constellations inked in blood Chapter 1: go your own way by fleetwood mac, a harry potter fanfic

Summary:

The youngest generation of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black is rather close in age (or, really, they mathematically should be).

There are the sisters: angelic Narcissa, sensible Andromeda, and loyal Bellatrix, and of course, the brothers, the wild Heir and the dutiful Spare: Sirius and Regulus—all five bound together by shared nursery promises and blood.

Yet, Sirius still is sorted into Gryffindor, Andromeda still runs off with a muggleborn, Bellatrix still begins to lose her mind, Narcissa still does as she is told, and Regulus… Regulus still joins the Dark Lord.

He still goes to the cave.

He doesn't leave alone.

TLDR: how The Black Family embodies the Big, Screwed-Up Family Trope. "though if you piss off one of them, the rest will instantly band together to destroy you in order to uphold the Family Honor."

[AU of the First Wizarding War in which a Horcrux muddles the conception of Toujours Pur and The Family, dysfunctional though it may be, finds a third side in the war.

Or: blood purity is *as* important as the near death of their children to the Elder Generation of the House of Black.]

Author's Note:

I am starting to post the AO3 Fic (currently up to Chapter 15 up over there) onto this site as I found out a lot more people read over here.

JKR royally messing up the ages of the Blacks somewhat inspired this fic. I mean Cygnus having Bellatrix at *13*? C'mon.

Anyways, this story is based on the premise that the Black cousins are much closer in age and therefore were much more tightly knit. The whole detailed age chart is at the end (with math! Shocking I know!) but our story centers around the four Black cousins.

I can say that this is not a Walburga Black was an abusive mother fic, IzzytheHut's masterpiece of characterization of Orion and Walburga heavily influenced this, while I'm taking a bit of my own spin on the Black Patriarch Arcturus.

all chapter titles are taken from the record collection of one S.O.B. [collected 1977-present]

"the beginning of the war will be secret" by jenny holzer

Christmas 1970 had been the last tableau of ordinary mischief in the Black Household. It was fitting, the first disappearances would be reported as the new year died, but as the aristocratic clan celebrated Yule, they felt invincible.

Most of all, the five youngest Blacks conspiratorially got into their Uncle Alphard's ink kit as Great Aunt Charis began her routine spiel about pro-house elf legislation, squawking that Arcturus as head of the family had to do something to stop it in its tracks.

Bellatrix should have been the ringleader, 16 and a sixth year Slytherin, but she was trying to feel quite grown up around the adults, her shiny Prefect badge on her chest, hissing at her fifteen-year-old sister, "Andy behave yourself," as the fifth year dragged her upstairs.

(The sister Father, Cygnus, had been the youngest of the Blacks and very wild. Everyone had found it a wonder that Druella Rosier, a year older than her fiancé, had made it past her graduation without a child.)

Narcissa, 11 and as fair as her sisters were dark, was, as always, the Black heir's favorite co-conspirator—distracting her Uncle Alphard with all the stereotypical stories of a first-year student at Hogwarts as Sirius, also 11 (but just missing the age cut off for Hogwarts by 64 days), stole the tattooing kit from Alphard's bag.

Regulus just followed Sirius into trouble, nine years old and still rather childish, as the baby of the family.

"Just what are you planning on doing with that, Sirius Orion?" Andromeda eyed the kit in his hand, his wand clutched in his other.

"Well," he savored the word, a wry smirk on his lips, "I've been a spot of reading in the library now that I have my wand, and Cis and I were thinking…"

He was the only one of their family to shorten her name even further, just as he called his brother 'Reg.' Sirius had always found the 'ee' sound that was tacked onto all their names too infantilizing—Bella instead of Trixie, Meda instead of Andy, Cis instead of Cissy, Reg instead of Reggie and of course his own name, Rus instead of Siri.

Internally, Bellatrix groaned at her eldest cousin's words.

Getting that boy a wand the second he turned 11, almost a year before he matriculated to Hogwarts, was a disaster waiting to happen, she had told Auntie Walburga. But, for all Burgie's bluster about Sirius's wild streak, it was in the family's nature to spoil the Heir.

"We think it would be nice to do tattoos, since Andy is such a good artist, and Trixie is such a dab hand at charms," Narcissa finished for him.

Clearly the three months of separation during her first term at Hogwarts had done little to dim the bond between the two of them. Regrettably, Bellatrix thought. Merlin was Sirius going to be a menace when he got to Hogwarts, Andromeda doubted her sister would even get to be courted, given her guard dog companion.

"We could do constellations…" Andromeda said thoughtfully, her eldest sister whirling on her with a glare for entertaining the idea, "And a narcissus garland for Cissy!"

Bellatrix rolled her eyes, but she was completely grown up. It did sound like a fun idea. She had seen a few purebloods starting to buy into the trend—in black ink, none of that tacky color like some mudbloods used.

"Why would you want charms on them? Animation will only attract attention to them." she eyed her baby sister suspiciously.

"Summoning charms! I read about it in a book, if we're ever in danger we'll always be there for each other!" Reggie eagerly burst out, his cow-like brown eyes, inherited from his Grandmother Melania, turning a hint of gold in his excitement.

"We're Blacks, we'll never be in danger," Bellatrix asserted haughtily.

"Remember the Squib Riots? We all got sent to the country for six months," Sirius dramatically complained. 1968 had been a perfectly fine year for Bellatrix and Andromeda, safely tucked away at Hogwarts, but for Narcissa, Sirius, and Regulus, the extended stay with Pollux and Irma Black had been their last idea of fun.

"Pleassseeee Trixie?" her little sister pouted. "You are always hanging out with the Lestranges or Dolohov, it's like you don't want to hang around the Blacks anymore."

Of course, The Family was how Narcissa got her. (Bellatrix would never tell anyone but the Hat had had half a mind to send her to Hufflepuff. Family loyalty is not House loyalty! she had vehemently argued with the hat.)

"Oh alright, just don't put it somewhere Mother will see," she mainly directed her gaze towards Narcissa, knowing the youngest Black had just as much of taste for rebellion as Sirius; she just was in a more innocent looking package.

Sirius, on the other hand, always looked like he was up to something.

