Falling

by trynathink

It had been seven years. Of course they had a little of the other in them. Of course it hurt when the other wasn't there anymore. The separation could have been a day, an hour, a minute, and Grace was sure it would have hurt the same—a cleaver sailing straight through her soul, severing it into two. (Everyone Lives AU; sequel to 'Flying')

17. Rot

Rot

Regulus is given a request he cannot refuse.

---

Today was a particularly nice day. The spring air was crisp and refreshing. There was a slight overcast, so the sunlight that spilled was not bright enough to hurt the eyes but still warm enough that the students milling about the courtyard and fields could bask under it. These were good Quidditch conditions, and if the sport had not been cancelled for the rest of the term, Regulus suspected Hooch might have set up a match for today. But, as it happened, there were no inter-House sports taking place at the moment, at least none that were officiated by Hogwarts. There were plenty of friendly games students played against one another on their own time. Renard had taken to booking the pitch every Saturday morning for the Slytherin Quidditch team. (Technically, the invitation was open to all Slytherins, but anyone who knew Renard knew without a shadow of a doubt that they wouldn't be invited to join any games the team played amongst themselves.) Most of the team arrived somewhat regularly, so long as there wasn't any homework or other extracurriculars stopping them. Regulus probably would have joined out of pure entertainment himself, if he was given the choice. But he wasn't given a choice. He was told to learn about Snyde's plans for Crouch Jr. by any means possible so that Dumbledore and Vance could begin to set up countermeasures to protect the Crouch family. This, of course, meant attending the friendly, no-stakes Saturday matches not out of leisure but out of duty.

Some of the team players had arrived already and were rummaging through the changing rooms. Renard was overturning Selwyn's pile of old unwashed uniforms, convinced that the Beater had swapped their gloves. Snyde seemed more withdrawn than usual, electing to skirt straight past the others and into the back room to change into something breezier. He didn't even laugh when Renard, with growing horror, found his gloves tangled in Snyde's underpants.

While Renard began to douse his gloves with water, Regulus slung his broomstick over his shoulder and followed Snyde outside, towards the field. "Hullo—haven't seen much of you lately."

This was true. Snyde had been eating at the Slytherin table less and less. The few times Regulus thought to look for the younger Slytherin, he found him sulking amongst the Ravenclaws, presumably to find and sit beside Crouch Jr.

"Oh," Snyde said with a hint of surprise. His eyes glanced over to Regulus and then returned to the loose soil of the pitch. "Yeah, I've been a bit busy lately."

"I see," he nodded. "Studying for N.E.W.T.s, is it?"

Snyde shot him a supremely baffled look. Regulus gave him one of feigned confusion. It was easy, almost, to make Yaxley, Snyde, and Gibbon talk and talk and talk about what was bothering them. All Regulus had to do was appear so simple and ignorant that they eventually snapped out of frustration and simply let it all out. (With Rosier, it was different, since he was simple and ignorant himself. Too trusting, Grace had said last night. Regulus could usually ask him directly what he was up to.)

"No, of course it's not bloody exams I'm worried about," Snyde hissed. "Do you honestly think exams matter right now? In a year, Hogwarts is going to be shut down. The Ministry, too, probably. Do you think my grades will matter then?"

"Maybe," Regulus said blithely. "There must be some way to continue measuring merit, even after Hogwarts and the Ministry fall."

Snyde rolled his eyes. "Merlin, Black, you're the biggest bore I've ever met. I suppose you're more concerned about your homework assignments than carrying out the Dark Lord's bidding."

"I generally find homework to be more difficult than his bidding."

"Well, of course you would. He hasn't asked you to do anything difficult, has he?" Snyde shot him a deeply jealous look. "Your cousin's his best lieutenant, after all."

Regulus chose to remain silent. He was very close now. They carried on across the field. Snyde stamped his way forward, digging his feet into the earth. Regulus followed softly. Above them, Pucey was rounding through the hoops.

Snyde stopped suddenly and looked to Regulus. "You… You don't happen to have a way to talk to Lestrange, do you?"

Regulus cocked his head slightly. "Talk to him? I thought you had your two-way mirror—"

"No, no, I mean… Convince him." He was gnawing at his lower lip. "It's just that he's been harsh lately about my progress with Barty, Crouch's son, and I don't know how to get him to ease up. I thought maybe… Since your cousin's married into the family, maybe…"

Regulus felt no sympathy for Snyde. It was becoming increasingly apparent that Snyde was the sort of person who preferred the easy way: shortcuts, cheating, anything that reduced the need for hard work. He had wanted to threaten Gryffindor's replacement Keeper into throwing the Quidditch match back in January. He had been the first to Apparate out of Hogsmeade when the Aurors began to converge. Snyde was greedy for some semblance of glory or prestige, but he didn't want to earn it. More than indifferent, Regulus felt bitter. Snyde had wanted this. He had not been forced. He had wanted to join You-Know-Who, wanted to sit at that long table with the others, wanted to sneak his way into power even though he did not deserve it.

"Bellatrix is not easy to convince either," Regulus said slowly.

Snyde's shoulders fell. "Yeah, I figured as much…"

"What exactly is Lestrange asking you to accomplish? Is it really unachievable?"

Snyde seemed willing to spill everything, but he was having a hard time figuring out what to say. Regulus was, truthfully, losing patience, but he kept his face smooth and benign. He had gotten rather good at this. Pretending. He wondered if he ought to thank his family for it, because he had spent many, many dinners with nearly the exact same facial expression: one of practiced calm, a blank indifference. He had never liked to lie. (It was scary to lie back then, because Sirius had been caught in so many. And every time he had been found out, he had been hurt.) But after Sirius left, all of Mother and Father's attention had been redirected to Regulus, and he found the only way to meet their expectations was to simply pretend. So, he did. He pretended to enjoy his family's company and the stifling social balls and the attacks on Muggle. (Sirius liked to pretend as well. He liked to pretend he had it all figured out the moment he was born, but the truth was he, like most pure-blood children, used to think Mudblood was a perfectly good word to use in place of Muggle-born until Andromeda told him differently.)

"I dunno…" Snyde said at last. "The problem I'm having is getting Barty to engage in what it is we do—or, well, what the older Death Eaters do. Torture Muggles or some bollocks. I just don't know how to tell it to him without frightening him."

A brief surprise flashed over Regulus. "I thought you were just convincing him to make his father…more vulnerable."

Snyde exhaled in frustration. "Yeah, that was the plan. But then Lestrange mentioned something about how, even if we did get Barty to kill his dad, it'd just turn him into a sort of martyr figure, you know? People might sympathize and rally together. So, it might be better to get Barty to do all sorts of awful things to other people and get him caught. And since his dad's in charge of the trials, he'd have to put his own son on trial. It'd be a scandal. He'd lose all credibility and probably get sacked. People wouldn't have faith in the department anymore."

Regulus hadn't been expecting this at all. If Lestrange's plan succeeded, he doubted Dumbledore or Vance could do much to prevent doubt and upset from gripping the Wizengamot.

"Oh," Regulus said succinctly.

Snyde nodded morosely. "Yeah, so…" He glanced up at Regulus again and squinted. "You really can't get your cousin to talk down Lestrange…?"

"I can try," he said, although he fully didn't intend to contact Bellatrix in any way, shape, or form.

Snyde gave him a small, relieved smile and turned away to clamber atop his broomstick. He raced off into the sky, spiraling ever higher, as if trying to get away from all his worries. Regulus let out a quiet sigh and threw his leg over his own broom, rising from the ground as well. Renko and both Beaters had not shown up today, so there were only four of them. It wasn't enough for a proper game, so Renard tossed the Quaffle between Pucey, Snyde, and himself. Regulus found the box of Quidditch apparatus in one of the booths and released the Snitch. He swung through the air, chasing after that blur of gold, feeling as light and unburdened as a feather. The bloodthirsty competition that clouded the school had made him forget how enjoyable flying could be on its own. For the next hour, he reminded himself of this simple pleasure.

The Ravenclaws soon arrived to use the pitch themselves. Regulus dropped to the ground and put away the Snitch and his broomstick before rushing off to catch the tail end of breakfast. He spotted Grace as soon as he entered the Great Hall. She was sitting at the end of the Slytherin table, along with the other seventh-years, shoveling a large mouthful of toast into her mouth in an attempt not to involve herself in the heated discussion Myrcella, Yang, and Fuentes were having. She caught Regulus's eye as he approached the table and gave him a small smile. He returned it readily.

"Black!" Rosier cheered, pulling Regulus into an open seat at his side. "Thought you weren't showing to breakfast."

Regulus reached over to grab a bowl of porridge. "I was playing Quidditch with Renard and the others."

"Oh, right," Rosier said. His face fell slightly. Given that he was a phenomenally bad flier (a slight in it of itself to Renard), he had been personally disinvited from attending any of the friendly matches. "Well, an owl's shown for you."

He pointed to a speckled eagle owl sitting primly beside a fruit bowl. It was Rigel, the family owl. Regulus just barely bit back a sigh. He beckoned Rigel forward and untied the letter from his leg. He must have tugged a little too harshly, because Rigel gave a deep hoot, his eyes narrowing into a sort of indignant glare.

"Sorry," Regulus said, turning the letter over in his hands. It was stamped with the Black family crest, so it was almost certainly from his mother. She was likely asking whether or not he'd be returning to Grimmauld Place for the upcoming holiday.

He folded up the letter and tucked it into his pocket, deciding to reply later. He might not be able to go home at all, given how time-consuming his espionage had been lately.

"You can go back," he told Rigel. "I'll send a reply later."

Rigel's glare didn't lift in the slightest, but the large owl gave another hoot and flapped away.

"Family business, is it?" Rosier asked as he watched Rigel take off.

"Yeah."

Rosier nodded in understanding. "It's certainly frustrating. I must have gotten six letters this week alone from my mother asking if I'll be helping with preparations for Samhain next year." He let out a small noise of exasperation. "It's constant event after event. The sheer stress of it all… It sort of makes me understand why some people leave the family, you know?"

Regulus's spoon froze over his porridge. "Yeah, I suppose," he forced out.

Rosier suddenly gave him a strange, sympathetic look. "Do you ever think about him? Your brother?"

"No," Regulus lied.

Rosier drummed his fingers against the table thoughtfully. "He's certainly a disgrace, but there's something to be said about his dedication. We've all thought about running away, at some point or the other. No one ever actually follows through on it, of course."

Regulus didn't say anything else, and the conversation quickly wilted and died. Rosier turned to ask Selwyn about some upcoming function, leaving Regulus to finish his scant breakfast in peace.

He stared emptily at his bowl. We've all thought about running away. It was true, in a way. Pure-blood children grew up so stifled, so suffocated. They were bound to pull a strop, usually when they were young, threatening in dramatic fashion that they would leave. Regulus had never thrown a tantrum, of course, but he'd certainly thought about leaving. He thought about it after Sirius had gone. He thought about it the entire summer. (The heat dragging over him. The emptiness of the room beside his growing ever larger. He didn't dare go inside and see what Sirius might have left behind. He already knew what Sirius left behind.) Nearly every day was spent holed up in his room, wondering if he ought to go, too, if he ought to follow. But how could he? He'd spent too much time in Grimmauld Place, given so much. How could he leave it all behind? And as the years went on, he simply found himself more and more stuck. He made Prefect for his parents. He got all Os on his O.W.L.s for his parents. He became a Death Eater for his parents. After all that, could he really just run away? He didn't know if he had the conviction to do that. He'd rather convince them. He'd rather fix his family, somehow, some way. That was all he needed to do. Fix them.

(Regulus was sometimes too good at pretending. He read so much when he was a child, because he liked to pretend he was in the stories instead of his house. He liked to pretend his mother only screamed because her heart was too big, brimming with passion. He liked to pretend his father only stayed away because he was off protecting them from the world. He liked to pretend his family was not bad, just broken. He liked to pretend and pretend and pretend.)

