Chapter 27: Crumbling
Cressida truly contemplates whether the pain in her shoulder is really worth the three hundred millilitres of Skel-Gro that she's been ordered to drink. Looking into the cup with a shrivelled nose, it was Madam Pomfrey's stern expression that made her down it in one go.
Cressida knows that she's quieter than usual, and people grow to assume their own speculations. Mostly speaking, James and Sirius do. They stand off to the side as Pomfrey wraps her arm in a sling, muttering about Quidditch being the main reason she even has a job.
The two boys are hushed, but not enough that she can't hear them.
"She's just devastated, Prongs," Sirius murmurs. They still have their robes on, not even having the chance to go back to their dorm yet. Remus and Peter walked up with them but were shooed out soon enough so Pomfrey has space to work. Besides, she'd be healed in two days completely. Not anything life-threatening. "You know how she is with Quidditch."
Cressida perks a mocking brow. Please do continue, Sirius.
James shakes his head softly. "If it was just Quidditch I think she'd be angrier. Angrier at herself. And maybe she is but she's just less vocal about it this time but I feel like something got to her. Before she got hurt."
"Why don't you just ask her?"
"Because she won't tell me anything, Pads," James breathes with a slight shake of his head. "She never does anymore. I just get 'fine'."
Cressida bites her tongue, darting her eyes downwards as they return to her bedside. James smiles at her, hands braced on the mattress, watching their matron work as Sirius stands behind with his arms crossed. Soon enough, she's let go with strict orders not to do anything foolish. She doesn't plan on it.
James never does ask her. Cressida doesn't know how she'd answer. There's nothing stopping her from telling the truth, and it wouldn't be the most shocking news. But Sirius hadn't said anything to any of them, and Cressida knows that he knows. It's what they fought about the other week.
Three evenings after the match, now free of her sling, she takes to the boys' dorm. Remus and Peter are in there, throwing a crumpled piece of paper back and forth. She passes them with a fleeting smile, heading straight for James' desk. She rifles through the mess of papers, looking for the folded parchment. He never puts it in the same spot.
"You know," Remus sighs, "if I did that and Prongs caught me, I'd get a wand up my arse."
Without looking up from her searching, though carrying a light smirk, Cressida responds, "That's because I put everything back where it belongs."
"But it's all a mess."
"An organised mess."
There's another pause.
"What are you searching for, anyway?"
She finds it in the third draw, among all his old kept letters and scrap pieces of paper. She holds it up to answer Remus' question and sits on the bed. Placing her wand tip on the empty parchment, she calls its secrets forward. "I solemnly swear, that I am up to no good."
The Map reveals itself to her. Her fingers quickly work to unfold as much as she can, searching the Slytherin Common Rooms first and the other common areas. Regulus' name doesn't appear anywhere. Sighing with frustration she continues on, scanning the courtyards and classrooms. He wouldn't be off the school grounds. Not on a Tuesday night. Though if he's involving himself in Voldemort's ring, he could be doing anything. Cressida has to remind herself that she doesn't know him. At all.
And there, she finds him. She could smack her own head for not having thought to look. Folding the map back up and casting the disappearing charm, Cressida places it back in the third draw. "I'll be back later," she says to Remus and Peter.
"Where are you going?" Peter frowns, his loss of attention on the paper earning him a light smack in the chest from its crumpled form.
How thorough does her lie have to be? They could check the Map at any moment. "Kitchens," she answers. "I'm going to go get something to eat."
Peter scurries to pick the paper off the floor where it dropped. "Could you bring me back some pasties, please? I haven't had any in ages." Cressida pauses but realises that she is in fact, heading to the kitchens and his request is plausible. So, she nods and then hurries back out of the dorm and tower, heading straight for the kitchens before Regulus can leave.
What is she even doing, going to see him? Answers? What questions does she even have? But she doesn't have it in her to just let her mind wander. It wonders too much already. By the time she reaches the kitchens, he may be well long gone but Cressida tickles the pear and turns the knob.
House-elves fille the large room, steam smoking from different pots and forming clouds near the high roof. Dinner would be soon. What is Regulus even doing here when he only needs to wait another hour to eat a full buffet?
But there he sits, on the same countertop that he always does, munching on a green apple. He looks tired and uncomfortable. No doubt tired from the Slytherin party for their victory over Gryffindor. It's not like they get many, she remarks to herself with a snarl.
He glances up at her arrival but does nothing else to acknowledge her. Cressida clenches her jaw, taking five steps forward to shorten the space between them. After a few moments of silence, he breaks it. "How did Potter take your loss?"
"Modestly," she quips flatly. A bit of sarcasm. James hadn't really spoken of it much. Perhaps for her sake, perhaps for his own. "I took it worse."
A spin on the truth. It wasn't the loss of the match that haunts her, but the reason behind the loss does. Regulus huffs, peering at his apple like it is the most interesting thing in the world at that moment. "I'd imagine-"
"Why?" She cuts him off. Mindless bantering only fuels her agitation. "Why are you doing down this path?"
Regulus exhales slowly, eyes moving from the apple to along the floor. "Because it's what I have to do. For myself. For my family."
"Family doesn't always mean-"
Regulus cuts her off now with a sarcastic laugh that sounds sadistic and cruel. It stops abruptly as his dark eyes bore into hers. "Just because you ran away from home, and just because my brother did does not mean that everybody hates their family. Not everybody wants to disappoint them." He slides off the table, marching the remaining few steps between them. His long, pale finger points to his own chest. "I am making my family proud. I want to do this."
Though they are the same height, she can't help but feel smaller in his presence. Something that has never happened before. "You want to have my kind dead? Me dead?"
His eyes narrow accusingly. "I told you I don't."