In the end, Bellatrix's penchant for long sleeves (she was proper) allowed her to wear the design on her left forearm, Andromeda's sensibility and self-tattooing (her pain tolerance was awe-inspiring) inked it on her thigh, Narcissa's craftiness managed to con Andromeda to put it on her feet (insisting her mother never allows her to go without stockings [she wasn't wrong], but Narcissa was a dancer). Sirius's love for danger and lack of fear of his mother's wrath wanted it spanning his left hand, intertwining with his fingers where he wore the ring of the Black heir. Regulus, always trying to following his brother's lead, proudly let Andromeda draw the design on his right hand.

Needless to say, Walburga Black's infamously short temper erupted when she was 'what her sons had done.'

Angelic Narcissa, sensible Andromeda, and loyal Bellatrix avoided suspicion all together, their mother only asking Narcissa wearily if she had egged Sirius on.

However, ironically, the Black men seemed to approve of the design: the constellations Orion, Canis Major, Andromeda, and Leo were connected by a chain of small narcissus flowers, arranged precisely so that they looked like stars.

"Wish I had thought of it, getting a new constellation every time whenever one of you tykes was born," Alphard admired the patterns, reclaiming his tattooing kit from Andromeda's pocket with a wink.

"It does look proper—the Heir and his right hand," Arcturus Black had told his hysterical daughter-in-law, fretting that no one would marry her sons if they were all-inked up 'like Mudbloods!'

"It's black ink, Burgie, why, Abraxas Malfoy had 10 tattoos and that never stopped him from landing a bride," her husband had comforted her, keeping his opinions of if he were to get a tattoo wisely to himself.

They were happy that Christmas, before Sirius was sorted, before people kept asking them to choose sides as if The Family was not one. They would pass each other in the halls, housemates hissing at them if they dared speak to one on the opposite side.

They would sometimes settle for just a hand motion, glimpses of the matching magical ink on the hands of the Black brothers. The blood of their covenant, their promise to protect each other was strengthened the water of the womb betwixt the quintet, Bellatrix had strengthened the spell's magic by mixing a drop of each of their blood in with Andromeda's ink.

However, it would come as no surprise that she broke it first, the summer of 1973 shattering any kind of remaining love and trust she had in the family. Who would ever choose romantic love over The Family?

Bellatrix's bonds with the rest of them had been fraught Sirius was sorted into Gryffindor, the worthless blood traitor delighting in the shame he caused the family. Bellatrix had passingly admired the Dark Lord's cause, but it had taken Andromeda's betrayal to lead her allegiance to another.

Running off with a mudblood, what a failure of a Black.

Bellatrix proudly watched the Dark Lord ink over her sister's constellation on her forearm, burning the magic away that kept her tied to a family who had abandoned her.

The constellation Orion had faded on the remaining four tattoos, the star Bellatrix dimming. They remained unused, but magic still hummed in their veins waiting to be unleashed.

Andromeda had considered it, in the depths of labor, but had resisted the urge to have a Black hold her hand.

Narcissa, married off like chattel, had felt the overwhelming compulsion to summon a protector on wedding night, after her innocence was ripped from her in the most ruthlessly efficient fashion.

And Sirius? Sirius thought about on the long lonely nights when Remus was out spying on werewolves, when James had his new bride to entertain.

Regulus had wanted to summon his brother to his side since the Sorting Hat touched his head, its shout of Slytherin! declaring that the Lord and his Right Hand would be forever separated.

It was pride that held the Brothers Black back.

So, then it was fitting that—in his last moments—Regulus Arcturus Black's desperate subconscious deigned to act, pulsing with ancient magic, as hands of Inferi attempted to drag him off the shore.

AUGUST 3, 1979

Sirius thought the Black Family would find a more elegant setting for a reunion than a cave, although knowing his family, he suspected they would find what looked like a site for a ritual sacrifice positively charming.

Amid a hoard of sallow-skinned Inferi trying to wrestle a weakly struggling body from an island in the center of the grotto completed the picture.

But…

He'd know that well-styled mop anywhere.

"Lumos maxima!" he screamed, hoping the flare would distract the hoard from his little brother. Andromeda and Narcissa, frozen beside him, jolted. They, of course, recognized their kin too.

"REGULUS!" Andromeda screamed, banshee-like, while her sister whipped her wand and a 20-meter-long tongue of flame erupting from it, stretching enough to reach the depths of the mob of corpses descending on the 18-year-old.

The Inferi abandoned the easy prey on the island, distracted by the light, fire, and fury of the shore.

Sirius's magic had always meagerly clung to the Light, restless as he constantly complained about why he couldn't show what he could do. Fight fire with fire, he would assert in Order Meetings. Alastor Moody would scoff something under his breath that sounded like 'once a Black, always a Black, and Dumbledore would peer down those half-moon spectacles at him, a 'benevolent' expression directed at him, as if he didn't know any better and simply tell him that is not what we do.

In the cave, surrounded by Dark Magic and allied with it, Sirius Orion Black had no such reservations, so such societal limits, no judgmental gaze. Rotting entrails, heads and limbs of once-living wizards lay severed at his feet and he smiled with every geyser of rotting blood he exacted from the corpses.

Andromeda seized onto the creatures' distraction, casting a Hover charm on her feet, and sprinted across the lake, reaching Regulus who had abandoned his desperate quest to drink and instead was emptying the contents of his stomach.

"Reggie, oh Reggie, honey," It was sheer dumb luck she had just gotten off her shift at St. Mungo's when the constellations pulled her away from the front garden.

She poured a purging draught down his throat, not even recognizing the effects of the basin's potion on her cousin. There was little time to puzzle out why he had summoned them or where they all were. Adrenaline pumped through her as she worked, wrestling him away from the clutches of Death.

Narcissa and Sirius were back-to-back, the entire lake of Inferi immobile at their feet. Bathed in the black blood of the corpses that only seemed to enhance his sharply handsome features, the errant heir seemed to prefer to slice, cut, and decapitate his victims, while his fair mirror kept her skirts clean, burning her victims to ash.

There wasn't a scratch on them.

"Cis," Sirius implored the blonde witch, still sending jets of flame from her wand with veela-like fury. "Cis, Cis, I think that's all of them,"

She whirled around, hair still up from dinner. There were unshed tears in her eyes, her black gown hopelessly shredded by the grabbing hands of the dead.

They stood there, panting for a second, taking in the soft murmurs from across the water's expanse and gazing at each other's face, tracing the differences that their separation had worn on the other. The light had left her grey eyes, as the joy and carefree nature had been banished from his face.

"Meda, is he…" Sirius called out, tearing his gaze away from her face.

