Regulus felt a wave of excitement running down his spine when he left his childhood home to go to the White residence to attend their Christmas lunch as he had promised that he would. For the very first time, he had lied for his mother in order to get away from attending his own family dinner. He had never lied to her before. That was the sort of thing that Sirius would have done in a heartbeat, but never Regulus. He was way too much of a mother's little golden boy for that. But interestingly, he wasn't feeling guilty about lying for Walburga Black as he thought he would be. In fact, it felt liberating as if for the first time he was the man of his own destiny.
With Kreacher's help, he got outside the house without raising any suspicion from the family portraits. After arranging a time and a place for his loyal house elf to collect him, Regulus marched towards the White household holding a flower bouquet that he had conjured. He felt nervous. Never in his life, he thought he would be asking a Muggle man for his blessing to marry his daughter. He had no idea how muggles proceed in this kind of thing, but he hoped that it wouldn't be too different from what would happen within the pureblood wizarding society. For the very first time, he wished he had taken Muggle studies as one of his optional lessons at Hogwarts.
Lucky for him, it was Annabelle who answered the doorbell, her sister just a few steps behind her. Regulus greeted her with the usual kiss on her knuckles, she smiled at the gesture but gave him a quick peck on his lips before inviting him in, making him gasp. A public display of affection like that was really rare around wizards and witches from ancient families. Annabelle exchanged a little giggle with her twin sister while he entered their house.
"Regulus, I don't think you have been formally introduced to my sister Helen…"
Helen and Annabelle were physically identical, so much that Regulus thought that he could have trouble to distinguish them apart if they did not dress and behave so differently. Regulus greeted Helen with the same hand-kissing greeting that he had done with Anna, but Helen just looked oddly at him.
"Do you always behave and dress-up like you just arrived from the beginning of the nineteenth century?" Helen blunted.
"Helen, please, be nice!" Annabelle begged her sister.
"Well, he needs to get used to me if he is seriously considering joining our family…"
Annabelle rolled her eyes while Regulus observed both sisters interaction with amusement. The rest of the introductions also ran very smoothly. Regulus was surprised to learn that Annabel's father was an elected member of the Parliament whereas her mother was in academia studying political sciences. Regulus actually struggled when they had asked him about his own political viewings, as he honestly knew nothing about Muggle politics. When they asked what was he hoping to do when he finished his studies, it was Annabelle who saved his skin by answering this question for him.
"Regulus is a magician. The best I ever seem…" she said with pride.
This leads the family to ask him to perform some magic tricks, which he tried to avoid doing, as he really didn't want to call attention about magic been used in a muggle area so near his own house. But the twins and their brother were so insistent that he ended up attending their request and made a few birds appear from thin air to the amusement of the spectators.
By the time they were finishing desserts, Regulus had finally asked the question to Annabelle's father, informing his intentions of marrying his daughter. Everybody from the family was very surprised by the question apart from her twin Sister, who looked like she had already been told about the news. Their father, however, was a little bit wary of this sudden request of a young man that they barely knew - but who wanted to marry his young daughter with such haste.
"Regulus received a job proposal from abroad... and I… I want to go with him" she informed her family, as to explain why they wanted to take this step further so quickly.
Even though Annabelle's parents did not seem pleased with that idea, Regulus could notice that they were trying their best to not look like they were fully against it. They emphasised their need of getting to know Regulus better before they gave their blessing to the young couple. Annabelle's mother suggested that maybe they could invite his family over for dinner someday. Regulus had to contain his own urge to laugh after the mention of such idea. He knew that the possibility of having Voldemort doing charity work to poor muggle children was likely to be much higher than seeing Orion and Walburga Black entering that house to discuss a possible wedding between their pureblood son and a muggle girl. But instead of saying that to the couple, Regulus politely nodded and told them that he was going to discuss possible dates with his parents, in such a refined way that only a true Slytherin would be able to do.