Breakfast was coming to an end. Swathes of students rose to meander back to their common room or the courtyard. Regulus pushed aside his unfinished porridge and left the Slytherin table without so much as a goodbye to Rosier or the others. He quickly stuck himself to Grace's side, who was looking similarly put-out.

"Today's subject of discussion," she told him under her breath, "was about pro-Muggle sentiment taking over the Wizengamot in the early part of the century and how awful and sorry Myrcella felt that my family had ever been a part of that."

Regulus grimaced. "Why do they only talk about politics?"

"I don't know. I think Myrcella has some hidden desire to become Minister for Magic or something." Grace rolled her eyes. "Next week, she'll probably go over how terrible it is that the Wizengamot has members who aren't even a part of the Sacred Twenty-Eight."

And her brother would probably prattle nonsense about how overwhelmed he felt with all the invites to pure-blood balls. Regulus balked at the thought of putting up with him again. They were doing good work, he supposed, collecting scraps from information as they fell from the conversation. It was just exhausting to have to listen to such idiocy without rest or respite.

"Do you want to have our own breakfast next week?" Regulus suggested.

Grace beamed at him. "Oh, absolutely!"

---

"Absolutely not."

"I promise it tastes good!"

"It doesn't go with plums," Regulus said with a touch of exasperation.

"But it does," Grace argued back. She took a knife and spread some more clotted cream across the bite she had taken out of her plum. "It's just fruit and cream. It tastes perfectly fine."

"Clotted cream is meant for scones—"

"It's meant for plums, too, I think."

"No, it isn't! It'll taste weird together."

"How do you know that? You've never tried it."

Grace offered her plum-and-cream monstrosity. Regulus stared at it warily. He'd come to the kitchens with Grace to have a peaceful breakfast—one without Rosier's babbling and Yaxley's snide comments—and now this was happening. The fact that Grace was spreading clotted cream on her plum was a secondary issue, honestly. He was more concerned that she was using the same spreading knife for the tureens of clotted cream, peanut butter, and melted chocolate Pokey had brought out.

"I don't need to try it," Regulus sniffed, batting away Grace's ruined plum. He took a bite of his own pain au chocolat. "I just know."

Grace let out a long, defeated sigh. She dropped her knife onto her empty plate and finished off her plum within seconds. She rested her chin on her hand and watched Regulus daintily eat his dessert.

"There aren't rules for eating, you know," she said.

"There are," he said indignantly. "There almost certainly are. There are rules for how you eat and when you eat and what you eat. The what you eat—" he gave a pointed look at the clotted cream, "—is especially important. Everyone would get sick if there weren't rules about what you were supposed to eat."

"And everyone would get sick of eating the same old boring thing, too. I doubt we'd have half the types of dishes we do if someone hadn't decided to pair two things that people thought didn't go together but actually did."

It was a fair point, but Regulus's dislike for plums ran deep. They were far too messy for his liking. "But we're not talking about food in general, we're talking specifically about plums and clotted cream."

"And they taste good!" Grace said immediately.

Regulus bit back a groan. "It's not just the taste. They don't go together. Plums and clotted cream are meant for two entirely different situations." He polished off his pain au chocolat. "Clotted cream is a staple at tea, for scones and other pastries. And plums are…" He wrinkled his nose. "I don't really know what plums are for. They're barely a snack. It's just a messy, inconvenient fruit that—"

He was interrupted by a loud crash. He looked up, startled, and found that Grace had fallen off her stool, knocking it down with her in the process.

"Merlin—!" Regulus cried out. Was his stance on plums that controversial? He scrambled down beside her. "Are you all right?"

A few of the nearby house-elves scurried over to help. Pokey fluttered over Grace with worry, her large ears pressed flat against her head.

"Miss Grace is hurt?" she asked.

Grace didn't respond. Regulus tried to help her up but found that she was limp against him. Terror cracked through him. He settled back on the floor and simply held her against him, studying her. She didn't seem to have hurt herself in the fall. Her head wasn't bruised or bleeding. But she also didn't seem well—or, rather, she didn't seem to be herself. He realized, quickly, that she hadn't gone unconscious at all. She was looking around the room. She could see. But she wasn't focusing on anything that was actually there. She was staring dead ahead, at a blank wall, and with every passing second, her expression grew more and more confused, as though there were something particularly puzzling hidden in the brick and mortar.

"Grace?" Regulus tried again. "Can you hear me?"

Her shoulders were tense. She continued to stare unblinkingly at the wall.

Pokey was growing steadily more concerned. She snapped her fingers and healed a scrape along the hilt of Grace's hand that Regulus had missed.

"Pokey will fetch a professor—" she began.

"No, that's all right," Regulus said, rising. He leaned Grace against him, supporting her weight. "I'll take her to the Hospital Wing."

"Pokey will come, too!" was the instant reply.

"Okay," Regulus agreed blindly, already moving forward.

It was easy to move her. Grace didn't protest being half-carried across the kitchen, although she didn't seem to be aware she was moving, either. She simply continued to watch quietly, surveilling that far wall with mounting bafflement. Regulus felt similarly baffled. His worry was reaching an all-time high. This, as far as he could tell, wasn't a paroxysm. Grace wasn't seizing. She hadn't collapsed. She was completely alert, although not in a way that made sense to Regulus—and it was beginning to frighten him. He ached for sense, for understanding, for things to simply fall into place. He didn't know what was happening to Grace right now, and that was enough for his heart to sting and ache viciously. He didn't know, and it was shameful not to know. He wished he were more useful.

He scarcely made it to the entrance when Grace began to stir. He came to an immediate halt, fixing his attention back on her. She was coming back into herself. One of her hands rose to rub at her eyes.

"Grace?" Regulus tried again. His heart was caught in his throat. He didn't know what he'd do if she didn't respond, if she was stuck like this, here but not, here but far, far away. "Are you—can you hear me?"

She looked up at him. Her other hand reached out towards him and then stopped. She hesitated. "Yeah, I can… Are you there?"

"Yes," he said immediately. "Yes, I'm here, Grace." He pulled her in closer for a fierce hug, squeezing her tight. "I'm here."

She drew away quickly, but only because Pokey was tugging at the end of her robes.

"Miss Grace is feeling better?" Pokey asked hopefully.

"Yes, I am. Sorry for the fright, Pokey."

Pokey smiled with relief. "Miss Grace is wanting anything?"

"No, that's okay—"

"Apple pie?"

Grace paused. "Well, if you don't mind—"

"Pokey will make apple pie!" she announced, and immediately zipped off to the appropriate station to do so.

Regulus guided Grace back to their little sitting area in the kitchens. She clambered onto Regulus's stool while Regulus gathered hers from the floor. He gave it a small, distrustful shake before setting it down, feeling somewhat angry at it for having fallen while Grace was sitting on it.

"Are you all right?" he asked, drawing his seat closer to hers.

"Yeah," she said. "I'm fine. It was just…strange is all."

"What was?"

She hesitated again. "I don't know." She drew away from him. "It was… I thought it was going to be a paroxysm. It felt like it might be one. My head hurt a bit—but then it went away. I just… I just blinked, and everything changed. I wasn't here anymore. Or, I guess I was here, but my mind wasn't? I dunno. It was strange." She paused, and then added, almost for Regulus's sake: "I knew it wasn't real, though. It felt real, but I knew it couldn't be."

Regulus's throat was tight. "Do you think… Is that what Vablatsky meant in her journal? She didn't know exactly what might happen if you ever opened your Inner Eye, but she guessed you might be overcome by visions."

"I don't know," she said again, frowning. "I mean… It was a vision. I think. It just didn't feel like a normal vision. It was like I was there. I don't know if all visions are like that. This was almost like when I had that prophecy, except I could pull myself out of it."

He let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding in. "You pulled yourself out," he said, almost in relief.

"I think so." Her brows were furrowed. She was still confused. "I don't know. I don't really understand what happened. I'm not even sure what I Saw. It was James, I think, but he was little. I don't…"

"It doesn't matter," Regulus said immediately. "You don't have to force yourself to remember or understand it. We were getting along perfectly well without knowing what's to come, and we'll continue to go on perfectly well without it."

She gave him a tired smile. "You must be the only person in the world who doesn't want to know the future."

"I don't," Regulus agreed, "not if it hurts you."

"It doesn't hurt," she began defensively. "It was just…"

She trailed off, lacking the proper word to fit in. Luckily, Regulus knew plenty of words.

"Bad," he said. Awful, terrible, frightening, horrifying…

Uneasiness fell over her. "Yeah, I suppose."

"I should have done more research on this," he said apologetically. "I figured since… You seemed fine after you had the prophecy, and nothing happened the first week, so I thought Vablatsky's worries might have been unfounded. I should have realized it wouldn't be immediate. I'll gather some material on this to read. Someone must have come up with something to lessen the negative effects of true Sight. Oh, and I can ask Dumbledore, too, the next time I meet him. Even if he doesn't know anything about this, he must know someone who does."

He finished in one large breath, suddenly feeling much better. He had a plan now. That was good. That was something. But when he looked back at Grace, he found that she wasn't sharing his relief. She seemed small, shrunken into herself. Her eyes were trained stubbornly on the white marble of the countertop. Her face was lined with deep distress. The sight was enough to wrench at Regulus's heart.

"We'll figure something out," he promised.

She glanced up at him. "All right," she agreed, although she didn't sound very hopeful.

Regulus inched closer and kissed her, soft and willful. He wished he could replace her unhappiness with his own calm. He wished he could draw in her suffering through his teeth, shoulder it instead of her.

"You taste like plum and cream," he mumbled.

She pulled away. Her lips twitched into a small smile. "Does it taste good?"

"Yeah, it tastes good."

---

Ever since the Legilimency incident a month ago, Regulus found it very difficult to look Dumbledore directly in the eye. He much preferred keeping his gaze lowered. There was a small timepiece on Dumbledore's desk that he liked to examine now and again. It was made of a twisting, twinkling silver metal, and instead of numbers circling the edge, there were planets. As the hands of the clock ticked, the planets revolved in place. There was a faint grey mist overtaking Mars in the nine o'clock position, which was currently what time it was.

Dumbledore had been in the middle of scribbling a note when Regulus arrived. He finished speedily and gave the paper to his phoenix, who clasped it by the beak and vanished in a puff of warm air. Dumbledore leaned forward and clasped his hands together.

"And how are you this evening, Regulus?" he asked kindly.

"Well," he responded tonelessly. "And you, sir?"

They began every conversation this way. Not a word was replaced from session to session. Regulus sometimes felt they were reading from a script, not that he disliked the repetition. It was nice not to worry about what might happen next. It was nice to know. (Regulus was, above all else, afraid of the unknown—because it could not be written, could not be seen or heard or observed in any meaningful way.) Dumbledore didn't try to surprise him, not like how Vance would with Grace: quizzing her on past information or dueling her at random. Grace's role was very active in all this (although she would likely say it wasn't active enough) while Regulus's was much more passive; he was meant to sit quietly and simply listen. He was meant to gain and pass on information. He was meant to provide Dumbledore with insight into the politics of pure-blood families, on the loyalties within You-Know-Who's inner circle. It was a role that was well-suited for Regulus. There was nothing daring about it. At least, that was how he saw it.

"I'm feeling rather bloated from all that pudding at dinner," Dumbledore remarked. "But, on the whole, I'm rather well, too."

"The pudding was nice," Regulus said politely.

Dumbledore hummed in agreement. "Well, what have you learned this past week?"

Regulus glanced down, to where his notebook was flat across his lap. Tonight's page was lacking. The Death Eaters in Hogwarts had not been particularly forthcoming this week, or perhaps there had simply not been much activity for them to talk about.