"He's stable, for now," she replied to her disowned compatriot. Andromeda's lime green healers' robes were stained to ruin in Regulus's bile, as she transferred him to the boat and ferrying him to the other Blacks, like Eurydice in the Styx.

They reached the shore like a funeral barge, the only thing distinguishing Regulus Black's body from cadaver was the shallow moment of breath. His eyes, briefly, focused on the three of them.

"Oh Regulus, how the bloody hell did you get us into this, you idiot?" his brother stared down at him. His eyes cracked open.

"You… came," Regulus choked out weakly, before a coughing fit overtook him. Andromeda's diagnostic wand whipped out in an instant.

"Of course, I came, now can you tell how the bloody hell you got here?" Sirius laughed, errant tears of relief falling off of his face.

"Kre… Kreacher," he choked out before starting to cough again, Andromeda conjuring a goblet for him.

"KREACHER!" Narcissa's harpy screech echoed off the cave walls. The loud crack of elf apparition shook the stalactites.

The small, dark, slightly hunch-backed creature appeared. The sneer that instantly materialized on his face with seeing the eldest Black brother evaporated upon glimpsing Regulus, weakly drinking water from a conjured goblet in Andromeda's hand.

"Master Regulus—alive! Alive!" the elf burst into tears, throwing himself onto the side of the boat. "A miracle, the nasty blood traitor saved the young Master!"

Meanwhile, Narcissa was running her hands alone the damp stone, her beautiful face growing paler by the second.

"Kreacher, please tell me that you didn't bring Regulus to a cave that reeks of Dark Lord," she said coldly, stopping Sirius's eye roll in his midst.

"If this poison in your veins is of You-Know-Who's creation, I am painfully out of my depth," Andromeda said, stricken.

"Fucking hell, Reg, what did you pull us into," Sirius muttered before turning to the elf.

"Kreacher, can you apparate out of here?" The not-yet 20-year-old had never sounded more like his father than he did now, all sharply enunciated vowels.

The elf was suitably cowed, where he would usually have simpered some snide remark, the old creature on nodded his head.

"With passengers?" Another nod.

"Very well, we'll apparate to my flat—it's Uncle Alphard's old place, you know on Marylebone Sq…"

Before Sirius could finish, the crotchety elf had whisked them away from the cave.

"I cannot believe you have defiled Uncle Alphard's flat," Were the first words out of the prim Narcissa's mouth as they landed in the handsome wood paneled penthouse that their shared Uncle had left his eldest nephew when he passed away three years ago.

Wrappers and garbage seemed to litter every surface, the fine antique ashtrays were positively overthrowing with old cigarettes and other kinds of smokes. She wrinkled her nose at the stench, her eyes scanning the room for why one of the most desired addresses in Central London smelled distinct of motor oil, frying grease, and cannabis.

"It's a hell of a lot better than when I got here—I swear he had half of an outfit of Elton John with his sweat stains still on it," Sirius vanished some of the garbage from the couch and attempted to lift his brother onto the softa.

Andromeda shot a cleaning charm at the offending upholstery before he could do so. A significantly large cloud of ash seemed to cough from it. Sirius shot her a look as he set Regulus down gently on the sofa. At the moment, Regulus had begun to look extremely green.

The healer was over to him in a second, conjuring a basin and drawing his head into her lap as he began to expel the poison from his stomach.

"He needs to go to Saint Mungo's," Andromeda said urgently, running her hands in a maternal, calming way through Regulus's hair.

"We found him in a cave belonging to You-Know-Fucking-Who, he can't waltz in there, they'll ask to many questions," Sirius retorted. "What we need is someone who can be secretive… who know how to treat curse wounds… someone like…"

Sirius snapped his fingers, turning towards the door.

"I'll go get Dumbledore, be right back!" As his hand touched the bronze doorknob, a trio of NOs followed him.

He turned around, confused.

"You… You can't," Regulus hoarsely coughed out.

"Why the bloody hell not?" asked Sirius, indigently.

"He could arrest Reggie," Narcissa said frightfully. Andromeda nodded.

"He'd better be arrested than dead, and hell, he'd probably have some pretty good information since he's turning spy," Sirius turned to the door again.

"There's a… a spy. In the Order," Regulus's hoarse voice turned around.

Sirius stood frozen, the entire dictionary of swears laid out before his brain like a buffet.

He settled on a very loud FUCK, accompanied with a hefty kick at one of the old amphs that Alphard had left lying around the flat.

The three arguing Blacks had failed to notice the house elf apparate out of the room when Sirius turned to the door.

Yet, the loud banging on the front door of the flat was impossible not to notice, as Sirius's hand only recently departing from the doorknob.

In a fit of temper and against his better judgement, Sirius stalked four steps to the door, muttering the enchantment to unlock it, and swiftly yanked the handle.

A middle-aged woman, wand gripped in her hand like a vice, had seemed ready to shove past whoever answered the door, a tall well-dressed gentlewizard at her heels. She was now, instead frozen, for the first time in Sirius's memory at a loss for words.

"YOU—" she said, her voice more of a growl of scarcely contained shock and fury. "You—"

Sirius Black palmed his wand as if he was ready to enact a counter-curse.

"Fucking hell, that bloody elf," he finally muttered, dropping his wand and stepping to the side of the door, allowing the couple to take in the whole picture.

Uncle Alphard's old flat, a Black family asset since 1951, was currently host to the woman's sons—one in a filthy muggle outfit, yet splattered with blood and dripping it onto the carpet, and the other prone on the sofa, a terrible pale color and vomiting into a basin held by a woman that Walburga had not seen in over 6 years. Andromeda's lime green healer's robes were soaked in vomit and other human substances, while her sister's dinner dress looked singed in a few places.

"What has—" Walburga Black breathily said, making a bee-line across the room to kneel next to him on the sofa. Orion still remained at the door, staring at his younger doppelganger in shock.

"We found him in a cave, Auntie—he's ingested some kind of poison," Andromeda said, her sharp gaze meeting her aunt's, as Walburga pressed the back of her hand against the forehead of her younger son.

"Did you figure out what kind?" Walburga had seemed to momentarily have forgotten how she had blasted the younger woman off the family tapestry herself, when she ran off with that mudblood.

"We?" Orion Black repeated, rounding on his eldest son, his expression transforming from one of surprise to befuddlement. The disowned Blacks and the dutiful ones, together?

"It's… it's the Dark Lord's," Narcissa managed to muster. "And there was Inferi attacking him and Reggie almost…." Her bottom lip began to tremble.