After dinner, the girls insisted that he played some muggle board games with the rest of their family. Before the day was over, Regulus concluded that Christmas with the White's was a very different affair than Christmas he had spent with the Blacks. And these differences were not only due to the obvious lack of magic at the White household. The White's Christmas was informal, intimate and cosy, whereas the Black Christmas was always a social event where everyone was scrutinizing and judging everyone. He decided that he prefered the White Christmas overall.
When it was time for Regulus to leave the White house, Annabelle took him to the front door and whispered on his ear before he left inviting him to come back to her bedroom that evening. Regulus smirked and gave her a wink while he kissed her knuckles before he left her.
Regulus had slept outside their home. Again. And again. And again. And Walburga Black was feeling betrayed. She could tell that her son was up to something, something that he was desperately trying to hide from her. He wasn't spending any night at home since that attack on Christmas Eve. Walburga's curiosity took over her, and during one of these nights Regulus was not in the house, she made her way to his bedroom to see if she could find any clue of his whereabouts. Break in her son's bedroom wasn't hard, and after scanning the room like a niffler who was trying to find a buried treasure, she finally found the answers she was looking for. A stack of letters. Letters which were written in muggle lined paper. Needless to say that Walburga did not rest until she read every single letter sent by that muggle girl. Also, needless to say, Walburga did not manage to rest after that.
She remained patiently waiting, seating at the green velvet armchair that was permanently placed in Regulus room, crushing the letters with her boney hands. Sooner or later Regulus would have to come back. And when he did, she would confront him about what was the meaning of this.
Walburga's waiting was long, but not in vain. Just before dawn, she saw her youngest son sneaking back to his bedroom through the window. As if he was a thief, Regulus opened his room windows' with a simple alohomora charm and dismounted his racing broom as he squeezed himself on the small gap that separated his bedroom from the outside world. Walburga didn't lose any second, and before he noticed her presence, she cast an immobulus spell on him to prevent him from escape from the scolding that she had been ruminating on her head on the past eight hours. Regulus who was caught completely off-guard ended up falling on the carpet floor, his face centimetres away from having hit the bed corner.
"HOW DARE YOU! HOW DARE YOU, REGULUS! AFTER EVERYTHING WE HAVE DONE FOR YOU!" Walburga shouted before she threw some severing and burning curses on her youngest son. She didn't want to cause any permanent damage, but her intent was clearly to hurt him. Making Regulus bleed and squint in agony had certainly somehow seemed to calm down her nerves.
"As if it wasn't enough seeing your brother…" she stopped middle sentence and took a deep breath before continuing. "now you want to follow his footsteps and become a blood traitor as well?"
Regulus was unable to move or give her any form of answer. But Walburga did not seem to mind. She turned his body to face her with her feet before she carried on her scolding.
"Courting a Muggle, Regulus! A WORTHLESS MUGGLE! HOW DARE YOU?" She said before she threw the crumpled letters on his face. Only then, she decided to lift the spell that kept him immobilized.
Regulus slowly stood up, and quickly got hold of his wand to cast some healing spells on himself before he decided to answer her.
"Mother… I'm sorry…" he said feeling suddenly very small "I did not choose to fall in love with her… it just happened…"
"FALL IN LOVE? Are you out of your mind Regulus!?" Walburga was completely lost in her own rage. She couldn't handle to lose her second son as well.
"Mother, please… the White's are nothing like the other Muggles… I'm sure that when you meet Anna and her family you will understand…" Regulus tried to defend his choices, but Walburga would never let him finished his sentence.
"THAT IS NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN REGULUS! WAKE UP, YOU ARE A DEATH EATER… What do you think is going to happen when the others find out about how you plan to contaminate our pure bloodline with your stupid teenager adventure?"
"Mother… I'm going to strike a deal with the Dark Lord. If he gives us his blessing, nobody will be able to be against us…"
"You are out of your mind! My son has been bewitched by a blood muggle!" She said with rage. "I strictly forbid you to carry on seeing that woman!"