"There's not much I've found out this week," he began. "But I did learn about Crouch. Snyde, if you remember, is supposed to turn his son against the family, but they've decided not to have him attack his father—or lure his father to someone who could."

Dumbledore seemed faintly perturbed by this. "Unusually wise of them."

"Yes, their new plan is much more…subtle. Snyde is supposed to convince Crouch's son to go out and join the others in torturing and killing Muggles. I suppose they might make it obvious that it's him so that he gets caught. They're hoping the resulting scandal will destroy Crouch."

"I see," Dumbledore said quietly. "Though Crouch's methods are draconic, I would rather he remain. Should he leave, I believe it will be very easy for Voldemort to slip one of his underlings into the position. The problem now, of course, is that it is not a murder we are trying to stop but a scandal. I daresay it might be nearly impossible."

"I thought the same," he admitted. "You can't arrest his son on the mere suspicion he's about to commit a crime; it won't hold up in a court his father's in charge of. But you also can't wait for him to commit a crime, because then You-Know-Who gets exactly what he wants. It's a frustratingly clever move."

Dumbledore appeared to have already realized this. He nodded along absently. "Indeed… It is a small relief that Crouch's son is still enrolled here. He cannot easily leave the castle walls."

"Not easily," Regulus agreed, "but he can still leave."

Dumbledore's gaze flickered up to meet Regulus's. "And where do you think he might go? Suppose he does not return after the upcoming holiday, deciding to devote himself fully to Voldemort's cause. I presume he will not want to return home. Where would he go instead?"

"I suppose Snyde would set him up with the Lestranges, since this was Rabastan's idea and all."

Dumbledore's mouth shrunk into a small, displeased smile. It was not easy to interfere with anything the Lestranges did. They were particularly ruthless; countless Aurors had already failed in trying to reign them in. It wasn't that they were any more careful than the other Death Eaters. In fact, it was the exact opposite. They didn't care at all. Where other families like the Rosiers and Malfoys continued to project some image of normalcy, the Lestranges had fully devoted themselves to You-Know-Who's cause—and they let the world know. They had nothing to lose—no reputation to protect, no legacy to furnish—and this made them infinitely more dangerous than the average Death Eater. Unhinged, an old Prophet article had said. An unhinged family of sadists.

Dumbledore remained quiet for a long moment. Regulus did not know the old wizard well enough to tell what was going through his mind, just that something was. Some plan was being formed and re-formed. Possibilities were being explored. Dead ends were being encountered.

At last, Dumbledore's steepled hands fell. "We will have to wait," he said simply. "What else have you learned?"

Regulus's gaze dropped back to his notebook. He didn't have to look away, not really. He knew there was only one thing left. But he preferred reading from his meager notes to locking eyes with Dumbledore.

"Rosier said his uncle and cousin are trying to liaise with Dementors. He didn't have much information to give apart from the fact they're still figuring out how best to approach the Dementors." Regulus's lips tugged into a sharp frown. "Grace said You-Know-Who might be planning a breakout from Azkaban. I suppose this is a part of that."

"Regaining prisoners from Azkaban would certainly be an added benefit," Dumbledore said. "But having the Dementors on his side instead of the Ministry's is more than enough impetus for Voldemort to seek their alliance. They are a particularly ruthless bunch."

"But they can't be controlled. It seems…" he hesitated, "risky."

"The Dementors will follow the side able to provide them with the most souls," Dumbledore said speedily. He didn't hold much interest in discussing the nature of Dementors. "This will undoubtedly be Voldemort. He has only to approach them. You said the Rosiers have not yet made contact with the Dementors?"

"As far as I know, no."

"Do you know how they will attempt this task?"

"No. Rosier didn't know."

Dumbledore's lips set into a thin line. "What is your best guess, then?"

Regulus forced down a weary sigh. He looked away from Dumbledore, back down to the notebook splayed over his lap. His thumb traced over the thin edge of the paper. Thanks to Vance's efforts and the cooperation of the Auror Office, You-Know-Who was short of spies in the Ministry. It wouldn't do to risk any more being found out by sending them to snoop around Azkaban.

"He would probably use Mulciber and Rookwood—anyone who's already in Azkaban," Regulus said. "But he'd have to get the directive to them through someone, probably a family member visiting them. After that, it's all easy, isn't it? All they'd have to do is sit and convince the Dementor that stands outside their cell. It won't be too hard. Like you said, You-Know-Who can offer more souls than the Ministry."

"Hmm… You don't suppose it might be easier for Voldemort to give this mission to someone and have them purposefully caught and sent to Azkaban to carry it out?"

"I suppose he could do that, too, but so many of his have been caught already. I don't know if he'd want to risk yet another one."

"I disagree," Dumbledore said softly, as though he had some deep understanding of You-Know-Who's psyche that Regulus lacked. "Frustration and impatience lead to hasty decisions. Is there no one Voldemort might deem expendable?"

"Well…he hasn't been pleased with Macnair and Rowle recently. He's not particularly fond of Goyle, either. He could spare any of them in Azkaban."

Dumbledore gave a nod and retreated into thoughtful silence once more. Regulus snapped his book shut and let his eyes wander over the room. The portraits that littered the walls were dozing away—or so they seemed. Whenever Regulus turned slightly away, he could see from his peripheral a few of the portraits awaken and drink in the sights of the office eagerly.

There was only one portrait that made no attempt to hide his awareness of the situation at hand: the portrait of Regulus's great-great-grandfather, Phineas Nigellus Black. The old man was sitting hunched in his cramped canvas, watching Regulus with narrowed eyes. Regulus returned the look with a wary one of his own. He had warned Dumbledore that this particular portrait was connected to another back at Grimmauld Place and that they surely couldn't have any confidential conversations while his great-great-grandfather was lurking about. These warnings fell on deaf ears. Dumbledore assured Regulus that Phineas would not say anything that might endanger the mission of the Order—but how Dumbledore could be so sure of this was a mystery of Regulus.

"Children these days…" Phineas muttered, having caught Regulus's eye. "No loyalty…"

Regulus winced and returned his attention to Dumbledore, who was still deep in thought. Desperate not to stew in silence—or hear any more of Phineas's pointed remarks—Regulus leaned forward and said, "Couldn't you ask the Minister to do something about the Dementors?"

Dumbledore looked up in surprise. He had not expected Regulus to speak.

"I will admit, the thought crossed my mind. But this may be better handled by the Order. If I were to warn the Minister, who, I must say, is not very fond of my tendency to intervene, I believe he would double the number of Dementors patrolling Azkaban."

"What?" Regulus said in disbelief. "But that would only give You-Know-Who more Dementors. That doesn't make any sense."

"I'm well aware," Dumbledore said calmly, "which is why direct intervention will not work in this matter."

"But if you were to explain to him, surely the Minister wouldn't—"

"Is there any other news you have?" Dumbledore's interruption was not brash or unkind, but it stung all the same.

Regulus ducked his head. "Er—no. That's all I found out."

"Very well. I suppose that will have to be all for tonight," he said. "Unless there is anything you would like to know?"

Regulus perked up. This was what he had been waiting for. Dumbledore ended every meeting of theirs with this question, more out of courtesy than anything else. Usually, Regulus didn't have anything to say, but tonight was different.

"I wanted to ask about Grace. She made that prophecy, and I think—"

An unreadable expression passed over Dumbledore. "If you have figured out any part of the prophecy," he interrupted, "I would ask—"

"No, I don't care about the prophecy. I'm worried about what might happen to Grace because of it. Her condition was related to Seer's snag. Have you—er, have you heard of that?"

"I'm familiar with the concept," Dumbledore said.

"Right, so it's related to the Inner Eye. Grace's Inner Eye. It was supposed to stay closed, because opening it could allow the power of true Sight to overwhelm her. Drive her to insanity. It's something Grace's old Divination professor was concerned about. Nothing happened immediately, but a few days ago, Grace had some sort of vision—except she couldn't really control it. It was more controlling her, keeping her from moving of her own accord. She managed to snap herself out of it, but I'm worried it might get worse."

Regulus and Dumbledore stared at each other for a long moment. He could not tell what was going through the old wizard's head. His blazing blue eyes studied Regulus intently. The strange silver clock chimed suddenly. Regulus realized, with a start, that he hadn't actually asked Dumbledore any particular question.

"Er—what I meant to ask—" Regulus began nervously, unsure of what precisely to say. There were too many questions to pick from.

Thankfully, Dumbledore raised a hand to stop him. "Has anything else happened to warrant concern?"

Regulus shook his head.

"Given that this is uncharted territory, I believe the only thing we can do is wait. This may be a one-time consequence of her sudden prophesying. There is a possibility her mind will acclimate on its own."

Regulus frowned. "But if it doesn't, isn't there something we could do to—"

"And I will do some research of my own on the subject," he said, somewhat placating. "Is there anything else?"

He asked this more out of decorum than interest. His tone suggested that he was done with questions for now.

Regulus pursed his lips. "No."

"Very well." He paused for a moment, and then asked, "What was the vision Grace had?"

"I don't know," Regulus said flatly. "She was too startled to understand what she was Seeing."

"I see." Dumbledore clapped his hands together softly. "Well, if that is all, then I shall see you next week. Goodnight."

Regulus rose from his chair. "Goodnight, sir."

He meandered down the stairs and to the Come-and-Go Room, where he recorded all the new information he had learned along with Grace. Afterwards, they snuck back to the Slytherin common room. There were a few lingering students still up, mostly fifth-years who had only just begun to realize how daunting and demanding O.W.L.s were. Regulus pressed a quick kiss against Grace's temple before heading up the stairwell to the boy's dormitory. Yaxley, Wilkinson, and Rosier were fast asleep. Gamp was reading some magazine under the dim light of his bedside lantern. Regulus clambered towards his bed and slid under the silken sheets. He shut his eyes and tried to stifle the upset churning in the pit of his stomach. Wait, Dumbledore had said. But how could Regulus wait? When it was Grace?

The lantern light by Gamp's bed went out. The hours tumbled on. Regulus was soon swallowed into a strange dream where he was stirring a massive, bubbling cauldron in the Potions classroom. There were no other students in sight, just him and some awful, sickly green concoction.

"Wrong!" a voice barked over his shoulder.

Regulus whirled around. His great-great-grandfather was peering over him, craning his neck to get a look at the potion. Phineas's mouth pulled back into a disgusted grimace as he took in the botched potion.

"You're running out of time, boy!" Phineas cried out. "The cure must be brewed now!"

"I'm trying!" Regulus said desperately, throwing ingredient after ingredient into the cauldron. The potion hissed and gurgled under his care. It remained stubbornly green. "I don't—I don't know what's—!"

Phineas was shaking his head ruefully. "Children these days," he said. His voice was like a clap of thunder.

"I just need—I need better ingredients than this!" He held up a knot of mandrake root, which quickly dissolved into scraps of tattered fabric in his hands. "I can't use this!"

"Wrong!"

"Can't you help me?" Regulus asked desperately.

At his urging, Phineas promptly transformed into a vulture now. He soared over Regulus. His cracked voice cawed down.

"Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!"

---

Weeks passed in a blur of meetings, meals, and classwork. The incident with Grace did not repeat, but Regulus was not foolish enough to believe it had simply vanished. Dumbledore had no insight to share about Grace's condition the next time they met—or even the week after that—so Regulus stopped asking. He would have to figure this out himself. He threw himself into research at the library. There were not many books about Divination, and even fewer about Seer's snag in particular, but Regulus didn't falter in his determination. He read everything he could get his hands on. He was now reaching the point where he was running out of reliable material. The majority of books in this section of the library were authored by fame-seekers or skeptics, and neither group was very invested in giving an unbiased, impartial portrayal of Seer's snag.