Sirius abandoned his staring contest with his father, crossing the room to wrap his arms around the diminutive blonde. Orion raised his eyebrows, shocked that his very proper niece didn't seem to mind the putrid, rotting blood that had transferred onto her silver robes.

"KREACHER," his mistress snapped to attention. "Go back to Grimmauld and fetch everything from the butler's pantry cabinet—all my potions ingredients."

The house elf bowed to his mistress, who was already back to scrutinizing her son's vomit as if it was a scrying glass.

"And Orion, fetch Arcturus—Merlin, Inferi set on a son of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black," Walburga began to examine the scratches littering Regulus's arms, looking for any missing chunks of flesh.

Orion turned, his house coat flaring open a bid as he did so to reveal the sheer haste with which the Blacks had made their way to the other side of the Inner Ring Road. He was still wearing his emerald and silver striped pajamas, with a perfectly sharp pleat in the leg.

Sirius took a step back from where he held the trembling Narcissa, the first flash of fear on his face the whole evening.

"Now, wait just a minute you can't just go ordering people to come to my house…" he started to feel his pockets, glancing at the windows and doors for an exit—not noticing the blonde witch had pickpocketed him most expertly, depriving him of a wand and escape from the impromptu family reunion.

"Sirius Orion, this is a Black family house, and for heaven's sake, Narcissa, where is your head at, scourgify the both of you before I made you scrub undead blood out of the rug by hand," Walburga could have been tell them at 7 years old not to track mud into the house from the dreary London streets and her tone would have been the same—a stern, maternal command that belonged in the same tenor as sit up straight.

The house elf had returned, bearing a large bulky, but stylish, black satchel. He wandered off, shooting malovent glares at Sirius as he began to clear the place, muttering about "blood traitor filth" all the while.

A look from her eyes alone enlisted her youngest niece to help her as they vanished the various bottles, magazines, and wrappers from the coffee table and set up his mother's vials and containers of mysterious and slightly sinister liquids and powers.

"Sirius, switch places with Andromeda—Andromeda, can you open a vein? There's too much bile in the vomit to get a good sample for the antivenom," Sirius would have ordinary dragged his feet, but there was something in Andromeda's expression of sheer relief at his mother's command of the situation that he shuffled to the leather sickbed and traded places with his cousin.

Regulus had ceased vomiting, yet he still shivered. Narcissa shot a warming charm at the 18-year-old, but it seemed to only marginally improved the tremors of his body. In spite of it all, the sheer peace on Regulus's face was infectious, as if he had no greater wish than to be surrounded by the powder keg that was any Black family gathering.

"Hold him still, Rus," Andromeda directed, taking one of Regulus's forearms and slashing it with a silent slicing spell.

As Regulus cried out, the front door banged open again.

"Orion, why can't you tell us what the ruddy hell is going on-" the patriarch of the Black family, like all the older Blacks was dumbstruck by the tableau: the rebel grandson supporting the younger on the couch, the trio of Black woman draining blood from the latter's arm, Narcissa catching it in a bowl and passing it to the eldest woman, who began to furiously add powders and liquids to the blood.

"Regulus was attacked, Father," Orion, in transport, had seemed to recover some of his composure. "Those three saved him from certain death, by a hoard of Inferi according to him."

He still seemed unable to say Sirius's name, but the implication was all the same. Since infancy, it was in the very nature of the youngest generation of Blacks to follow Sirius Orion.

"Inferi? Pah, another one of Sirius's stories, those mudbloods are making up lies to sell papers," the 78-year-old wizard looked skeptical, glaring at his son for interrupting his sleep most likely.

"Take a look at his arms if you're going to be obstinate, Father, hell, Sirius was covered head to toe in blood when we first arrived," Sirius's flint grey eyes shot up in surprise at his father's resolve—unused to such faith from his father.

It was also the first time he had heard his father say his name in three long years.

Arcturus Black marched into the room, paying no heed to keeping his dressing gown closed. The Black women had released Regulus's arm, which fell listlessly onto the couch, easy prey for the hawk-like eyes of the old wizard.

Sirius felt grateful to see the skin of his forearm bare other than the Inferi's marks—he had already known Regulus may have joined the Death Eaters, yet had doubted he would have warranted the Inner Circle's mark only a few months out of Hogwarts.

"Grandfather," Regulus croaked as respectfully as he could muster. Sirius decided a silent glare was more appropriate, hoping his will alone would force him to disappear.

"Regulus, don't speak—your throat is shredded from everything you've put it through today," Walburga Black pushed her father-in-law out of her way, forcing a steaming goblet under her son's nose. Obediently, Regulus consumed the reflective onyx liquid pulling a face when he reached the bottom.

"There's no doubt they're Inferus claw marks—Aunt Cassie tutored all of us on the importance of distinguishing their scratches from that of wights or liches," Andromeda said rather conversationally, dabbing a sulfuric smelling paste onto Regulus' brutalized skin.

Sirius began to slowly slide out from under his brother's torso, replacing his lap with a plush cushion—eying his favorite armchair.

"Well, what the hell was Regulus doing fighting them then?" Arcturus said stubbornly, parking himself in Sirius's intended destination, putting his feet up on the ottoman and pointing his wand at the empty grate, where a cheerfully roaring fire began to crackle.

The three adults stared at the barely of-age ones. Well, mostly at Sirius.

Why is it always me? Sirius's internal voice whined.

"He summoned the three of us with these," flippantly, Sirius's swatted his left hand in the air, the black ink of the garlanded constellations stark against his pale skin. "Cis was the one to puzzle out that it was You-Know-Who's cave, but it was Kreacher who brought him there in the first place. I was wondering that myself, since it's been the ruddy thing's command since birth to keep us out of harms' way. Funny that he wasn't there when we arrived."

Perhaps Sirius was a bit dramatic (or a bit cruel) but after all, he was a Black.

The elf, who had been dusting the crystal chandelier muttering insults to the owner of the flat, froze. All 14 pairs of eyes rested on him.

"Kreacher," his mother's voice was quiet, low, and terrifying. "What possessed you to abandon your master to a certain death?"

The elf trembled for a second, before flinging himself off the dining room table, banging his head on the floor.

"The young master said to tell… tell no one… he said to hide the locket... Master Regulus said to leave him…" the elf burst into tears flinging himself onto one of Regulus's very muddy boots, hanging off the end of couch.

