Chapter 4: Regulus's Reflections and Auror Training

Regulus Black pushed through the vines concealing the door of his hideout, which was built into a hill like Bilbo Baggin's. It wasn't Regulus's preferred home, but as a known death eater, he had to stay hidden. (From the ministry and Voldemort.) Of course, his hideout was pretty comfortable. It was fully furnished, and quite spacious. An advantage of having rich parents. His parents had fully supported his dropping out of Hogwarts and becoming a death eater. They completely believed in pure-blood superiority and wholeheartedly supported The Dark Lord. Regulus had joined the death eaters when he was sixteen. He hadn't exactly wanted to drop out of Hogwarts, but because of an incident last year at school, he was now a rumoured death eater. Besides, with the war brewing, there were more important things than getting an education, he supposed.

After walking between his silver armchair with emeralds ingrained in the backrest, and past the near empty fridge, Regulus flopped down on the couch covered in green cushions. He liked to play up the Slytherin vibe, the Slytherin common room had been one of his favorite places at Hogwarts. Classy, yet subtle.

Regulus had mixed feelings about how the night had gone. On one hand he and Snape had been able to collect some valuable information on the rumoured organization "The Order of The Phoenix." The bad news was he had seen his brother and they had instantly quarrelled. Talk about bad luck; all he had wanted was to get some food after a long day of spying for The Dark Lord. The upside of the night was that he had seen a very good looking girl with chocolate colored long hair and hazel eyes that sparkled with life and energy.

Unfortunately, Regulus didn't have much time for cute girls nowadays… Most of his time was taken up by death eater assignments, moping, hiding, sneaking and more moping. Turns out, being a death eater entailed a lot of tedious tasks and gritty details. In all seriousness though, Regulus was starting to find some of The Dark Lord's policies and beliefs quite disturbing. He had joined because he believed that wizards shouldn't be forced to do magic in secret, and if he was being honest, wizards really were above muggles. Wizards can do magic, of course they are better! He had grown up knowing this, but although Regulus thought muggles were below him, he didn't necessarily think they should all be enslaved or murdered. Of course, sacrifices would have to be made for the good of wizard-kind, but Regulus had just been questioning his life decisions slightly, that's all…

There was a loud knock on the door-if you could call the entrance to his hideout a "door"-interrupting Regulus's deep thought. He cautiously opened the door to see a wrinkly old elf with large bat-like ears clutching a pile of mail. "Kreacher!" Regulus announced, pleased to see his loyal house elf. When he had moved out of his parents house, (and later when been forced to go into hiding), Kreacher had continued to run errands for him or just come around for a chat.

Regulus thanked Kreacher and accepted the mail, offering the elf some lemonade before going through the pile. No one except Regulus's parents knew where he was, so his mail was delivered to his parent's house, unbeknownst to the Ministry. Not that he got a lot of mail, as a rumoured death eater wanted for questioning.

The first piece of mail was a quickly scrawled note on a piece of parchment paper. It was from his uncle, Ignatius Prewett. A quick read-over showed that the note was a business offer; apparently his uncle was running an illegal magic carpet operation. Magic carpets were popular world-wide a few years back, but were now illegal in magical Britain, and many other places. They were deemed too obvious, too fast and too dangerous. Regulus dismissively put the correspondence aside.

The second piece of mail caught him off guard. It was a copy of The Daily Prophet, and the cover story was "Amateur Aurors vs Rumoured Death Eaters-Mayhem at The Spicy Meatball." There was a full-length photo of the two girls pointing wands at Snape and Regulus. The photograph was slightly blurry and had clearly been taken by a bystander. But all the same, Regulus was clearly recognizable, and had an especially stupid look on his face, as he had just been stunned. Upon skimming the article, Regulus found the girls's names. Addilyn Lovelace and Lily Evans. "Wait, the girl in the photo is Addilyn Lovelace?" Regulus stared at the name incredulously. Addilyn Lovelace had been a nerdy Gryffindor a year above him at Hogwarts. She was completely unrecognizable at first glance, with her leather jacket and long hair. Her face however, was the same; although she had replaced her thick-framed glasses with eyeliner.