"Mother, I'm sorry but I cannot comply with your request…"
"I forbid you to carry on seeing her! You are grounded! You are not to lay a feet outside this house!"
"Mother, you can't do this! I'm seventeen. I'm no longer underage…"
"Yes, you are. But while you still live under my roof you will do exactly as I say!"
"So be it." He said serious, and for a moment Walburga's body relaxed as she felt like she had won the battle.
However, Regulus pointed his wand to his new school truck, making all his most important belongs to flew from all the corners of the room, making his luggage to pack itself with haste, as if he was ready to fly off to Hogwarts that very same moment.
"Regulus, what do you think you are doing!?" she answered with horror on her voice from the first time since they started the argument.
"It is not obvious, mother? I'm moving out!" Regulus said with one hand holding his suitcase and the other carrying his racing broom.
"No, you can't! I forbid you!" Walburga looked almost panicked with the possibility of having her younger son leaving her house.
"Yes, I can! I'm doing it." and he left through the same place he had entered - his room window.
"You have nowhere to go!" she pleaded.
"We shall see about that..."
"If you leave us now, I will disown you!" she warned as she gave him a severe stern.
"No you won't," Regulus said with all the confidence he could muster "I'm sure you don't want to disown the last two male heirs of the Black bloodline, am I right?"
Walburga did not say anything against his argument, instead, she remained standing there, looking at her son leaving his childhood home without her blessing. She observed him flying way until he was completely out of her sight. She then summoned Kreacher.
"Follow him. Make sure he is cared for. Make sure he is safe."
The house-elf gave her an exaggerated courtesy before he disappeared with a loud pop to do her bidding.
Not even half an hour had passed since Walburga saw Regulus leaving her house, and she was already on her way to the White's residence in order to do something that she never believed that she was going to need to do. However, desperate times, required desperate measures. And Walburga was determined to make that Muggle woman to leave her son - in one way or another. Finding her house with a tracking spell was easy. Breaking in her room, was even easier. Apparently, her youngest son did not care enough for the girl for setting traps or to give her house any sort of protection or seclusion. "Better this way", Walburga murmured to herself while she observed the teenager woman that was still deeply sleeping on her bed. Walburga couldn't help but wonder what forces had driven Regulus to her in the first place, as on her eyes, the young woman was nothing but ordinary plain.
Walburga remained there observing the muggle while trying to decide which spell or curse should she use on her. Obliviate sounded like an obvious candidate, but there were others that could do even better work on keeping her away from her precious Regulus. It was then that Annabelle moved her body in a way that made her hand be visible to Walburga, who quickly noticed the engagement jewellery from the family vaults that the muggle was clearly wearing.
"Regulus, you crossed all lines this time!" Walburga whispered with a mist of disappointment and frustration with the choices of her youngest.
Instead of cursing the woman, she performed some spells that allowed her to learn things that she would have rather remained ignorant about it. So that was it. Regulus had chosen to contaminate the pure Black lineage by breeding with a worthless muggle. Well, she decided that she would not kill the girl… at least not yet. And certainly not with her own hands. Nonetheless, she would have to rush to the Lestrange Manor. Informing her dear niece Bellatrix about the existence of an unborn bundle of joy that was risking to stain their family tapestry, seemed to be the most plausible course of action. At least for the time being.
It was New Year's Eve, and as it was the tradition, another banquet had been served to honour the Dark Lord that evening. Regulus decided that it would be more than imprudent to miss another important gathering from the inner circle, especially when he felt like he needed more than ever to get on the Dark Lord graces. He had left his childhood home earlier that day and decided to rent a room at the Leaky Cauldron as temporary lodging for him to stay. At least until it was time for him to return to Hogwarts and finish his studies.
However, now that his mother knew about Annabelle he was starting to grow worried about if leaving the girl vulnerable and near his mother would be a wise course of action. She certainly had sent Kreacher to keep one eye on him, as he had spotted the house-elf unpacking his belongs on his new room when he went to use the restroom. Regulus took that as a sign that she did not disown him as she had done with Sirius, as he had predicted.