"Elf—what. Have. You. Done?" Orion asked, snatching the sobbing elf by his large whiskered ears and dropping him off of Regulus.

"It's ok Kreach, I'm ok," Regulus, sick all down his front, brutal scarring on most of his body, tried to smile and comfort the hysterical creature. He winced. "Go… fetch the locket."

Kreacher still had not disapparated, yet his sobs had stopped which was a marginal improvement.

"Master made Kreacher swear not to tell the family… they must never know…" he stared at Regulus as if he had misheard him.

"I know what I said," Regulus Black hissed, a perfect rendition of his mother's aristocratic snarl. "And clearly, that was futile."

He spared his brother a lopsided grin and half eye roll. His handsome face, fortunately, had mostly been spared from the Inferi's claws.

"Bring it, now, elf, or else I'll be forced to take off my dressing gown," Arcturus Black threatened. Sirius caught Narcissa's eye, and scarcely resisted barking out a laugh at the mental image it had conjured in both of their heads.

At the threat of clothes, the elf cast the gathered Blacks one last fearful look and disapparated with a loud CRACK.

At the elf's absence, Walburga wheeled on her ailing son, pressing her wand to his chest, magnifying the sound of his rattling lungs. Wheezes filled the room.

"Andromeda, he's aspirated fluid—can you,"

"I already suspected, Auntie," Andromeda handed Walburga a tub of some kind of cream from her sturdy Healer's apron. "Good thing I came from a shift at Mungo's… put the numbing agent on his left…"

Andromeda withdrew an extremely large needle from her apron. Sirius sucked in a breath.

"Absolutely fucking not, you are not doing surgery on my couch!"

His mother and cousins turned to him.

"Well, I'd hazard a guess that here is a fraction more sterile than your bed?" Andromeda was the picture of innocence, although her twinkling eyes betrayed her. Her sister hit her giggle behind her hand.

As Sirius spluttered under his mother's glare, he was grateful for another loud CRACK—never gladder to see the onery Grimmauld House Elf.

"Kreacher has brought the locket, young Master—" he said, bowing low in front of the elderly wizard who had threatening him with freedom. Some kind of gold object was clutched tightly to his chest.

Putting out his hand, Arcturus did what their entire family did best—look down their aristocratically fine noses at others.

The elf glanced back at Regulus again, still reluctant to disclose an ordered secret to The Family.

"Give it to him, Kreacher," The elf trembled a bit, gasping a bit as Arcturus, fed up with the elf's dramatics and had wrenched it from his grip.

The locket looked rather like something that his mother would wear, Sirius thought, heavy, old-fashioned, and decorated in emeralds. Arcturus stilled the second the object touched his hand, the only movement a slight widening of his eyes of true surprise.

Arcturus Black (the Third) had not expected his biggest surprise of the night be the reappearance of his runaway Heir.

His grandfather was every opposite of Albus Dumbledore. While an opaque mask always covered the Headmaster's emotions, a thin layer of ice sealed over Arcturus Black's face, threatening to crack with scarcely concealed rage, disgust, and alarm as he held the gold locket.

"How many people know about this place?" his grandfather's words were quiet, sharp, and effective—his gaze directed at Sirius with the same precision of a defending wolf.

"Alphard's old acquaintances, but they haven't been here in years, handful of friends…not Dumbledore," Sirius listed, warily gazing at the antique.

His grandfather cut him off again, directing his gaze at Regulus.

"You know what this is, Regulus?"

A mute nod from the boy on the couch.

"You knew before you retrieved it tonight? Alone? With only an elf for protection?"

Regulus didn't nod this time. He didn't need to.

"You didn't expect to survive the attempt," Arcturus said flatly. The eyes of his dear departed wife remained on the ground.

Walburga, finally, let out the sob that had been threatening to break free since she had seen the near corpse of her child, prone on the chaise. Narcissa and Andromeda clung to each other on the floor, gasping in the silence. Sirius and Orion, ironically, let out the same fucking hell under their breath, nearly in unison.

"It would have been better for The Family, if I ha-" Regulus rasped, a cough racking through his body at the end.

"We're family, Reg, you could have come to us!" Sirius, never known for his patience, blurted out.

"I suppose your brother wanted to prevent making The Family a target, given what this is," Arcturus stood and walked over to his son.

"Here, boy, feel the secret your son has cursed this family with," he forced the locket into his son's hand. Orion's eyes took a second to go from studious and scared. His wife rose from her kneeling position beside Regulus, crossing the room to examine the locket as well.

"Isn't… isn't that Salazar's mark?" Narcissa asked hesitantly.

"His magical mark too," Arcturus affirmed. "But that's the least interesting thing about this lovely piece of jewelry—Regulus would you like to do the honors?"

"It's a horcrux," Regulus's confession caused a simultaneously sharp intake of breath between the three Black cousins.

As Blacks, they had forgotten more dark magic than the world cared to remember.

But there were certain magics deemed too corrupting, too sinful for even them. Magic like that which had defiled such a relic wasn't pure—it was the kind of magic the half-breeds and bottom feeders practiced behind Knockturn Alley: a pollution of purity, not fit for the parlors of families like theirs.

"Effing hell, Reg, when you decide to be rebellious, you're certainly ambitious," Sirius looked just a bit awed. "Voldemort's horcrux…."

Orion and Walburga looked at Arcturus, and then the door, as if they expected Sirius saying the name would cause the Dark Lord to appear.

"Do you think He knows it's missing?" Walburga asked, reaching out from her husband, holding tightly to his arm.

Arcturus looked at the quartet.

"There was no kind of trigger in the cave and Inferi aren't sentient," Narcissa accessed, straightening her skirt a bit to cover more of her legs. It was singed in several places and ripped in others—her shawl was long gone and the bodice of the dress had seen better days.

Nevertheless, she looked regal.

"He tested the protections… with Kreacher… he expected him to die," Regulus's voice was steady, his breath still shaky. But his mother's potion must have started to work.

Orion was pressing the bridge of his nose, as if trying to ward off an impending migraine.

"Regulus," he used an exasperated tone that was only reserved for his eldest son. "Please tell me you didn't execute this plan as petty revenge for the bloody elf."

Regulus barked out a laugh, coughing hoarsely at the force. He looked at his brother.

"Do you remember when I came to you, in July, asking you to come home?" Sirius for once in his life only nodded, too rapt with attention to speak.