The book he was currently reading was little more than the memoirs of a woman who lived in the same town as a young girl afflicted with Seer's snag. Regulus had hoped it might provide a more personal understanding of the timeline and symptoms of the condition, but, to his dismay, the author was more interested in sharing anecdotes of her painfully dull life than discussing the Seer who lived down the street.

Regulus sighed heavily as he reached the end of yet another chapter that failed to edify him. He shut the book and let it topple onto the table with a thud. Thankfully, he was the only person in the library, so no one was disturbed by the noise—except for Pince, who looked up and narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. Regulus ignored her and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the edge of the table. He cradled his head in his hands. He could feel a slight headache brewing in his temples, probably a consequence of having spent nearly the entire day staring at small print.

"I thought you'd be here," a quiet voice called out behind him.

He didn't have to look to know it was Grace. He heard her pull out the chair next to his and sit down. She pulled the book he'd been reading away from him.

"Remembering Caoimhe: My Time With the Seer Who Was—" she paused for a moment, and when she picked up again, Regulus could hear the frustration leaking through her voice, "—Snatched Too Soon." She tossed the book back over to him. "Merlin, really, Regulus?"

He lifted his head. "I thought it might be useful."

"Clearly, it wasn't," she said, eyeing the cover art of a dreary town with distaste.

"That one wasn't," he agreed. "But I found some others. I've already packed a few to read over the holiday, but I stopped by to see if there might be some other books I missed."

She frowned at him. "You're going to read during holiday?"

"Yes," he said, and frowned as well.

"Can't we just…" she struggled with something for a moment, "…ignore this for a bit?"

He stared at her in disbelief. Ignore this? That was like trying to ignore how much oxygen you had left while you were drowning.

"We can't just let this sit," Regulus protested. "I don't know how much time you have until it gets worse for you. If we were to go off the cases, you could have a year before you start losing control of your body. I'm not even sure if it's a year, really. It could be less. We can't rely on what's happened to other people since your Inner Eye was opened much later than theirs were. We should prepare for the worst. We should figure out something—anything—that might be able to help stop this."

She wasn't looking at him anymore. Her fingers picked at a splinter of wood peeling from the tabletop. "I know this is important, Reg. I know it's something we've got to figure out. But it's not anything we're going to figure out in the next week."

"You can't say that for sure," he countered.

She didn't say anything for a long moment. The air around them was thick and heavy. Regulus's head hurt tremendously. His heart felt waterlogged.

"You probably think I don't think about this that much, but I do," she said. "I can't afford to live my life and not think about my condition every waking second. I have to think about how much stress I can take on. I have to think about whether or not the twinge in my temples is a headache or a paroxysm. I have to think about when to take my next dose of Clear-Head. I think about this all the time, Regulus. And all your reading has done is tell me that it gets worse. So much worse." Her chin trembled. "I'd like to have one week—just one week—where I don't have to worry about it. This had been hanging over my head my whole life. Can't we just ignore it for one week?"

He didn't know what to say to that. Grace was right. She'd been living with this her whole life. It'd be more than all right for her to simply let it go for one week.

But Regulus couldn't.

This was simply too important. This was Grace. It pained him not to have answers. It pained him not to know with absolute, one hundred percent certainty that she would be okay. He was far out of his depth. He wasn't even sure if any of his reading would accomplish anything. He was fairly certain he wouldn't be stumbling on any cure in the tomes packed away in his trunk. But he also knew he couldn't just not read those tomes, because…what if? What if there was some crucial secret stamped into the parchment? What if there was some small detail there that might help Grace? That might lessen her burden? That might save her? He was ready to devote his entire life to this. He was ready to go without sleep, without food, without warmth—all in search of answers. He was ready to be devoured by this, because the other option—having Grace be devoured by it—was too frightening to even consider.

His silence seemed to have gone on for too long, because Grace abruptly stood up. Her chair squeaked against the floor as it slid back. "We'll talk about it later," she said flatly. "We've got to check in with Vance."

"Okay," he said numbly, and rose to follow her.

The walk to Vance's office was stiff and silent. Regulus couldn't stop glancing over at Grace, who was storming ahead. He knew she had been looking forward to Easter holiday for a while now, but he didn't exactly know why. He'd simply figured she was tired of the castle. But now…

His gaze was pulled back to her. Every step she took was hard and unforgiving, as though she were trying to pummel the stone floor as she walked. Was she tired of spying, too? Was she tired of Myrcella and the ceaseless Ministry talk? Was she tired of Vance and their late-night duels? An awful thought crept into his head: Was she tired of him? Of his relentless reading? Of his unfaltering worry?

They came up on the door to Vance's office. Grace ripped it open.

Vance looked up from her desk and gave them a kind smile. She set aside the case file she was marking with notes and ushered them inside. Regulus glanced around the office. It was scant as usual, filled with only the most minimal of furniture. He had expected Vance to fill it out as the year progressed, but she seemed adamant not to leave any personal mark on the room. Or maybe this was her personal mark. He wouldn't be surprised if her house looked like this, too: a bedroom with basic furnishings, an ink pot and quill, a few case files, and nothing else.

"Good, you're on time," Vance said speedily. "Let's make this quick. I'm supposed to head to the Auror Office soon."

Grace's brows furrowed. "Why? It's eight o'clock."

"There are no off-hours when you're an Auror," Vance said primly. She regarded the two of them intently. "You'll be heading off on holiday tomorrow. I don't anticipate anything to happen so long as you're cautious and keep to yourselves. That means no crowded areas. You can't nip over to the Leaky Cauldron if you're feeling stifled in your cottage. Stay out of the way, where other Death Eaters can't happen on you and where Order members can't find you." She gave Regulus a particularly stern look. "Don't go looking for your brother."

Regulus frowned at her. "Why in Merlin's name would I do that?"

"I've no idea. I'm simply telling you not to. The rumor that you might be a Death Eater has made rounds, courtesy of your brother, so you mustn't come across any Order members. They'll want to confirm this, and we can't have anyone coming after you two for obvious reasons."

Weariness slid into Regulus. Trust Sirius to muck things up for him.

"I won't go anywhere," Regulus promised.

"You say that now, but…" Vance sighed. "Look, if you two leave each other for any reason—"

"We won't," Regulus insisted, finding himself growing irritated, although that might have been because of the tense exchange in the library. "We'll be staying together at Grace's—"

"I know that," Vance said, "but you two won't be stitched to each other's sides all day long. If one of you leaves to get a breath of fresh air, go for a swim, whatever it is you do in your free time—when you return, be sure to use the Ministry's security protocol."

"The Ministry has a security protocol?" Grace said dubiously.

Vance let out a lengthy sigh. "Yes. The Auror Office came up with it. Be sure to set up protective wards. Cut off your Floo connection if you don't need it—which you two don't." She gave them a sharp look. "And be wary of any sudden visits. A favorite tactic of Death Eaters is disguising themselves as relatives or friends of a victim, which gains them easy access to the victim. If one of you leaves for an extended period of time and returns, be sure to ask each other a few questions—something only the other would know—to ensure that they're not a disguised Death Eater."

"Why would a Death Eater disguise themselves as one of us?" Grace asked. "We're Death Eaters, too."

"This is in case you're found out as spies—or suspected of being spies. A Death Eater could disguise themselves as one of you to get the other to admit to espionage."

"Why would that happen?" Regulus said, alarmed. "You said you don't anticipate anything happening to us."

"So long as you're careful. But things can always go wrong."

This was clearly not welcome news for Grace. Her expression grew stormier. "Well—how do we keep in touch with you, then? In case something happens?"

"You won't."

Regulus's brows rose.

Grace stared at Vance. "What?"

"It's too risky," Vance said. "Besides—you haven't mentioned any Death Eater meetings scheduled for Easter."

"There still aren't any, but You-Know-Who could call a meeting at any time."

"He could," Vance acknowledged. "You'll have to wait to give any updates until after you're back here. It's too risky to have you send owls. They might be intercepted. The Floo network is being monitored, so that's out of the question, too. We could get you two-way mirrors, but there's no telling when might be a safe time for you to call. I'll be back at the Auror Office, and consequently surrounded by Aurors and Order members for the next week. As it stands, it would be best if we had no contact."

"No contact?" Grace said incredulously. "But what if something happens? You just said things can always go wrong!"

Vance gave her a pointed look. "If you were truly worried about yourselves, you would have chosen to stay in the castle instead of gallivanting off to your seaside cottage."

Grace scowled. "You can't expect us to stay cooped up here. None of the other Death Eaters are staying behind for holiday. It'd look suspicious if we didn't leave with them."

Vance waved away the explanation. "Yes, yes, so you've argued. It is inconvenient for you two to be so far away, but I can't quite say there's a better option. Although…you could come back after the train arrives at King's Cross. Apparate back to Hogsmeade and—"

"What?!" Grace cried out, alarmed. "You agreed we could go on holiday. You said that we—"

"Wouldn't be needed, I know," Vance completed. "I'm simply raising the option to you, since you seem to be so concerned about whether or not something might happen."

"I just want to know what to do in case we have to contact you," Grace said with mounting frustration.

"You won't be contacting me," Vance corrected immediately.

Grace glowered. Regulus swallowed a small groan of exasperation.

"What are we supposed to do, then?" he asked before Grace could throw a few colorful insults Vance's way.

"You're supposed to keep your head down and lay low. It's only a week. I don't expect anything major to occur. You haven't given us any intel that might suggest the Death Eaters have anything planned for the holiday. Our own operations will be limited to cutting off contact between Death Eaters and Azkaban prisoners. Nothing involves you two."

"I know that," Grace said, "but suppose—"

"Oh, fine," Vance said. She dug out her lipstick from her cloak pocket and tossed it to Grace. "If something does happen, you can use the Portkey to travel back here. You'll be safe within Hogwarts walls."

Grace rolled the tube between her fingers. "But you said you won't be here?"

"I won't be," Vance agreed. "But the Portkey isn't for contacting me. It's for getting out of a tight situation—if you're being attacked, or if Voldemort has figured out you're spies. That Portkey is a last resort. Do not use it unless your very life depends on it. You can't just come in and out of here whenever you feel like it. I won't be here, but since the castle will be basically empty, other Order members might be popping in and out to see Dumbledore—and they cannot know your affiliation with us."

Grace pocketed the lipstick. "You still don't know who the leak is?"

Vance's lips settled into an unhappy grimace. "Unfortunately not." Her tone was hard and steely. This topic was clearly not open for discussion. "You two had better head to bed. Train leaves first thing in the morning."

Grace and Regulus nodded in agreement.

"Goodnight, professor," Regulus said politely.

Grace was already moving towards the door. She gave Vance a halfhearted wave. "Thanks for the Portkey. We'll see you next week."

"Yes—and don't forget to lay low," she reminded them loudly. "Trouble won't find you unless you go looking for it. Just keep to yourselves. It's only a—"

The door closed behind them, cutting her off.

"Week," Grace completed quietly. A current of bitterness ran through the word. "It's only a week."

She strode along, a deep-seated frustration working through her. Regulus could see it in the tense hold of her body, in the crush of her feet against the stone floor. He followed behind her unsurely. He was usually very good at cheering her up, but lately he was beginning to feel like he was doing everything wrong.

Nevertheless, he tried.

"We can do a lot in a week," he assured gently. "It won't all be research or reading. We can do other things, too. It's all right if—"

She stopped and swung around to him. "Except it's not all right," she said miserably.

He realized, with a jolt, that she was crying. An overpowering guilt flooded him. His heart stung viciously. How had he not noticed? He could see, now, that it wasn't schoolwork or spying or even himself that was troubling her. She was tired of herself. She was worn out, and she wanted to rest and not have to think for a moment—and Regulus wasn't letting her.

"Grace…" he said helplessly. The name came out like an ache.