Once Regulus was done mourning the loss of his reputation from the photograph, and had gotten over the shock of seeing Addilyn, he set down the letters, an idea forming in his mind…

*Two Days Later*

Lily and Addilyn turned onto the now-familiar path to Auror Academy, the off-site, Ministry officiated classroom where they received their training. The entrance to Auror Academy was a modern brick storefront on a main street; hidden in plain sight. Muggles saw a yoga studio that was "closed for repair." Auror Academy was the first step; after the girls completed their required training, they would graduate to training at the ministry with Agatha Brightflower, the head of aurors. For now, their lessons ranged from dueling, to forensics, to healing potions. Being an Auror required a vast skill set.

Today they were practicing defensive spells on other amateur aurors. Their trainer Mrs. Kneedander was helping the other two aurors, offering dueling tips to both sides while they practised.

Together Addilyn and Lily were unstoppable. They had been close friends since their third year at Hogwarts. It almost seemed that they could read each other's minds when it came to battle moves. "Protego '' Lily did a protective spell blocking the jelly leg jinx that was just shot at her. Addilyn took advantage of the distraction and cast a stunning spell at one of their opponents. The other girl toppled to the ground without moving a muscle.

The girls shared a high five. They got back to dueling just as Mrs. Kneedander shot a disarming spell. Addilyn's wand fell to the ground. "Reducio" Lily had shrunk Mrs. Kneedander. While Lily was battling Mrs. Kneedander, Addilyn had plenty of time to grab her wand. Lily glanced at Addilyn, "let's finish this together." The girls pointed their wands at their last opponent. "Impedimenta" The tall guy opposite them was hit by the force of their double jinx; they had won!

They were tired, but at least they could end the day proud. Lily could not believe she had shrunk Mrs. Kneedander! Addilyn was proud that she stunned their opponent on the first try.

Mrs. Kneedander cast Engorgio on herself, and walked over to talk to the girls. "I'm really impressed by your dueling today. You have improved a lot since the first session." Addilyn and Lily were both visibly pleased at the compliment. "I wanted to speak to you about something important." Mrs. Kneedander went on. "As you know, the aurors at the ministry are very busy at the moment with the war effort…Or trying to prevent a war, rather. Tracking down death eaters and such. The point is, the ministry doesn't have enough aurors to spare for every little thing that comes up. So they have decided to give the less crucial missions to you and your classmates. The aurors-in-training. I wanted you two to have the first mission because of your stellar performance today." Lily and Addilyn were captivated.

Their instructor went on to explain that the ministry had got a report a couple months ago that someone was illegally selling magic carpets; there had been numerous carpets confiscated. Apparently, there were warehouses all over, but no one had been able to find the headquarters and shut down the whole operation. "That's your mission," She told the girls. "Find the headquarters, get inside, and once you find the mastermind of the whole operation, send out a signal, so that the aurors can put an end to this business."

When the girls got home, Lily began making casserole dinner while they chatted excitedly about their mission. Lily could cook just about anything, and it was always delicious. They wolfed down their dinner, and stayed up late talking and planning. Looking at the Daily Prophet reports on illegal magic carpets confiscated in the last few months, seemed like a good place to start. See if there was a pattern. They would also, it seemed, have to find a warehouse, to somehow find out the location of the headquarters. It would be a wearisome and time-consuming job; no wonder the aurors from the ministry were only going to show up during the action.

They had finally gone to bed when there was a sharp rap on the door. "Who would be knocking on the door at midnight?" Lily wondered. Even James, who stayed up late into the night, would know not to come calling at this hour.

Lily cautiously approached the door, as Addilyn stood back, her wand pointed towards the door, ready for anything. With one last anxious glance, Lily swung open the door and both girls gasped in surprise. None other than Regulus Black stood before them!