"That was my mission. Recruit Sirius and if he didn't join—he was to die by my wand," the room sucked in a breath. Walburga added fresh sobs to her embroidered handkerchief.

Arcturus had a very strange look on his face—horror, fascination, admiration, rage all collided in his features.

"He'd dare spill the blood of the Sacred 28?" Orion's fists were clenched at his sides. "Of the heir of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black?"

It was rare that the iron backbone of Orion Arcturus made an appearance. Sirius had seen it seldom few times in his life, but he found it impossible to deny that it was a great comfort.

"The Dark Lord cares for nothing and no one but himself," Regulus bitterly laughed, a sound far beyond his years.

"Purity of blood matters little to him if they don't subscribe to his views," Sirius quietly said, remembering how Frank and Alice had been threatened that summer, James asked for the second time to join.

How Edgar Bones had been dispatched, along with his wife and two small children.

"And even those who do are not treated with respect, Uncle," Narcissa said quietly. Her hands were folded, her eye fixed on her wedding ring with an expression of poorly concealed regret and loathing. "We are a caste below Him."

Clever, manipulative Cis. Sirius thought. The one lesson drilled into every Black child from the cradle was that they were a class above even other purebloods: the wealthiest, the most powerful, the purest.

Sirius and Regulus watched their grandfather intently as he took back the locket from their father. He glanced down it for a long moment, before pocketing it.

"I will add to the wards. Regulus must stay here, for now. I trust you both are well-trained enough to perform any kind of procedure here?" Walburga and Andromeda both nodded.

"And tomorrow morning—I will be calling every Black to have a full family meeting."

"NO!" Sirius and Narcissa shouted. Arcturus couldn't hide his surprise; the latter was usually the most courteous and well-behaved lady.

"Bella… she's one of them," Narcissa did not meet the Black Patriarch's stare, demanding she explain herself.

"A follower? Bah, she'll listen to the Family."

"No, she won't, she's tried to kill me a half dozen times," Sirius's non-chalance shocked Walburga out of her handkerchief. Did her son's life truly mean so little to him?

"The mark…it pollutes the Inner Circle's minds. Distorts them." Narcissa said quietly.

"And you know this how?" Orion had one eyebrow raised.

If the room hadn't already been silent, no one would have caught her whispered Lucius.

Sirius's eyes were suddenly very sharp.

"How long until he notices you have been gone?"

"He's at a hunting weekend at Yaxley's," she didn't say hunting what.

"Do the elves report on you?" Narcissa shook her head.

Sirius looked pleadingly at his mother. For the first time in his life, he was pleased to see his mother's short temper to be flaring.

"I will write anyways and say I required your companionship in London. You will stay here, it's the least likely place for anyone to look and the wards will be amongst the safest in Britain once Rion and Arcturus are finished," she cast a glance at her husband, making her statement more of a threat than anything else.

Walburga Black, for all her faults, was still a she-wolf, ruthless protecting her den, her cubs from Others.

"Orion, I believe there's a box at Grimmauld for such a hateful thing," Orion nodded his head at his father, taking the locket from him.

Arcturus turned to the group.

"I'll summon the rest, excluding Bellatrix, to Castle Black in the morrow," he then turned to look at the Heir, a faint sneer of disgust at his grandson's muggle attire. "Do try to look presentable Sirius."

With a sharp CRACK, the elderly wizard disapparated, breaking the rigid hold it had over the gathered family. Walburga once again turned to her youngest son, casting a Hover Charm on his body.

She turned to Sirius.

"Is the guest room completely filthy or is it fit to treat your brother?" she asked him.

The guest room was actually quite clean—he kept it made up passably well for Remus whenever he returned from god knows what mission Dumbledore sent him on or James after long shifts as a Junior Auror.

"Not to your standards, but it should be fine for Reggie," Walburga pursed her lips, yet didn't protest, hovering her son's body down the narrow hall. Andromeda trotted after her, sending an attempt at a reassuring smile.

His father still stood by the fireplace, arm heavily resting on the black marble mantle, the shadows of the flame making his face look more aged and tired, looking as though the weight of the last few years had been harder to weather for him.

From the echoey hall, Sirius heard his mother ask Andromeda if she had a sleeping draught, Andromeda warn Regulus that this would not be particularly pleasant.

Narcissa, the consummate hostess, had begun to put away his mother's potions supplies, vanishing stray bits of trash as she went.

"Sirius," his father quietly called him over, turning away from the flames.

"Father," the younger man, scarcely a boy wandered over to the first. From the mantle, he snatched a crystal decanter, pouring the aged firewhisky swiftly into a glass and downing it, before handing it off to his elder.

"I expect you to know that none of this leaves The Family," the statement lacked the usual qualities of orders that Orion had tried to give his firstborn. Was that… respect in his father's voice?

"Not Dumbledore, not James Potter or any of your friends," Orion swirled the amber colored liquid morosely.

"Why the hell not? Reg has probably single-handedly changed the course of the damn war!" Sirius reared back.

"The spy, Rus, we don't know who we can trust," Narcissa reminded him from the other side of the sitting room.

"You must trust The Family, Sirius," his father attempted to affect a kind tone.

"No, you can't!" Sirius shouted. "You heard us, it's not as though family means shit—Look at Bella!"

"Bellatrix may be the exception, perhaps, not the rule," his father cast a sideways glance at the younger pair. "The three of you seemed to spare little thought for anyone else when you saved your brother's life."

Bashfully, Sirius cast his eyes down.

"He did the same for me," he muttered, still in shock that Regulus had suicidally thrown his life away rather than commit fratricide. "Disowned or not?"

Sirius looked up at his father's face to realize his father's gunmetal grey eyes shimmered with unshed tears.

"Whatever gave you that idea?" his father asked him. Sirius opened his mouth.

"I…I ran away, like Meda," Orion pulled a face as the diminutive, their parents had never liked the pet names the children gave each other.

"And here she is, helping your mother," Orion took a sip, surprised at the quality of his son's supply.

"But… she married a muggleborn! None of you have spoken to her in YEARS!" Sirius shot a particularly pointed look at Narcissa, who was in the process of slinking down the hall, no doubt looking for the washroom.

Orion and Narcissa shifted uncomfortably.

"While we may not… approve of her choice, your cousins still heeded the call from her blood," Orion admitted. "I can't speak for her father, but at least for today, Andromeda is a Black where it counts."