"It's so stupid," she wept. He wanted to disagree. Nothing she'd ever done or said was stupid, not to him. "It's just like before, when the Healers said it was chronic—but it's worse. So, so much worse. And I—I know you mean well, but I hate talking about it—about how much worse it'll be, about how rotten it is, how awful it is. Every day, every hour, it's… It's always about this, and I don't—I don't want it to be about this. I can't just be this. I can't just—"

She said something more, but she was sobbing harder now and Regulus couldn't make out what it was. Tears were burning against his own eyes. His ears seared painfully. His throat was tight and swollen. He hadn't meant to obsess over it. It was just the only way he knew to approach any of this, because any moment he wasn't thinking about Grace's condition was spent screaming at himself for not thinking about her condition.

"I… I'm sorry," he said, his own words strangled and choked.

But she didn't want an apology. She only wanted him to know, to understand. She pulled him close to her, wrapping her arms around him tightly. Regulus pressed himself against her just as firmly. He laid his cheek against the top of her head. Grace's weeping quickly devolved into a few sniffles, and Regulus could feel his own hurt and turmoil calming alongside hers. They stayed still for a long moment, simply wrapped within one another, holding on to each other. A hundred million things bubbled at the base of Regulus's throat. I didn't mean to make you feel worse. I just love you so much. You shouldn't have to think about it constantly. It's not fair. But these were things Grace already knew. He didn't have to say anything at all. He only had to wait to hear how Grace wanted to proceed.

She shifted against him. Her head angled up, and she peered up at him through wet eyelashes. "Can't we just pretend everything's all right? Just for one week?"

"Yeah," Regulus croaked, "we can."

---

The last time Regulus visited Falmouth, it had been dreadfully cold. The small shack of a bungalow that Grace stayed in hardly protected from the bitter bite of winter. It had been too many years since anyone had stayed there, and the disuse had allowed all manner of things to fall apart: the slates of the roof had been shaken by storms, allowing little gaps for the freezing cold to slip through, and the hinges that fixed the front door in place were so rusty and old that the door barely fit in place anymore. Grace had fixed it up with a few household charms during the holiday, so it hadn't been too bad, but she didn't put much effort or thought into renovating the entire place. Why would she? She hadn't planned on coming back.

They arrived hand-in-hand at the base of the hillside and began the long climb up. Their trunks floated in the air behind them. Cliodna leapt from Regulus's arms and disappeared into the sparse brush of the surrounding area. Her black coat blended easily into the spates of dark rock that dotted the coast. Regulus was pleased to find that Falmouth was not immune to the gentleness of spring. The ocean lapped at the shore in the background, folding in cool air to keep the unrelenting warmth of the sun at bay. Under the light, the sea sparkled like a blanket of diamonds. The sand of the shore was fine and pale. It was late afternoon now, and the sky was a perfect, undisturbed sheet of pale blue. For a moment, Regulus didn't think a more beautiful place existed—and then he stepped into the house.

It was in absolute disarray, which didn't surprise him in the slightest. Grace hadn't cleaned up when she left for spring term. The drawers and cabinets of the sitting area were open and upturned, books and trinkets spilling out, some thrown to the floor without care, others shoved onto a shelf hastily. The pull-out bed had been half-made: the pillows pushed to one side in a crumpled mess, the sheets tugged off halfway and then promptly abandoned. Grace's star-patterned blanket was splayed over the floor.

Grace set both of their trunks against the floor with a quick flick of her wand. She stepped further into the house and gaped. "Why is it such a mess?" she cried out, kicking away her fallen blanket.

"Because you left it like that," Regulus said rather pointedly.

"Yeah, but it wasn't this bad before," Grace insisted. She explored the house further and settled by the bookcase, where she stooped down and squinted at something underneath it. "Oh, Merlin, I think those are Doxy eggs…"

Regulus's brows flew up. "What? No—that can't be," he said immediately, more out of denial than any real, plausible reason.

He ventured forward to take a look himself, and he saw that Grace was indeed right. In the crack between the bookshelf and the floor, there was just a flash of soft, brown shell. The dark sludge just barely crept out beyond the bookshelf, leaking into the hardwood floor. He stared at it in disbelief.

"Salazar," he said numbly. "Can you kill it?"

"Kill it? They haven't hatched yet, Reg. The shells will absorb any spell I cast."

Cliodna strutted through the open door after a few moments of lounging outside and fastened over to where Regulus and Grace were. Her curious eyes caught onto the infestation, and she immediately extended a paw, as if to claw at the rot. Regulus scooped her up before she could, horrified at the prospect of his cat making physical contact with something so disgusting.

Grace dropped to her knees and pulled the bookcase out a little bit, angling her head to get a better look.

"No!" Regulus cried out in alarm. "Don't open it—!"

"They haven't hatched yet," she said again, this time a little more exasperated. "You don't happen to have some Doxycide packed, do you?"

"Of course not. Why would I pack Doxycide with me?"

"For…emergencies?" she tried.

He was too distressed to give a retort. He crouched down behind her and peered at the rot with mounting distaste. "What if we…vanished it?"

"Vanish—? No, the shells absorb—"

"I know, but what if it worked?" he asked, sounding almost desperate. He couldn't bear the thought of sleeping in a house infested with Doxies.

She gave him a very unimpressed look before relenting. Her silver wand arced through the air. A burst of pale blue light washed over the eggs, but it had no effect. Just like Grace said, the dark shells swallowed up the light and continued to lay stubbornly in the crack.

"Do we have to stay here?" Regulus asked weakly.

"Vance wanted us to stay out of the way, and this is the most out of the way place I know." She paused for a short moment and then added, with a touch of acerbity, "It's not like I wanted to come back here."

Remorse flooded Regulus. He didn't mean to sound so put-out, just as Grace hadn't meant to leave the house in such a state. She only wanted to forget this place, leave as quickly as possible and not look back. She only wanted to go home, but she couldn't. Going home would mean going to James, and that wasn't an option that was open to her right now. Regulus could see the frustration and regret working across her face: crushing, all-consuming, scrunching up her features, wrinkling her brows, twisting her lips into a deep frown. An overwhelming sympathy filled him.

"Sorry," he said softly. "You're right; it's not too bad. They haven't hatched yet, so we've got until then to figure it out."

She nodded in agreement. "If we tidy the place up, the Doxies might not even stay once they hatch."

He was happy to help her with that. "Okay, then let's clean."

It felt absurdly mundane, to meander around the house and pick up fallen items, but it was a mundanity Regulus welcomed wholeheartedly. This was something he could control.

Grace tossed the sheets and blankets from the pull-out into a basin in the washroom. With one quick charm, the bedding began to wash itself. She folded up the pull-out, too, letting it settle into a lumpy old couch. The sitting room suddenly felt so much larger. It still didn't compare to the parlors of Grimmauld Place, but it was far more comfortable to maneuver through now. Regulus set Cliodna down on the couch and began to attend to the cupboards and cabinets of the joint kitchen and dining area. He couldn't tell exactly what was trash and what wasn't (there was a case of shattered cowrie shells among some dusty children's pails and shovels), so he just shoved it all into one large drawer below the kitchen sink. The Scouring Charms he used during the winter holiday had kept the place relatively clean, but he applied a few more to get rid of the collecting dust. In about an hour, the sitting area and kitchen seemed livable—not perfect or pristine, but acceptable. Regulus felt they were done and returned to Grace to ask what they should do now, but she wasn't anywhere in the sitting room now.

"Grace?" he called out, but his voice was drowned out by the loud splashes and scrubbing coming from the washroom.

On the wall opposite the bookcase was another door, half-open and creaking slightly. Regulus approached the threshold with some hesitation. This was the room he had not been allowed to enter months prior, because it belonged to Grace's parents. The room itself was nothing special. It was about the same size as the cramped kitchen, with a comfortable albeit dusty bed in the middle and dressers pressed along the walls. An ornate opal mirror hung above one of the dressers, and there was a gold and crimson trunk pushed against the foot of the bed. Grace was sitting on the edge of the bed, going through the trunk. Regulus caught glimpses of old clothes, some spare change, a few spoiled sweets, and then some smooth, translucent stones. She stopped, then, and simply stared at them for a long moment.

Concern leaked into Regulus. His feet carried him towards her, and he gently sat down next to her. "Are you all right?"

She glanced up at him. Her lips quirked into a small, sad smile. There was a quiet wistfulness unfolding across her face. She took one of the stones from her palm and pressed it into his hand.

"James collected these for me when we were little," she explained softly. "Dad charmed them to light up, but I suppose since he's gone now…they've stopped working."

Regulus rolled the stone between his fingers. It was smoother than silk. He could see, now, that this wasn't any sort of naturally occurring rock. It was sea glass, shards of some broken bottle that had been tamed by the sea. This one was a verdant green. It would have looked wonderful all lit up, so Regulus decided to do just that. He struggled, for a moment, to recall the proper charmwork for this, but he figured it out quickly. With a few taps of his wand, the sea glass began to glow, shining and glittering as brightly as an emerald. The light it cast ebbed and flowed, dimming and brightening between seconds, like the steady beat of a heart.

"Here," he said, handing it back to Grace.

She gave him a fond smile. She closed the lid of the trunk and set the glowing sea glass on top of it. It shone like a small lamp, casting soft shadows that grew and receded as its light came and went. Grace looked at it for a moment longer, and then let out a long exhale and collapsed fully into the bed. She glanced up at Regulus, hazel eyes so warm and bright they seemed to carry the sun itself.

"Thank you."

He fell in beside her, spreading out over the large bed. It was much more snug than the pull-out. He propped his chin up in his hand and gave her a small smile of his own. "What for?"

"I dunno," she said, inching closer to him. "For overcoming your fear of Doxies. For cleaning up the kitchen. For giving us a light source in this dreadfully dim room. For being you." She leaned in and pressed a quick kiss against his lips.

Regulus smiled against it. "I thought there were four things you were thanking me for?"

She laughed and kissed him again, this time harder, fiercer. Regulus deepened it on instinct. His hand fell away from his chin and latched onto her cheek, brushing away her hair, thumb tickling over her ear. He loved to have her near like this. They were always within reach of each other, right by each other in classes, only a few seats over at meals, but nothing compared to when they were like this—their hands grasping at each other, their lips moving together in perfect, blissful synchrony. Regulus had never been this close to someone. He didn't want to be this close to anyone but her. No one compared to Grace. She was the only one he never had to pretend around, and that realization, that wonderful, simple truth, lit something in him. He pulled her closer to him, until they were flush against each other, but it still didn't feel close enough. (The truth was that he was just as greedy as Grace. He simply never allowed himself to show it.) She blazed with intensity, with strength and loyalty and love; he was drawn to her like a moth to flame. He could feel her hands winding into his hair, fingers tangling over his scalp. He fell flat against the bed, Grace rearing over him. Her hair fell around them in curls, draping over his collarbones, tickling the sensitive skin that connected neck to shoulder. He breathed deeply, taking in the jasmine fragrance that wafted from her, sweet and strong, the scent of her soap. It was his favorite smell in the world: powerful, intoxicating. He felt, suddenly, like a vat of Amortentia had spilled onto him; he was dizzy with love, with that delicate floral scent, with her mouth spilling open into his—and just as his hands began to wander further down, she stilled and pulled away. It felt like a chasm splitting between them. Regulus's eyes fluttered open, an awful, wanting ache filling him from head to toe. His pupils, blown wide and unfocused, slowly settled on Grace—but she didn't seem like Grace.

She was straight-backed at the end of the bed, balancing on her haunches, eyes darting over the room, tracing over things that did not exist. Regulus scrambled up, smoothing back his hair.

"Grace?" he called out. "Are you—can you hear me?"

She couldn't. She continued to watch what Regulus could not see. She sat still on the mattress, stiff as stone, jaw tight, hands folded tight into each other. She looked very tense, but that was how she always looked when she was afraid. Her body tightened up, as if trying to withdraw into itself. This was how she was whenever she felt a paroxysm coming on, tensing herself, making herself rigid and stoic, some hard, unfeeling, impenetrable thing that was readying itself for the worst. Regulus's heart swelled with worry. He reached for her, folding her hands into his, and simply waited.

