Back then, I didn't understand at all what had happened. Now, of course, it is clear. At some point in the following days, someone must have explained to me that Andromeda had gone off to marry the man I had seen in the garden. His name was Ted Tonks and his parents were Muggles. Aunt Elladora and Uncle Claudius had tried to prevent her from making such a terrible mistake, but she had refused to listen.

The embarrassment of this scandal far out shadowed anything Sirius had done, and for a while he was almost forgotten. I expected Mother to revel in Aunt Elladora's obvious shame and misery, but to my surprise, even she seemed incensed. "How could she?" she would rage, and Father would shake his head and respond, "I never would have thought it of our little Ann." Aunt Elladora was inconsolable and expressed several times her wish that Andromeda had died rather than do such a foolish, shameful thing. Narcissa cried that she wouldn't be able to face any of her friends at school and Bellatrix called her older sister the most wicked names. Everybody got all choked up and red-faced when the subject was brought up, and early in January, Mother dragged out the large tapestry of the family tree and, with one angry swish of her wand, burned a jagged hole right through Andromeda's name. This set me crying all over again, and for several months I was miserable, especially as Sirius was back at school.

Then, as if to add insult to injury, Uncle Claudius revealed that several things had been stolen from his house the day Andromeda disappeared—New Year's Eve. He was loathe to describe the missing items in great detail and all I could gather was that they were valuable and sorely missed. I balked at the idea that my lovely, carefree cousin would steal precious artifacts from her own father; she didn't seem the type. But in the sad aftermath of her disappearance, we all had to admit that she had obviously been disturbed enough to do something crazy like running away with a Mudblood. Mother said that someone who would do that was already so far astray, he wouldn't hesitate to commit any crime.

I did finally get to hear that, among the missing items were several books from Uncle Claudius' private library. This news gave me pause. I had only seen Sirius stuff one book into his pocket, but who was to say that he hadn't taken more once I turned my back? A nephew who can steal one book from his own uncle can probably steal two. Maybe he can even steal other things. It dawned on me for the first time that I had no idea why Sirius had taken the book, some discourse on wild beasts or other if I remembered correctly. At the time I hadn't questioned it, and I hadn't wanted to incur Sirius' wrath. But looking back, it could easily have been part of a bigger chain of events. Sirius had, after all, also stolen the Butterbeers from the cellar. In fact, Sirius, it seemed suddenly to me, was rather fond of stealing things in general. I became obsessed with the idea that Sirius was heading down a criminal and degenerate path. Uncle Claudius was obviously livid, so the stolen items must have been important. And it didn't seem fair to let Andromeda, crazy or not, take the blame for something she didn't do.

For several weeks I kept quiet. But the more Uncle Claudius' lamented his loss, the guiltier I felt. Claudius was my uncle, after all. I couldn't bear the thought of betraying my family's trust like that. True, I would have to betray my brother, but who should one stand up for in such cases? The criminal? How could I defend Sirius when he had knowingly betrayed and hurt the entire family? I went to Mother and told her all I knew. First her face went white as chalk, then red and she scowled. The angry flush in her cheeks frightened me and I regretted having confided in her. Perhaps sensing my fear, she suddenly grew calm and cold again and, bending down to look me in the eye, stroked my hair and said, "It was very right of you to come to me, Regulus. We must put an end to such deviance immediately. You do want to help your brother, don't you?" I nodded vigorously in response and felt immediately cheered. I had pleased my mother, been true to my family, and taken the first steps to helping Sirius out of his moral decline, or so I thought.

Mother sent him a howler at school. He wrote back an angry letter that denied all knowledge of any items taken from Uncle Claudius' house, which I knew to be a flat out lie because I had seen him take the book. The knowledge of this lie helped Mother and me to remain firm in our measures.

July 14th, 1973

Number 12, Grimmauld Place

I stood, mournfully, by the window, watching the street. I'd just had a fight with a mate of mine. It was a petty affair, but to a 10-year old like me, it seemed like a big deal. On top of that, I'd fallen on the way home and scraped my knee. Mama wasn't particularly sympathetic to such things, so I'd tried to keep it to myself, but nothing could prevent a few sniffles from escaping me as I traced a pattern in the dusty windowsill.

I saw Sirius look over at me, not unkindly, and I dared to hope that he might be open to hearing my complaints. It had been a fairly muted summer, and lately he hadn't antagonized me at all.