Regulus smirked before he requested the house-elf to fix him some breakfast, more to inform the old fellow that Regulus was aware of his presence. He then looked at his window where he could see the Muggle London that he knew so little about. He started to wonder if it would be wise to ask someone's help to protect his muggle fiance. The name of his brother Sirius crossed his mind, but he ended up deciding against it. He knew that his brother was very involved with Dumbledore's Order to make it safe enough for Regulus to approach him. Then he thought about each one of his school friends, trying to figure out if there was someone he could safely ask for help on this matter. Regulus ended up concluding that there was nobody that he could trust enough to protect Annabelle from the wrath of his mother. He would have to do this all by himself.
"...if you are here, having the honour of dining with me tonight, it is because I consider you to be one of my most loyal soldiers," the Dark Lord said in the middle of his speech he was giving to the Death Eaters that were dining at Malfoy Manor with him that evening.
Bellatrix was sitting on his right - an honoured place. Lucio Malfoy, his host was sitting on his left. Cousin Bellatrix smiled at him, and Regulus thought that his mother had decided to keep it secret the fact that he had left home. Regulus hide his relief and smiled back to her.
"I need your help once again to request your help, my loyal followers. I need you to perform other attacks to drag the Ministry attention to way from me tonight, as I will be evoking some very powerful ancient magic that is going to help us immensely with our cause."
Regulus face remained expressionless, but his heart sank with the perspective of having to lead another attack. He did not want to murder more and more muggles. He was sick and tired of doing that. He was very glad that Severus had been kind enough to teach him some Occlumency, otherwise, he was sure that Voldemort or some of his followers would have picked his displacement with this idea. He masked his feelings and gave a small smirk to act as the others expected him to do - however, he was certain that some of the Death Eaters were genuinely happy with the perspective of spent the rest of New Years Eve torturing and killing muggles. His cousin among the ones he was certainly was feeling ecstatic with the perspective of torturing and killing muggles.
"Brothers and Sisters, let's feast before the slaughter," the Dark Lord said before he waved his wine giving a toast to his followers, who copied their master. Regulus did this best to hide his disgust with the entire situation - would he ever be able to free himself from that cursed Death Eater's life?
When the Dark Lord finished his meal and stood up, all the others stood up in a sign of respect and left the dining table. It turned out that the Dark Lord had already allocated three different group leaders for that evening's attack. Regulus wasn't surprised to see that his cousin Bellatrix would be leading one of them - the smallest of the groups. Regulus was walking his way to join Lucius Malfoy who was going to be leading the larger group when a cold hand grabbed his shoulders. Regulus was stunned to see that it had been the Dark Lord who was holding him back from the others.
"Not you, Regulus. I have a special task for you if you please…" Voldemort pointed to Lucius Malfoy's office, clearly ordering Regulus to join him there.
"Of course my Lord," Regulus answered politely, but his blood went icy-cold with fear. Did him already know about his relationship with Annabelle? Did his mother tell him? She wouldn't dare to risk his life like this... would she?
Voldemort led the way as if he was the owner of Malfoy's manor. He poured himself and Regulus a drink before he pointed to some of the couch chairs, silencing ordering Regulus to seat on it.
"Regulus Black, the last heir from the most noble and ancient house of Black. You are going to help me to make history tonight. But first… you need to prove your worth..."
"Anything you want my Lord…" Regulus said, but he tried to avoid looking at his bloody-red-eyes, as he wasn't really trusting his Occlumency skills not to betray him at that moment. Instead, he decided to bend down on his knees and kiss the Dark Lord's green robes.
"That is actually not much that I require… you won't need you to lift a finger. I just need you to lend me your house elf for the evening. I've heard you have a loyal house-elf, I am right?"