After another minute or so, she snapped out of it. Her gaze, now weary and worn, returned to Regulus. They stared at each other for a moment.

"Sorry," she said uselessly.

He shook her head. "No, you don't have to apologize—it's not—I thought… I don't know why I thought it, but since it was just once, I—"

She grimaced. "It wasn't once."

Every part of Regulus froze. There was a ghastly dread seeping over him. "What do you mean?"

"It's happened a couple of times—right before I sleep, mostly. Sometimes when I'm in the loo. Once in class. But I just stay still and try to ignore it until it passes."

"What?" he said in disbelief. "How many times has it happened to you?"

"I dunno, a dozen or so… It doesn't last for longer than a few minutes."

"Grace, that's not good! That's—" He struggled to speak, overcome by everything that was so dreadfully wrong in what Grace had just said. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because I knew it'd make you obsess about it even more." She didn't sound at all defensive, simply exhausted. "And it wouldn't make a difference, really. Nothing would have changed, because there's nothing we can do about it, is there? Vablatsky doesn't mention any sort of remedy in her journal. And I've told Vance already—it happened once while we were dueling, too, so she definitely knows—but she doesn't have any answers either. I suppose I've just got to live with it."

"You can't just live with it," he said. His words were a river of desperation. "You won't always be able to sit still. It might get worse—it got worse for others, for Caoimhe Stiobhard. It starts to overtake your movement, your sanity, everything. And she—she threw herself off a cliff, Grace!"

An uneasy silence fell between them. Regulus realized he was doing precisely what she didn't like—jumping to the worst-case scenario—but he was too irritated by the fact she hadn't told him of all the other times she'd been overcome by visions to care.

She didn't respond like how he expected her to. There wasn't any scowling, no snapping back. An unusual calm lined her face. Regulus wondered if she was still disoriented from the vision. "But if you're there, you'll stop me."

And she really believed it. Her eyes shone with such honest, open trust that Regulus's frustration was quickly replaced by a sudden urge to weep. There was no guarantee he would always be there. Save for that day in the kitchens, he had not been there for any of the other times. And, even if he was there, he wasn't entirely sure what he could do. How many times could he stop her? What if she resisted him? He wouldn't know what to do then. He didn't even know what to do now. He was wary of doing anything at all. It felt like every little thing he did could set off another vision in her: snogging too hard, breathing too hard, feeling too hard.

"I'm fine," she insisted. He wasn't sure if he believed it. "I know the visions aren't real. I know how to control myself. The others never had their Inner Eye opened so late. It might be different for me. And my Occlumency is good—better than good. Maybe that'll keep my head straight."

It didn't help that she used maybe. Regulus could not help but worry. It was in his nature to do so. They sat quietly for a little while. Regulus pulled Grace closer to him so that they were in a half-hug. Her head rested against his shoulder, her hands playing at the hem of her robes. Regulus stared blankly at the pulsing light of the sea glass. There was no solution to this, none that Vablatsky wrote, none that Vance found out, none that Dumbledore knew—but Regulus could not accept that. If the answer to this problem did not exist, he would simply have to invent it. He just didn't know where to start.

"Are you hungry?" he asked eventually, because that, at least, he could fix.

Her head rolled against him as she looked up. "Yeah, now that you mention it. Those pumpkin pasties on the train didn't fill me up at all."

He snorted softly. "What do you want?"

"We could—oh, bollocks," she frowned. "There's no food here. Kreacher was bringing it during winter."

"I could…" He faltered. He couldn't call Kreacher, actually, not without making his mother suspicious. He'd told her he would be staying in the castle during holiday to prepare for N.E.W.T.s.

Grace caught onto his line of thought quickly. "Your mum'll wonder why you're calling Kreacher if you're supposed to be at Hogwarts, right?"

"Yeah."

"We could just get food ourselves?" she suggested.

"We can't go to Diagon Alley," he protested immediately. "Vance said—"

"I meant the Muggle market."

Regulus opened and closed his mouth several times. "The…Muggle…market," he repeated slowly, as though unaware that Muggles could have markets of their own.

"Yeah. Mum and Dad used to take us to the Muggle market when we stayed here during the summer." She pointed lazily at the thin slit of a window above the bed. "It's a little ways off from here. Mum and Dad didn't want to be too close in case someone saw us use magic. But it's not too far. Just a ten-minute walk, maybe. They've got loads of stuff. They've even figured out how to keep the cold in their boxes so the milk isn't warm."

That was certainly surprising.

"Oh," Regulus said. He was wary of going somewhere he had never been before, but they needed food to eat. "All right, then. I suppose that will do."

She grinned at him. A flash of warmth thrummed through Regulus.

"Okay. I think there's leftover Muggle money somewhere in here." She shot up from the bed and began to open the dressers once more, digging through the tightly packed clothes. "Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll have Doxycide, too."

Regulus gave her a doubtful look. "I don't think Muggles get Doxies in their houses."

"But maybe they get something like Doxies," Grace countered as she grabbed a small box pushed into the back of one of the drawers.

She brought her findings back to Regulus and began to pull out some colorful slips of paper. As she sorted through them, the box tumbled from her hands and onto the mattress. A few coins spilled out. Regulus picked one of them up and squinted at it. It didn't look too different from a Knut.

"What should we have?" Grace asked as she organized the money. "I suppose we could do a fry-up: bacon, eggs, toast—"

"You want to have breakfast for dinner?" Regulus said skeptically.

"We don't have to do that. I just thought it would be simple to make. What do you want to eat?"

"I was thinking a light soup, maybe watercress, and then a roasted lemon-and-thyme chicken for the main course—"

"Regulus, do you know how to make watercress soup and roasted lemon-and-thyme chicken?" she interrupted.

"Well… I suppose we'd need watercress and chicken to start…"

She rolled her eyes and returned her focus to counting the papers. Regulus shifted closer to her and saw that each slip had its own number inked into the corners. Was that the value of it? Some numbers were higher than others, but the papers themselves didn't seem very different, apart from color.

"Okay," Grace said, putting down the notes, "we've got forty-three total of the papers and twenty-two coins."

"What is that, roughly, in Galleons?"

Grace bit her lip, glancing down at the Muggle money. "I'm not sure what the conversion is. But this is probably a lot of money, right? This one has got a woman with a crown on it—" she picked up one of the notes with the number ten, "—I feel like that means it's worth quite a lot."

Regulus glanced down at notes. They all held the same picture. "I don't think that means anything. All of the papers have a woman with a crown on it."

"Right, but the back has a different person." Grace flipped over the note, which held the visage of a man with a long beard. She stared at the picture intently. "He looks rather important."

Regulus peered at the picture, too. "They don't move," he noted quietly.

"No," she agreed, "but only because they haven't figured out how to do it on paper yet. Lily showed me a—she called it a telly—one time. They figured out how to make pictures move on there, so they can do it. It just has to be on a monitor."

Regulus looked at her doubtfully. "But it can't be like the way we do it, right?"

"It's their own technique, but it works really well." She smiled suddenly. "Maybe we'll see some tellies on the way to the grocer's. They put them up in windows sometimes. It's wicked, Regulus. You'd like it."

He listened to her ramble on about tellies as they prepared to set off for the nearby Muggle town. They followed a partially obscured path that twisted uphill. As Regulus climbed further and further, he noticed other houses dotted over the landscape, tiny ones like Grace's, situated very far from one another. They all faced the coast.

"Isn't there a wizard settlement here?" he asked.

"Yeah, but it's further away. On the other side, I think." She caught his gaze lingering on the distant houses. "Those are the other summer homes—although I doubt they're in use now."

He felt the same. Who, apart from them, was itching for a retreat to the coast while war waged?

The path melted away as they reached a large cluster of trees. The walk hadn't felt especially long, but when Regulus looked back, the seaside seemed little more than a distant dot. He could barely make out the cresting waves over the grassy hillside.

"It's over here, I think," Grace called, wiggling through a tangled thicket of shrubs. "There's glamour over here. Meant to stop Muggles from wandering in."

Regulus followed her past the shrubs. The small patch of forest was immediately met by cobblestone. Without the shade of the canopy, the full force of the sun fell on Regulus. He raised a hand to block away the light, and blinked blearily at the sight of the Muggle town. It was similar enough to London, although far more scant. There were roads, but they were badly paved and there were only a few cars rumbling by. The houses that clustered over the streets were a far cry from the townhouses Regulus was used to. This was a more homely neighborhood, with stout little houses pushed up against each other. A few windows were left open, curtains fluttering in the slight breeze. Some of the houses had planters hanging underneath.

"Look!" Grace gasped, hurtling off towards one of the shops opposite the street. "There's a telly shop right there!"

Regulus took off after her, more out of fear of being separated than looking at the Muggle contraptions. The window she stopped in front of was plastered with all sorts of monitors, large and small alike, and each showed the same image: a man in Muggle dress cycling down the street. The scene abruptly shifted to a small cottage in the countryside.

Regulus's brows furrowed. "That's—they've got the background changing, too. Our portraits don't do that."

"I know," she breathed. "I told you, it's wicked. They put on performances in the telly."

Grace continued to watch the monitors, enraptured by the scenes playing out. Regulus found himself feeling somewhat putdown. How was it Muggles had figured out something wizards hadn't? He knew they were clever in their own way, but this seemed to go beyond cleverness. They clearly had their own unique methods to achieve whatever a wizard could, and that baffled Regulus, because—well—if you took away the magic, Muggles and wizards were essentially the same. They had the same brains, the same hands, the same tools. And, yet, Muggles had developed their own technique to make portraits move—to make something better, in fact—and no wizard had done the same. Looking at the window of this telly shop made Regulus feel somewhat ashamed to be a wizard: to have everything at his disposal, to have magic at his fingertips, and not to have figured out something a Muggle had.

"Er—where's the grocer's?" he asked, turning away from the window.

Grace peeled her eyes away. "Further down."

She led the way, and they soon reached a rather unassuming store that was similar in build to the telly shop. Grace pushed open the door, triggering some wind chimes.

"Okay, how about you gather food," Grace said, walking further in, "while I go and ask about Doxycide?"

"They won't have Doxycide—"

"I meant something like Doxycide," she said with a touch of exasperation. "Would you rather we didn't get anything at all and just leave the rot as is?"

"…No."

"Right, so I'm going to ask about Doxycide," she said triumphantly. "And you can get food. Don't get anything ambitious. I'm not going to waste the night trying to figure out how to make roasted lemon-and-thyme chicken."

"I won't," Regulus promised. "I'll keep it simple."

They parted ways once Grace got a hold of a nearby man in the store's uniform. Regulus began to wander through the aisles aimlessly. He had found bacon, eggs, and bread rather easily—everything Grace had wanted. But he wasn't in the mood for a simple fry-up, so he delved deeper into the store, eventually coming across a whole row with boxes of pasta. He picked up one to examine and found that, on the back, there was a recipe for spaghetti bolognese. There was a picture stamped above the recipe, showing a beautiful image of golden spaghetti and rich red sauce. Now this was what Regulus wanted. A newfound appreciation for Muggles surged through him. It was very kind of them to print recipes on the back of food items so that ignorant wizards wouldn't go hungry.

Regulus quickly gathered all the ingredients the recipe called for—along with some other items that caught his eye, like a chunk of chocolate shaped like an egg—and made his way back to Grace. She was in the very back of the store, which wasn't devoted to food at all. Instead, there were various soaps and cleaners scattered throughout.

"The man I spoke to didn't know what Doxies were," Grace explained, going through some containers of bleach. "But he said this ought to get rid of mold, which is close to Doxy rot, I guess."