Sirius fervently wished Andromeda had been in the room. She rarely showed it, but she always had look morose in his company—leaving gaps in the conversation where Bellatrix's sarcastic drawl, Narcissa's easy laughter, and Regulus's eager musings would normally reside.

"I still was preempting you—we had been fighting for weeks about all the disappearances, Minchum's new protocols, all new bits of legislation!" Sirius mulishly insisted.

Orion levied a glare onto his firstborn.

"You seriously thought that we would turn you out on the street because of some… political disagreement?" the elder's grey eyes remained glazed over.

"Well, yes, there's enough holes in that damn tapestry—I mean isn't that what Phineas Nigellus did to his son? The mudblood lover?" Sirius raised his dark eyebrows in challenge.

Orion Black was caught off guard.

"He was not the Heir," he said stiffly. Looking at his son's clenched jaw, his expression softened. "And just because something was done in the past does not mean it is always right."

Sirius's jaw when slack in shock—his father was a consummate conservative, fighting every single progressive view of Sirius's with stern coldness throughout his Hogwarts years.

He gazed at his father's face, convinced he had to have been 'body snatched' like in one of those muggle films.

Orion put one hand on his son's shoulders.

"You are my firstborn son," he used his arm to force Sirius to look into his eyes. "The child upon whom I conferred my very name. It was never my intention to disinherit you, least of all after tonight."

"Why?" Sirius whispered, suddenly feeling very small.

"Tojours pur," his father whispered their House words. Most Purebloods used Latin, but for some reason, the Blacks had preferred the French translation of their creed in the last several centuries.

"What more pureblood propaganda? Because of the purity of my blood, you keep me like a pet crup?" Orion, oddly, didn't rear back as though his son struck him. Instead, he kept that soft paternal stare at his son.

"There are many ways to translate the original semper pura—yes, there is akeraois, as many are fond of the definition…" he looked at his son for translation, seeing if his decade of the finest tutors in Europe were still worth the money.

"Unmixed," Sirius ground out.

"My father has always had a liking towards pistikos," Sirius resisted the urge to pout like he was 9.

"Trustworthiness," this call and response, however, couldn't shake the same dynamic of his childhood, Sirius on one side of the desk, performing for his father's assessment.

"But you know that's in his nature, he's scarcely trusts The Family with all his plots and ideas," Orion drained his firewhisky.

"I myself have am fond of eilikrinés, but I suppose that's why you perceived us clashing so."

"Sincerity."

"But, to be Head of the Family, to be the Heir, we all must subscribe to Aei Hagnos."

"Always without… deceit?" Sirius wrinkled his nose, the entire family had been in Slytherin, deceit was their second nature.

"Always with pure intentions, my son," Orion put his other hand on his son's shoulder. "I am… proud that you had the mettle to not pollute yourself with whatever deal with the devil they have made."

Sirius felt like choking up. He had been on this earth for almost two decades, yet, this was the first time his father had told him he was proud of him.

"Reggie, Reggie didn't know any better Dad," Sirius sniffed, wanting to completely ignore the tears caught on his high cheekbones.

"Then I have failed miserably, as a Father and as the Heir,"

"You… you couldn't have known what he was getting into, what they were forcing him to do; I should have known better" the Sirius Black of yesterday would have told him he was on pixie dust: comforting his father over the near death of his brother.

"You are my sons!" his father's voice rose to a shout. "It is not your job to protect your brother, it is mine."

It was then that Sirius's sorting decided to take over the aristocratic mannerisms that had been drilled into him since the cradle, throwing his arms around his father in a very Gryffindorish hug.

Orion went rigid at the surge of physical affection from his firstborn.

"We're ok, Dad, Reggie and I are alive, maybe a few scars but no worse for wear," Sirius muttered into his father's brocade dressing gown's shoulder. Later, he would tell himself the drops of water he felt on his head were a figment of his imagination, like Orion would pretend not to see the dark wet stain on the shoulder of his robe.

"Sirius?" Andromeda's voice caused him to release his father, turning to where she stood at the hall.

"How… how is he?" Orion tried to recover his composure, discreetly wiping his cheeks with his sleeves, a very undignified gesture for such a proper man as Orion Black.

"Aunt Burgie is with him now administering the sleeping draught; he should make a full recovery," An invisible weight lifted off the pair of Black men in a sigh of breath.

Andromeda looked around the empty sitting room as Walburga quietly shut the door to the guest room and rejoined them.

"Sirius, where has Narcissa gone off to?" his cousin asked him.

"Likely to wash—she was ordered to stay here tonight," Sirius examining his own attire.

Merlin, his jacket was likely ruined, Narcissa's cleaning charm may have dried the blood but the tarry blackish red stains remained on the leather.

"I am leaving Kreacher to monitor your brother, tonight, can I entrust you to behave yourself tonight?" His mother was giving him one of her very pureblooded stares, ripe with expectations.

There was something just below the surface of his mother's expression that prevented him from chafing under her orders. Her eyes were rimmed with red and the light seemed to glimmer off of her cheeks. It was not a question that she had been crying.

"I'll go change the linens for Cissa," his mother gave him a begrudgingly approving tilt of her head. "Meda, you heading home or do I need to make up the couch for you?"

"Ted always waits up for me," the invocation of her muggleborn husband did not seem to raise the usual ire from the elder Blacks; Sirius's parents looked as though their fire and fight had look since departed as Walburga stiffly crossed the room to her husband.

Orion gently wrapped one arm around his wife's shoulder—practically kissing for the rarely publicly affectionate pair.

"Ten O'Clock Sharp, Andromeda," his father told his niece brusquely.

Her handsomely lovely face split into a girlish grin, the tiredness fading from her face. Worn down by her child, her work, and the war, Andromeda Tonks usually looked closer to a woman of thirty than her four and twenty years.

"Mum, Dad," Sirius told his parents, hoping they would take their cue to be dismissed.

He trotted down the hall, passing the quiet guestroom door and the bathroom, where he could hear the shower running. He could hear the soft pop of his cousin's apparition, the sharp crack of his father's, the whip snap of his mother's.

The French doors hung open onto the rooftop terrace, the half-moon making the (enchanted) motorbike to glint quicksilver in the light. At his sudden apparition, he must have left them open, shivering a bit at the crisp summer night air as he pulled them shut.

The room had once been his Uncle's and of course was done up in his style—dark wood paneling, a navy ceiling enchanted to show the night sky. A massive blackwood four poster bed dominated the space.