"Yes My Lord! Kreacher is one of the best house-elf's a wizard could dream to have…"
"Very well. Summon him!" he ordered.
"Now…?" Regulus eyes were wide open as he was caught by surprise with that strange sudden request.
"You should have learned by now that I don't really like to repeat myself…" Voldemort said starting to get a little bit impatient with the younger wizard. Regulus felt like he didn't need another hint, so he summoned Kreacher immediately.
"Kreacher! Kreacher! Come here, now!" Regulus ordered, and as soon he stopped to speak, Kreacher apparated with a loud pop inside Malfoy's office.
"Master Regulus," Kreacher said with an exaggerated reverence. "My Lord," the house-elf said with giving an equally exaggerated reverence for the Dark Lord.
"Kreacher, I want you to obey the Dark Lord and do everything he needs you to do. Return to me once you are done with his assignments."
"Kreacher is extremely honoured to serve Master Regulus's Masters. Kreacher is going to do anything on his power to help you, my Lord!" Kreacher said bowing once more to the Dark Lord.
"Indeed a very fine elf, which knows its place, Regulus" Lord Voldemort gave Regulus such an evil smirk that made him chill. Regulus didn't dare to demonstrate it or say anything, but the fact that Voldemort had called Kreacher 'it', instead of 'him', had really bothered him.
"Is that it, my Lord? Is there anything else that I could do to assist you tonight?" Regulus asked really hoping that Voldemort did not ask for him to join the others in the massacre.
"Yes, Regulus. I want you to clean the mess left by my Death Eaters at the feast." Voldemort said casually as he adjusted his cloak getting ready to leave him.
"But my Lord, this is a house-elf's job!" Regulus saw the words leaving his mount before he had the sense to keep them to himself.
"Exactly. Well, your house-elf is doing a Death Eater's job, so nothing more fair, right?" Voldemort said giving him an evil grin. "Don't be upset Regulus, I know that you don't enjoy some… types of dark magic… and I understand that. After all, how would we recognise the stronger if it wasn't for the weaker? It is not everyone who like me, have not only the brains but also the strength to do what it takes to become indestructible"
Regulus's blood froze when he heard that piece of information. Did the Dark Lord know about his unpleasant with killing muggles? Did he think that Regulus was weak?
"Yes, Regulus, I know that you don't enjoy killing or torturing Muggles like some of my followers…" Voldemort said casually grabbing Kreacher by his neck in such a way that Regulus was certain that would have hurt the poor elf. "but I also know that despite everything else, I feel that you are still loyal to our cause. Don't worry child, I still have great plans for you. After you are done with the cleaning, you can go and enjoy the night as you see fit. It is New Year's Eve after all…"
"Thank you, my Lord! You are very merciful," Regulus said before he gave him a bow leaving the Dark Lord alone with Kreacher.
He felt a pang on his chest as he realised he had just been humiliated by the Dark Lord. There was no way he would manage to get on the man's good books after the words they had exchanged. Even though Regulus was certain that his Oclumency shields were right in place, he knew that somehow the Dark Lord had learned somethings about his persona - things that he would have preferred to remain unknown.
"I'm sorry for having you on this position, cousin, but the Dark Lord told me clearly that you weren't to have any aid from me or any house-elf…" Narcissa Black - Malfoy, Regulus had yet to get used to her married name - told him just after she informed him where the cleaning supplies of the manor were located.
"Did him tell you something about not using magic?" Regulus asked hopefully.
"No, he didn't mention anything regarding that…"
"In that case…" Regulus said taking his wand out from the pocket on his robes "I'm glad that mother made me learn a lot of cleaning spells..." he said giving Narcissa a playful smile.
"You are so much like Sirius… you like to play with fire. Careful, you might end up getting burned" she said to him, but her eyes were smiling, not condemning his behaviour. Regulus smiled back, and then he focused on doing the task requested by the Dark Lord. If he was quick enough. He was likely to still make it to the White's New Year's Eve party after all.