"It's worth a shot," Regulus said. He was feeling rather hopeful after coming across that box of spaghetti. Perhaps the Muggles would surprise him again, and this bleach would take care of the Doxy eggs. He would be eternally grateful if so.

Grace picked out the largest bottle of bleach on the shelf, and the two meandered back to the front of the store, where the clerk was. Unfortunately for them, there was a rather large queue stacking up. With an unhappy sigh, Grace settled in line, Regulus beside her. As the queue gradually shortened, Regulus realized that he was getting quite a few stares. It wasn't anything hostile, just that whenever he looked around, he found someone staring at him. After the fourth time this happened, he began to worry he might have committed some sort of social taboo.

"Do I smell bad?" he asked Grace.

"What?" She looked up at him sharply. "What are you talking about?"

"It's just… I feel like everyone's looking at me," he said sheepishly.

"Everyone's looking at us," she corrected. "We're not dressed like them."

Regulus blinked in surprise. He glanced around the shop and found that Grace was right. They were all wearing Muggle clothes, as Muggles were wont to do, and he and Grace…weren't.

"Oh," he said, patting down his robes, as though that might help him camouflage with the Muggles better. He just didn't want to be looked at any longer.

Thankfully, they reached the front of the line in short order. The clerk took their items and began to total up the price.

"That'll be thirty-two pounds," she said.

Regulus and Grace shared a look.

"Pounds?" Grace questioned. "Pounds of what?"

"I won't say I haven't heard that one before." The clerk chuckled slightly. "Anyway, will you be using cash or a card?"

"What?" Grace said with mounting confusion. She turned to Regulus unsurely. "What card?"

He shrugged. He was about as helpful as a flobberworm in this situation.

The clerk's smile was beginning to falter as she took in their perplexed looks. She was beginning to realize that they weren't joking around. "Er—you know?" she said. "You need to pay money for—"

"Right!" Grace said instantly, bringing out the wad of paper notes from her pocket. "We have money. How much do you need?"

"Thirty-two pounds."

Grace frowned. "Yeah, you said that, but I don't have thirty-two pounds of money. That's absurd."

The poor woman seemed at a loss. "No, I mean… I need thirty-two pounds. Like, you know…" She opened the till and pulled out a note like the ones in Grace's hand. "This is a pound—"

"You mean the woman with the crown! And the number is how many pounds she is!" Grace said happily. She pulled out an amount that equaled thirty-two and handed it over to the clerk. "Here you are."

"Woman with the crown?" she repeated. "You mean the Queen?"

"Oh, now it all makes sense," Grace said, looking at the notes in her hand with new eyes. "She's wearing a crown because she's a queen."

The clerk stared at her, and then at Regulus, and then at their robes. She seemed to be doing some mental gymnastics. She quietly put the money in the till and asked, almost for her own sake, "Are you two…tourists?"

"In a way," Regulus said vaguely, and picked up the bags.

Outside, the sun was beginning to set. Regulus hadn't been very hungry before, but now, with the food right in front of him, he was beginning to feel peckish. They hurried back towards the small grove of trees and quickly slipped past the glamour.

When they reached the house, Regulus began to store their newly bought ingredients in the kitchen while Grace went to deal with the Doxy eggs. To Grace's utter despair—and Regulus's disgust—the Doxy eggs drank up the Muggle bleach as though it were water. Grace decided they would have to order Doxycide at some point and curtained off the entire bookcase for the time being, throwing a bedsheet over the whole thing. Her goal was to hide the mess, but the stark white sheet covering the bookcase only served to consistently draw Regulus's attention to the rot creeping into the house. Still, he tried his best to ignore it by focusing all his attention on cooking—which wasn't going very well.

The spaghetti had been left in the water for too long, and by the time it had been strained it was too soft, almost mushy. The sauce came out mostly fine, except Regulus had thinned it out with too much stirring, and then Grace had gone and added a bit too much salt for his liking. The Muggle bread they'd gotten wasn't the same type Regulus was used to and didn't pair very well with their dish. But they ate it all the same—and, somehow, it tasted better than any other meal Regulus had eaten. The dining table in the kitchen wasn't at all like the large one of Grimmauld Place, which loomed on and on, separating all members of the family. This dining table was small and cramped, but that only meant he could be nearer to Grace. He could hear her laugh when she took her first mouthful and realized just how much salt she'd added into the sauce. He could feel the warmth of her whenever she reached for her goblet and bumped her elbow against his. He could watch the glow of the hearth light her eyes gold. There was a moment, in all this, in between mouthfuls of the soft, salty spaghetti bolognese, in between the banter that flowed from them, where Regulus felt wonderfully, blissfully normal. It felt so nice, so cosy, like a scene plucked out of a storybook. He wanted to be in this moment forever, in this little house by the shore, where worry didn't seem to exist.

Night swept over the sky. Grace put out the fire in the hearth and began to get ready for bed. The pull-out had been fully abandoned in favor of her parent's old room, which was far more spacious. She fell onto the mattress with a sigh and a smile, and Regulus followed her all the way there, his heart full and aching. There was so much love spilling out of him: love for her and all she had ever given him. Love for her too-loud, too-hard laughter. Love for the loyalty she carried for him. Love for this rickety old house she had brought him to. Love for the burning gold of her eyes. Love for her love, which only drew him in further, made his own love stronger, made him feel utterly, unbelievably lucky.

He kissed her with reckless abandon. The steady pulse of the sea glass flashed over the ceiling. Grace laid a hand against his heart.

"I'm really glad you're here," she murmured against his lips.

"I'm glad I'm here, too."

---

They made it two more days pretending everything was all right before they were brought back to reality.

"Fuck—!" Grace swore suddenly, dropping the plate she was drying in favor of clutching at her left forearm.

"Mine, too," Regulus winced, rubbing at his own Mark, trying to stamp away the searing pain that flashed over him. "It might be about the Azkaban breakout."

"Or it might be that he's figured us out."

A chill fell down Regulus's back. He wanted to protest. They hadn't done anything detrimental to You-Know-Who's plans, just as they hadn't done anything noteworthy. There was nothing to warrant attention from him. But, of course, Regulus could never be certain that he and Grace were safe. There was always a chance, after all.

He turned back to Grace, wondering if it would be better if they ignored the call altogether, but found she was no longer in the kitchen. She had sped over to the bedroom and was now sifting through the robes that had been messily thrown into her trunk.

"Here it is!" she exclaimed in relief, pulling out Vance's tube of lipstick from one of the pockets. She clasped it tightly between her hands and returned to Regulus. "All right, we can go now."

"Go?" he echoed.

"It would be worse if we didn't go."

She had him there. Regulus trudged quietly to the coat rack and shrugged on his cloak before setting down the hillside along with Grace. Night had already set, and the darkness seemed far more sinister in Falmouth than anywhere else in the world. It might have been the nearby ocean that made it seem that way: the endless crash of the wave as it hit the shore, the boundless echo of it as it bled into the dark. Regulus found himself shivering as he reached the base of the hill. He could barely make out the sea from the sky. It seemed to be all one large, rippling blanket of darkness.

"Ready?" Grace asked. She reached out a hand.

He sighed and fitted his hand into hers. "Yes," he sighed, feeling very tired of being worried about so many things.

The two Apparated together and landed near the front door of Malfoy Manor. Thankfully, the call wasn't just for the two of them. Other Death Eaters were making their way down the path, although there were noticeably fewer than normal—just the Rosiers, Averys, and a few other more influential families. Regulus and Grace followed them to the back of the house, where You-Know-Who was sitting calmly in the regular meeting room. The Lestranges were already there. Bellatrix was sitting on You-Know-Who's right, along with her husband. Rabastan was seated on the left and was already speaking fervently to You-Know-Who, but his voice was too low for Regulus to catch onto anything he was saying.

Grace chose a seat further in the back of the room, and Regulus dutifully sat down beside her. The few other Death Eaters filtered in and took their seats speedily. They didn't seem to be all that perturbed about the sudden meeting—or that so few of them were present.

"My faithful Death Eaters," You-Know-Who began in an unusual display of respect, "you are called here tonight to discuss troubling news regarding the Order's operations." He glanced to the left. "Rabastan?"

"Shall I bring him out, my Lord?"

"Yes."

Rabastan rose and opened a back door. "Wormtail," he called out, "you may step out. You are in the presence of only the most trusted of our fold."

All eyes darted towards the man stumbling out of the shadows. Wormtail was a stout man, perhaps only a year or so older than Regulus, with watery eyes and straw-like hair. He was huddled into himself, hands knotted together anxiously, eyes darting around the room of dark wizards and witches. There was a certain alertness he carried, a careful touch to his posture—one leg leaned back, foot outward—that made it seem as though he were about to run away any moment now. Regulus's gaze skimmed over him. His lips tugged into a small frown. There was an air of familiarity around this Wormtail fellow. Regulus felt as though he had seen him before, but he couldn't be sure where. He glanced over at Grace to see what she made of this character, and saw that she had stiffened to a degree where she seemed almost inflexible. The planes of her face were tight and hard; her lips were pinched together so tightly they seemed almost like one thin, grave line. And just as Regulus was beginning to wonder why this man was having such an effect on her, he heard Wormtail speak.

It was a weak, timid voice he spoke with, not one that was used to addressing crowds of people. "M—my Lord," he said to You-Know-Who in greeting, almost bowing.

"Wormtail," You-Know-Who acknowledged. "Tell us what you told Rabastan."

"Certainly." He held his head up slightly to address the room, but he couldn't hold eye contact with any particular individual for longer than a few seconds. "The Order is well aware of the plot to break into Azkaban. Dumbledore seems to be under the impression you may have one of your own captured and thrown into Azkaban to assist with your plan. As such, he's planning to ambush some of your own within the week. Rowle, Goyle, and Macnair are the primary targets."

Whispers were spreading through the table. You-Know-Who sat perfectly still. "I see," he intoned deeply. "And if they do not want Rowle, Goyle, and Macnair to reach Azkaban, I can only presume they intend to make sure none of them survive the ambush…"

He said something more, but Regulus wasn't listening. His gaze was still focused on Wormtail—because he had figured out who Wormtail was. Regulus may forget faces from time to time, but he never—not once—forgot a voice. And he knew this voice very well. He heard it titter and guffaw and squeak at Hogwarts, usually in the shadow of his brother. This was the voice of Peter Pettigrew, one of his brother's closest friends. The Marauders, they called themselves. Sirius's band of brotherly buffoons. The people Sirius put above all others. The people Sirius trusted with his very life. The people Sirius left Regulus for.

A white-hot rage erupted from some unrecognizable part of Regulus, from some deep pit within himself. He struggled to stifle it. For Peter Pettigrew to be here was inexcusable, because to be a friend—to be a friend to Sirius—meant to swear loyalty. And perhaps that friendship, that bond of brotherhood, that loyalty had meant something to Peter at Hogwarts, where he was untouchable, but it certainly meant nothing now. Regulus could see clearly, from the cowering, from the nervous looks, that Peter did not belong here. He did not do this out of malice; he did it out of cowardice, and that, somehow, felt worse. There was no conviction behind it. Regulus could not imagine hurting someone so deeply. He could not imagine being frightened to the point of betrayal. This man was a traitor. The longer Regulus stared at Peter, the more he felt it was true: traitor, traitor, traitor. Sirius won't forgive you, he thought, staring at this timid man he had never really met. Sirius will hate you. Sirius will kill you.

