibly hard to make my food fly to me, but eventually when I got the hang of that I decided that this was going to be my ultimate weapon. So the next dinner time I made sure that my abilities were shown. My parents' shocked face was only beaten by my grandfather's face as I flung my peas at his face.
"Pea! Pea! Pea" I chanted. My mother tried to stifle her laughs behind her hand but my father wasn't trying to hide his amusement. My first word had been mum and they reacted so happily, they truly loved me. Their love makes me dread their upcoming imprisonment. I know my grandfather loves me too but he can't control his anger while drunk. My eyes still creep him out because they're just all white, but he doesn't let that get in the way of hugging me and reading to me about our family history.
Just like that my peaceful two years passed and it was October 1981 before I knew it.
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I had prepared for this day for a long time. I was tall for a three-year-old, and my speech was 'impeccable' as my mother tells me. My father even bought me a real broom. My mother yelled at him for a good half hour before she realized I was already gone with the broom and out in the fields behind our house. I was a natural flier partly because I had my wandless magic to support me in case I fell.
When October came around my parents weren't around as often, but I knew when the dark lord vanished because mother wouldn't stop yelling. I walked up to her at that moment. She stopped yelling and my father stopped arguing when they spotted me approaching them.
This was a pivotal moment that I decided to do when I realized I couldn't stand the thought of not being loved by my parents if they went to Azkaban.
"Regulus, we don't have time to play with you, go to your grandfather." My father ordered me.
"Father, mother. Don't go. Please don't go. I can't be without you!" I was really crying now, I felt so guilty because I knew that these people had killed countless amount of people but I pushed aside my guilt for this selfish request. If only they would listen.
"My little star," My mother's nickname for me, "We have to make them pay, we have to bring back our lord."
They weren't going to listen unless I revealed my secret of being a seer to them. But should I? I could hurt the timeline and be a villain instead which would not meet the requirements of being a hero. This was the worst moment I had experienced in my new life, choosing between my family or my responsibility.
"Please don't go, you'll be captured. You'll be taken away! You can't go!" I was hysterical at this point. Yelling like my mother often does, I knew now that the Black madness was making my judgment a little clouded. I grabbed onto my mom's sleeves and held as tight as I could.
"We'll be right back, Regulus. Let go of your mother. I promise we'll be safe, we won't be caught." My father was trying to reassure me while taking my hands off my mother's sleeves. He knelt in front of me and smiled, "We'll be right back son."
Mother knelt in front of me as well. "No one can catch me without suffering the consequences! You don't have to worry my little star, we promise we'll be back before you know it."
I knew it now. I had to let them go. I fell to my knees and they both hugged my sobbing form before standing and leaving through the front door. I watched them go, still crying and I stayed crying and kneeling there until late into the night.
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Aurors showed up in the morning, I had fallen asleep in front of the front door and was shocked awake when a loud banging on the front doors started. I climbed to my feet and composed myself before striding to the doors and opening them revealing my small form, my puffy eyes staring straight at the lead Auror, I'm sure my white eyes were creeping them out, it was a small victory.
"I'm Auror Proudfoot. My associates and I will conduct a search on this house following the arrest of Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange. Who are you, child? Are you blind?"
"My name is Regulus Xerxes Lestrange, may I see your warrant?" I stuck my hand out and Proudfoot placed a sheet of paper in my hands. I read over it briefly before handing it back to the Auror in front of me. I stepped to the side and gestured for them to go right ahead. I knew that my parents hid everything dark and dangerous in the many secret rooms in the manor. That's the beauty of having a crooked-looking house. It may not look nice and it's definitely haunted but hiding things and people is easy. The Aurors have raided our house before and I know where all the best hiding spots are so I was confident that they wouldn't find anything. Well, I didn't warn grandfather so they may encounter one angry old man during their search.
I sat on the couch in front of the main fireplace when I spotted grandfather coming down the large staircase. He was stumbling and had a bottle of alcohol in his hand. I stood up quickly intent on helping him to the couch.
"Grandfather, the Aurors are here because mother and father have been arrested." I reached him and held onto his free arm. "Come sit on the couch grandfa-!" He shoved me back down the stairs. I landed on my side with my arms protecting my head.
"Regulus." His voice was calm but I was genuinely scared of the hurricane of emotions he was holding at bay.
"You've let them into the house without my permission." Oh shoot, looks like the price of my fourth wish was now coming into play.
Luckily the Aurors came back into the entrance hall at that moment. I stood up to greet them but suddenly I was shoved back down unexpectedly and hit my head on the floor as my grandfather started shouting at them to get out. My head was throbbing where I had hit the floor but I stood up anyway to calm my grandfather back down.
His speech was slurred and so obviously drunk, "Grandfather! Please calm down sir! Please let them finish their search!" I grabbed his arm again and he tried to shake me off and failed.
"Don't yell at me Regulus! Go to your room! Go!" He was shouting very loudly now. I couldn't just disobey and be hit in front of the Aurors so I backed off and ducked my head to the Aurors as an apology. I turned away and fled up the stairs to my room as my grandfather started yelling at them again.
yay