"I had a fight with Daedalus," I told him. "He really hurt my feelings. And then I fell down and scraped my knee."

"Why don't you just run crying to Mum?" he snapped. "That's what you normally do, isn't it?"

"What?" I protested. He was being grossly unfair. "Just because I have a good relationship with our mother…"

"Nobody can have a good relationship with that woman," Sirius muttered darkly. I found that extremely rude and unfair of him. He had never tried.

"For your information, everything runs pretty smoothly when you're not home."

"Which is why," he sneered, "you found it necessary to tell her about Uncle Claudius' book, I suppose?"

I grew stiff. Up until now, Sirius had always denied everything. This was the first time he had openly admitted to me that he had taken the book. "You should have seen Uncle Claudius," I said softly. "He was beside himself."

"About this one book? I doubt it." Sirius gave me a sideways look.

"Other things were taken, too."

"Not by me!"

A heavy silence fell between us.

I sighed. "Why did you take the book in the first place?" I had been dying to know ever since the whole uproar occurred.

"Why should I tell you?" Sirius was still looking at me out of the corner of his eye. "You'll just go snitch on me to Mum. You always do."

"That's not fair." Annoyed, I got off my stool and came around to face him. I forced him to look me in the eye. "You want me to stand up for you? Then stop dishonoring the family! I try to be your friend, and then you turn around and stab me in the back."

"Who's stabbing whom?" Sirius leapt off his seat with a mad glint in his eyes, his face flushed. "You're the one who betrayed me! Remember?"

I didn't remember ever betraying him, unless he meant about the stupid book. "You did steal it. You admit to it. How can you demand that I stick up for you if it means hurting other members of the family? Don't I owe them something, too?"

"I don't care about the bloody book," Sirius exclaimed, his eyes round with anger. "The day I went to school. You turned your back on me."

Another silence reigned. It took me a long moment even to recall what he was talking about. It had been almost two years since he had left for his first year at Hogwarts and I had only been eight years old.

"You and Father," he prompted. "You left me when I asked for your help."

At last a faint memory came back to me. "When Mama was helping you pack?" That had been so long ago! How could he possibly remember it so well? Why on Earth did he keep that memory bottled up with him all this long time? "Sirius, that was two years ago!"

"Two years or two hundred years, it doesn't matter." Sirius crossed his arms across his chest and glared at the floor. "You betrayed me. You sided with Mum. You always do."

"Only when you do stupid things. Like steal from our uncle."

"Always that damned book! Why do you keep bringing it up?"

I felt like hitting him. How could he be so dense? "Because I don't understand…"

"No, you certainly don't." Sirius turned his face away from me and grimaced. "Listen to me, Regulus. You're perfectly right. In order to stay faithful to me, you would have to betray other members of this family. I don't intend on being a 'good boy' so there's no way you can satisfy us both." He turned back and looked me squarely in the eye. "But that's a choice you're going to have to make. We all make choices, Reggie. That's what makes us who we are. And you are going to have to choose between me and the family. There's no sitting on the fence. This is a war. Everyone will have to choose sides eventually."

"This is not a war…"

"You don't understand. It's going to be a war." He threw his hands up in disgust. "Mark my words, Reggie. Don't you hear the way people are talking? Riots break out in the streets. Three Muggle-born wizards who worked for the Ministry were mugged or beaten in the last six months alone. One of them is in St. Mungo's."

I had heard the story, but only vaguely. I didn't read the newspapers. I didn't have much interest in hearing all the gory details, and anyway, Father said the Prophet was all sensationalist speculation. "That has nothing to do with us," I argued. "Those people are batty. They won't touch our family."

"You think we'll be left alone?" He began pacing, but abruptly he stopped and faced me again. "Nobody remains untouched by war."

He was posing again. When had Sirius ever been in a war? I didn't know where he got this stuff. Probably from his school mates. Sissy said that Sirius hung out with an odd bunch. I thought that was sad; Sirius deserved better. I decided to change the subject. "I'm your brother, Sirius," I reminded him. Sometimes I felt as though he had forgotten. The word 'brother' felt almost foreign on my lips. "I want to help you."

"Then make up your mind." Sirius shook his head vehemently. "In the end, everyone will have to choose, Reggie. Even you."