And the thoughts went on and on, cycling through him. Regulus worked through his fury until he was able to calm it, until he was able to turn it inward. The longer he looked at Peter Pettigrew, the worse he felt about himself—because wasn't he a traitor, too? Wasn't he frightened, too? Didn't his mother browbeat him into meeting You-Know-Who? Didn't Bellatrix intimidate him into staying? Regulus looked at Peter Pettigrew, at Wormtail, and he saw some awful, distorted reflection of himself. A horrifying disgust lanced through him. Regulus knew precisely how Sirius would react to finding out Peter betrayed him: he would be so hurt, so deeply wounded, that he'd simply explode. He would be nothing more than a ball of fury, a mess of pain so destructive and devastating that the whole world would shake under him. And Peter wasn't even his real brother. That was Regulus—and Regulus was not like Grace. He had not joined out of selflessness. He had not joined out of loyalty or duty. He had joined out of fear. He had joined to join, plain and simple. How would Sirius feel about that?

Regulus often thought about the day Sirius ran away. Regulus liked to think he knew people well, but he had not expected that. Perhaps he had been blinded to the situation, how dreadful it truly was, how deeply Sirius's desires ran. There had been a fight, as there always was. There had been a curse or two, too. Regulus knew full well. He'd seen Kreacher cleaning up the remains of the fractured silverware, mending the blasted legs of the dining table. There had been screams, Mother's and Sirius's, intermingling, so loud and terrible that they seemed almost to be one voice. And after it had all calmed, Sirius went to his room, and he did not come out. Regulus knocked, and he did not come out. It became dark. The hours carried on. Morning arrived, and, still, he did not come out. For the whole day, Sirius Orion Black, firstborn son and heir to the House of Black, did not leave his room—and Regulus realized, quickly, what had happened. Sirius would never come out of that room, because he wasn't in that room anymore. Sirius left. He didn't care anymore. He left, and in the dark, in the night. Without Regulus. He had always thought Sirius simply forgot about him. Sirius got lost in himself often enough: in his joy, in his anger, in his sadness. It would have been almost too easy for Sirius to forget about everything but himself as he packed his things—but now Regulus wondered if Sirius had been thinking about him. What if Sirius had been running away from him, too? What if, when Sirius looked at Regulus, who kept his eyes downcast all through his childhood, all he saw was what Regulus saw in Peter: a debilitating fear, a cowardice so paralyzing it could consume? When Regulus thought about it like this, there was no other way to see that night: of course he went. Of course Sirius left him.

Regulus stared ahead blankly, eyes roving over You-Know-Who as he gave out new instructions, as the other Death Eaters nodded their assent. The meeting went on with a new sense of urgency, but Regulus wasn't at all paying attention. The only thing he could manage to focus on was the overwhelming disgust that filled him whenever his eyes flickered back to Peter, who continued to stand and fidget by the wall. Regulus only regained the thread of the meeting as it came to a close, when he heard the scuffle of chairs as they moved back, Death Eaters rising to take their leave. He felt a warm hand on his shoulder and looked up to see Grace hovering behind him.

"Come on," she said quietly. She had flattened out her anger, leaving her face smooth and untroubled, but Regulus could tell she was still bothered. There was a certain tension she carried. "Let's go."

"Okay," he croaked out, following her towards the door.

Peter was no longer by it. Regulus wondered if he had gone to You-Know-Who to tell him more about what he'd learned or if he'd finished his job and gone home. What if he had gone to visit Sirius? It wasn't entirely implausible. They probably visited each other often, all four of them. Regulus wondered how Peter could sit with his friends, how he could chat with them and laugh with them, when he was doing all this. Wasn't the sheer guilt of it eating him up? Or did his fear outweigh his guilt? Regulus hoped this might be the case, because they would be different in that, at least. Regulus felt far more guilt than he did fear: guilt for every mistake and misstep he had ever made, guilt for disappointing Sirius by having not been braver, guilt for letting down his parents by having not been better, guilt for having dragged Grace into all this, guilt and guilt and guilt.

Grace might have been able to read the emotions as they played out on Regulus's face, because she looked up at him and said, "I know." Her hand brushed his, knuckles passing over knuckles. "I know."

Regulus wanted to collapse into her, hug her hard, weep into her. How had it become like this? With friend betraying friend? How had he become like this? Spineless enough that he'd let himself be pulled into You-Know-Who's fold? Fearful enough that Sirius had simply left him?

They continued towards the exit, but they barely took another step when someone stopped them.

"Regulus," a voice called.

He stilled, and so did Grace. Making his way forward was Rabastan Lestrange. His older brother was lurking some distance behind, listening silently as Bellatrix spoke to him in hushed whispers.

"Rabastan," Regulus acknowledged, albeit a bit more flatly than usual. He wasn't in the mood for this, whatever it was.

Rabastan didn't say anything, simply studying him further. There was a small furrow between his thick brows, as though he couldn't quite understand why Regulus was here. The seconds ticked by quietly. Regulus could feel Grace shifting beside him restlessly.

"Was there something you wanted?" she snapped after a moment.

Rabastan shot her a supremely unimpressed look before shifting focus back to Regulus. "The Dark Lord requests your presence," he drawled.

An icy cold apprehension slipped down Regulus's back. "Oh," he said, racking through his mind for any mistake that might have garnered You-Know-Who's attention, but he couldn't find any. "What for?"

If it had been Bellatrix who delivered the message, Regulus wouldn't have even bothered asking. But Rabastan had always been somewhat forthcoming, at least to those he deemed worthy.

"However should I know?" Rabastan said, and that slight look of confusion slipped back into his face. "He's in the back room. You'd best go now."

With that, Rabastan turned and headed back to his brother and sister-in-law. Regulus looked to Grace, whose face was wrought with worry. She didn't say a word, but he could plainly see the question burning through her head: why was You-Know-Who calling him? The only reason Regulus could find was his spying. Perhaps You-Know-Who had pieced something together from what Peter Pettigrew had said. Perhaps he had figured out that it was Regulus who was sabotaging his plans. Perhaps Regulus was being called now to confirm that suspicion.

"You should go back to the summer home," Regulus said softly. If he was going down, there was no chance he would take Grace with him. She would be safe as long as she got out of here. He was not brave like Sirius, but he was loyal. Loyal until the very, very end. "I'll come to you later."

"Will you be okay?" Grace asked. "What if he…does something?"

"I'll be fine," he assured.

"I can wait somewhere—"

"You shouldn't hang around the manor. It'll look strange." He took her hand in his and gave it a soft squeeze. "I'll be fine. I'm sure it's nothing." At least, he hoped so.

It was no easy feat to convince Grace to leave. She stood by him stubbornly for another minute, silently debating, before coming to some sort of conclusion. She drew nearer to him, an inch apart, a centimeter apart, a hair's breadth away—and Regulus wondered with a confused panic if she was about to kiss him in Malfoy Manor with the Lestranges right behind them. Her arms wound around him and pulled him into a tight hug. One of her hands reached down into his pocket and slipped something inside.

In his ear, she whispered, "Come back quick."

She drew back, gave him one final, worried look, and began to make her way towards the exit. She left through the half-open door, and she took all the remaining warmth of the room with her. Regulus felt as though he had just been transported to the middle of winter. His bones rattled with every step he took. The door to the back room was curved, an arcing ebony. It seemed almost like a tombstone. One hand reached down into the pocket Grace had touched during their hug, where he felt the cool touch of metal: Vance's lipstick. The other hand reached up, trembling as it curled around the doorknob and pushed. The door gave a small groan of unease as it pulled open a crack, letting a sliver of light into the dark room. Regulus could just make out the shadow of You-Know-Who's profile, lounging with heavy boredom against an ornate chair pushed to the very corner of the room. He took one shaky breath and went inside, steps slow and soft.

"You called for me, my Lord?"

"Regulus," he acknowledged. The name slithered out of his mouth. Regulus found himself shivering. "I require a house-elf."

Regulus's brows lifted slightly. Relief filled him at once, quick and warming, a roaring hearth in a world of darkness—but it was quickly followed by a crushing confusion. This was certainly not what he had been expecting. He wondered, briefly, if he ought to be happy about this at all. Any other Death Eater certainly would be. They might have even thought themselves lucky, handing over their house-elf instead of their life, but Regulus didn't feel that way. Kreacher was not his house-elf, after all. Kreacher was his friend. And You-Know-Who was a cruel man with crueler motives. How could Regulus be expected to simply hand over Kreacher? An even worse thought: How could Regulus be expected not to? He was in no position to refuse.

(How would Sirius have approached any of this, if he had messed up badly enough to be in this sort of situation? What would Sirius have said if You-Know-Who asked him to give over a friend? Fuck off, probably. Over my dead body. Regulus could see it clearly: Sirius, bright and blazing, brave until the very end, refusing even when he had everything to lose. Regulus could not do that. He was not brave like Sirius. He would say yes, out of fear, out of desperation, out of some foolish desire to avoid conflict at any cost. He would say yes, like how Peter Pettigrew probably said yes when he was approached by Death Eaters.)

"Of course, my Lord. Shall I call for him now?"

---

A/N : So sorry for the big delay! This chapter was surprisingly difficult to write. I must have re-written it three or four times, and I'm honestly still not quite happy with it, but I also didn't want to subject myself to more rewrites.

Just some insight into Voldemort: he's has been thinking really hard about the "by the bold, the chain shall be stolen" part of Grace's prophecy and believes that if he uses a particularly "bold" Death Eater to lend him their house-elf to hide the locket, then that Death Eater might come back later to steal the locket. So, Voldemort's going with a Death Eater he is *so sure* is in no way bold—which is Regulus. Of course, this is a phenomenally bad decision as we all know Regulus's superpower is being underestimated.

Jo : Regulus never met the Potter parents formally, but they've heard a lot about him from both Sirius and Grace and have probably had a few distant interactions (maybe waved at him at King's Cross or something). Sophia is related to Olive Hornby! She mentions Olive indirectly in chapter two as her great aunt; it's the reason Moaning Myrtle has been pestering Sophia since she stepped foot in Hogwarts. And the Wilkinson Regulus mentions and the Wilkinson in his year are two different people and not related. That's sort of my fault! I totally forgot I used the name Wilkinson already, haha.

lilyflowerre : ahhh, thank you for the lovely review! "They're especially nice to suck on" omg! Killed me! LOL

RandomReaderRawr : Thank you so much! Hope you're safe and well, too! Grace has sort of been "cured" of Hywell's; the cause behind her condition was that disconnect between herself and her Inner Eye, and now that she's sort of realigned herself, all that weird mystical excess magic manifests now as hyper-real visions instead of seizures.

"Regulus will most likely be receiving a summons for a house elf here pretty soon" — again, *so* spot on! Also, Grace has never met Moody and doesn't know who he is, so whenever she sees him in a vision, she's like, 'oh, it's that strange man again!' But she gave good descriptors of Moody to Vance (the peg leg), so Vance knows.

NicCraft18 : thank you! Voldemort is such a difficult character to write; I feel like his meddling with dark magic has given him (more of) a tendency to lash out in a deranged manner. In the last chapter, he was really frustrated with the setbacks he was facing and decided to take it out on Grace. Your observations about Vance & Grace were amazing! They both have firm convictions, but where Vance acts out duty, Grace acts out of love.

James will absolutely be re-entering the story! I went into this story planning to not have any Tonks family interactions (I think there was a throwaway line somewhere that they've gone into hiding because Bellatrix has it out for Andromeda), and it'll probably stay that way simply because there's a lot that's going to happen.

Mars : haha, Dumbledore had like a whole plan for approaching Regulus. Dumbledore definitely knows how to play people (e.g. when Snape came to Dumbledore to ask him to protect Lily and he was like "you disgust me"; and then sort of using Snape's "love" for Lily to get him to protect Harry). In Chapter 15, he was reminding Grace of her condition, her parents, her Sorting—all the more vulnerable parts of her—to sort of get her to feel ashamed of herself so that she would bend more easily to what he needs her to do (because he knows full well how rebellious Grace can be and he desperately needed a spy). In the last chapter, Dumbledore was going to bring up Regulus's parents and Sirius and stuff, but then he went into his head and saw Grace&Regulus hardcore snogging and just peaced out LOL Regulus 100% ruined him with that