"That doesn't seem to matter," she whispers. Her throat feels tight and sore. "What you say and what you do are two completely different things. I tried. I tried to believe that maybe you were different from the rest of the Slytherins. That you might be more like your brother than you let people believe-"
"Don't compare me to him."
"Why not?" she counters, voice raising. "Your brother is one of the most amazing people I have ever met. He is brave, loyal, gentle. He has been nothing but-"
"A disgrace. He has disgraced the title of Black."
"A man," she finishes, leaning forward. "He is a man of his own choice, and he continues to choose what is right over what people expect of him! I may be alive because you gave him a warning, but that is all you did. Sirius is the one that saved me. Sirius is the one who chose to act. Why did you even tell him and not me?" Regulus' throat bobs. She takes a moment to give her own thoughts. "Was it because then he would know? Sirius would know that you helped? You didn't care if I lived or died, you just cared that he still saw hope in you."
She knew Regulus never wanted to admit his love for his brother. Never wanted to cut the tie between them officially.
"You're such a hypocrite. You carry a mark that you're afraid to commit to yet preach for it," she finishes softly. Regulus gulps again, eyes drifting down to his covered forearm. His pale fingers reach for it, tugging it upwards. Her stomach sickens at the sight of the snake and before it can reach the skull, she closes her eyes. "I…I can't."
Violent nausea raises through her throat, a hand rising to cover her lips as she spins around and marches out of the kitchens. She can't separate it. The mark that tried to kill her. Regulus. They are one and the same.
He chose his path, just like Sirius chose his and she cannot change that for him. It's not her job to. It's not Sirius' job to, but she would struggle to convince him otherwise, if he hasn't given up yet.
Her friendship… Mutuality… Whatever it was, for Regulus dissolves like sugar in hot water. She had found empathy for him, knowing Sirius' tales of his home and how his mother and father behaved, but she heard none of that from Regulus. He takes pride in his family and takes pride in his future. If he's old enough to make the decision to join Voldemort's legions, then he's old enough not to be told around by her on what is wrong and right.
But she wants to. By Merlin's socks, she wants to erase that tattoo and bring him away. Show him a life better than behaving like a perfect son for a corrupted family. Show him what her life has gifted her. Her friends, her home. Sides to them he's probably never seen. But she can't. She can't thrust herself into his life when her own is still filled with her own burdens.
One day, Cressida hopes. One day he will realise his mistakes for himself and she hopes it isn't too late for him to change them.
Wiping her nose with her sleeve, Cressida is almost too busy in her thoughts to notice the two students enter the corridor from the intersection just at the end. But she does and her pace slows, first seeing their green ties, and then their faces. Rosier, and someone that she has never bothered to put a name to. He hadn't caused her many issues before, but in the former's presence, he could be any level of threat.
Her first instinct is to look back over her shoulder, in search of Regulus who might be able to calm the potential situation, but her head barely makes it half-way over her shoulder before she remembers. He wouldn't help her.
Cressida doesn't grab her wand just yet but grazes her fingers over the fabric separating it from her skin. Rosier snarls through a smirk upon seeing her. His friend is a little more hesitant to openly show a threatening stance, but adjusts his shoulders to straighten and stand taller. Cressida's fingers inch into the seam of her pocket.
"Gentlemen!" Cressida barely holds her jump at the voice. The two Slytherins scowl even further, eyes pointed over her shoulder. She is yet to figure out whether his entrance is a safety net or just pure annoyance. Arthur McMullen strides up next to her, hands placed on his hips and a jolly grin on his cheeks. Though out of context one would see nothing amiss with his expression, both Cressida and the Slytherins know he isn't naïve about the situation. "Dinner starts soon. Wouldn't want to delay a feast for any of us, now would we?"
Rosier rolls his eyes, glancing at his companion. Then they march towards Cressida and Arthur. Her muscles tense, her mind preparing a series of spells, but they just walk past. Her shoulders don't drop in relief. "What are you doing?" she demands the Ravenclaw.
He gives her an incredulous expression. "Saving you."
Rolling her eyes, her hand leaves her wand pocket and Cressida starts walking in the direction she intended. "Don't need saving."
"Helping then," he corrects. He picks up his pace to stay in line with her. "I'm just trying to make it up to you."
"You can make it up to me by staying away. Or I'll inform Sirius that you're on my tail again."
That gets his façade to drop. Sirius has always been threatening to him for some reason. "And get him to do your dirty work? Aren't you a Gryffindor?"
Cressida continues walking as he stops in place. "He likes dirty work," she calls over her shoulder. "And I told you, I don't need saving." The rest of the way back to the Tower is uneventful but it gives her time to mull over everything. She's frustrated. Pissed. Upset. Annoyed. "I could use a hug," she mutters under her breathe with a hint of a wheeze, climbing the stairs.
Muttering the password, the Fat Lady swings her portrait open wordlessly, inviting her into the Tower. Her eyes are set on the stairs to the dorm, expecting the boys to be up there, but her assumptions are quickly proven wrong as they are all spread across the main lounge. The only one not sitting is James who looks deep in thought, arms tightly crossed over his stomach as he leans against the nearest wall.
"James?" she calls. Something is bothering him.
His face lifts at his name and the expression doesn't ease. She waits as he kicks off the wall. James licks his dry lips, barely meeting her eyes. her stomach churns harder than it has all day. "Can we talk?"
Three words punch her in the gut. Her lips part, the air itself becoming sickening to breathe. She looks to Sirius first who is looking at James with a frowned expression. Not an upset one, but of cautioned curiosity. Remus wears the same thing and Peter is still looking between them all.
With a croaky voice and a single nod, she whispers, "Sure."