Sirius rummaged around the closet, eyes finally alighting on the second set of black silk sheets that he hadn't bothered to replace when he moved in. They were the same linens the whole family used, the finest from Paris, and as much as he hated to admit—he had never slept quite as well without them.

"I'm sorry if I'm displacing your nightly activities," Narcissa's voice came from the doorway. Sirius turned around, flicking his wand at the pile of fresh bedclothes as he did so.

She could have been her fifteen-year-old self, sneaking into his room to hear all about her new niece that he had gotten to see in Hogsmeade (there was always someone watching her, always someone ensuring another Sister didn't become a Blood Traitor).

Her face was barren of cosmetics, her hair tumbling down in a half-dry cascade of blonde curls. Her fondness for high heels had manifested around the beginning of her fourth year—when it became clear that five foot, five inches was the tallest she would ever reach. Her bare feet shuffled against the hardwood floors, black inked flowers and stars winking hello as she shifted, unself-assured, in place.

Without all the trappings, without all the armor, Narcissa looked like just a girl.

"You mean running around fighting your Housemates and collapsing into bed?" he said, the words coming out a bit harsher than he meant to.

"Oh," she looked down at her feet again, moving back and forth in place in a nervous sort of dance. "I had thought you're still with… with Remus."

Sirius turned down the sheets and fluffed the duvet, keeping his eyes focused on his work before he turned back to her, motioning with his hand to encourage her towards her bed.

"We're… on a break right now," Sirius said slowly. The silence was stilted as she crossed the room, all long graceful legs underneath a threadbare cream shirt. His threadbare cream shirt, he realized, the faded Pink Floyd logo coming into view as she stepped into the moonlight.

"Was it his lycanthropy, the war, or our last name?" she asked him, slipping between the sheets.

"None of them… all of them," he said, a tight, rueful smile on his lips. "I'd expect you'd know—how is Seraphina?"

She shot him a glare. He knew where her ex-girlfriend was. Married like Narcissa was, to a man, although Lord Zabini was quite a deal kinder than her own husband.

Seraphina, after all, had gotten to choose a man she could love.

"That was cruel, I'm sorry, Cis," He knew how it goes—how it always goes with anyone who loved a Black rather than married one.

Their lovers always realize, in the end, that their partners had no way to shake off their nature, their blood.

Narcissa had heard the rumors, in her sixth year, of what had transpired just before the OWL exams.

("Fuck you Sirius!" Remus had screamed at his new boyfriend, their honeymoon period dying when James had informed him of the previous night's events.

"Remus—I-" Sirius had dealt with temper before, but how the righteous anger burnt through Remus was another beast all together.

"You. Don't. Get. To. Talk." Ice dripped from the boy's lips. There was silence, as Sirius waited for a physical blow and Remus seemed to singularly realign the vision of the man he loved.

"You're no better than them, you're sick, Black," he snarled. Out of all the things Remus could have said, it was the most apt, the most hurtful. Sirius had spent a lifetime running from that uncomfortable truth, that his urges, morals, and soul were Black. Like a black leather glove, the insult was not ill-fitting, the words gripped him—knowing how much Remus meant and how right he was.)

"You aren't wrong. You have read your romances, dear cousin, you must know such love is impossible," she said—knowing well enough that she did not mean merely that of the same sex.

Love without goals, advantages, dynastic consequence never remained unpolluted by the Black family nature. Sirius was just an example of it.

"Impossible loves… I've read the same romances as you and am very much afraid they can become an addiction," he pressed his lips to her temple and turned to leave.

However, she grabbed his hand in her own petite one, holding him in place.

"Sirius… did Uncle Rion tell you what they plan to do about me?" he noticed she still wore the garishly large Malfoy ring—there was likely some kind of spell work preventing her, marking her as the property of Lucius. He shook his head no.

"I'm scared Rus," she whispered, her face no longer resembling a girl but a lost child. "I can't go back and just keep hosting, I can't go back and hear the screams… I'm not built to be a spy, Lucius will find out, he always does…"

Her sobs could break anyone's heart, the china doll shattering in a most spectacular fashion.

"Shhhhh…" Sirius sat on the edge of the bed, wrapping her fragile body in his arms. "You have nothing to worry about—the Family won't let anything happen to you,"

"They arranged the match in the first place," she protested, sobs receding a bit.

"If the Family doesn't, I will," he tilted her chin to look up at him. "What did I tell you, just before your graduation?"

"If your husband proves ungallant, I shall cut his heart out with a dinner knife and serve it to you," Narcissa gave a bit of a laugh.

It seemed so ridiculous to repeat it now, but at the time he had been as solemn as a man making the Unbreakable Vow.

(He had practically snatched her from her patrols, dragging her behind the tapestry in the Trophy Room corridor, between it and the Charms Classroom. He had almost cornered her in the narrow alcove, pushing her up against the cold stone as he spoke, his eyes burning fiercely with the power of the heavens. She hadn't doubted he wouldn't risk Azkaban for any one of the younger generation of the House of Black.)

"You, Regulus, Andromeda—I will curse from this earth whomever threatens you all," Sirius rose from the bed and crossed towards the door.

"Why now?" Narcissa called after him, "Are we now on the same level as James Potter and Remus Lupin, deserving of your protection in return for our heroics?"

He glanced back at her, the Black smirk embossed on his noble features.

"Haven't you heard, Cis? It's my sacred duty—I am the Heir, after all."

Sirius Orion Black, third of his name, sank down onto the hallway floor as he shut the door. Opposite his own bedroom door, he could hear his brother's soft snores and Kreacher's mutterings emanating from the guest room.

The carpet was comfortable under his paws as he circled once and curled but in a ball between the two rooms, guarding them from whatever uncertainties lay in the morning.

This has been languishing in my drafts for far too long-may as well get some feedback on it and see if I should continue!

Honestly there's nothing I love more than a good The Family AU drama from *any* show and all the TikTok edits of Andy/Cissa/Sirius/Regulus have eventually gotten to me. So, ergo, going full into writing the Blacks more fully into the Big, Screwed-Up Family Trope with the requisite amount of intrigue.

Also playing fast and loose with canon in that JKR has stated all religions exist in the wizarding world just so I can play with all the Biblical translations of 'pure.'

**Birth Years Remain Canon for Arcturus (78), Pollux (67), and all that generation (the math was fine there!)**

Drop a review! I should be uploading every couple of days until this is caught up with where we are on AO3 (over 170k words!)