If you're interested, I wrote a one-shot not long ago, "Trial of a rat" ( which I at first planned to title "Ratting him out") about Sirius catching Peter back in third year...
Chapter 29: The latest Black scandal
The day had been somewhat goodish for Rufus Scrimgeour, everything taken into account. Meaning, yes, sure, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named hadn't been taken down yet, no new Death Eater was in Azkaban, but on the bright side, no one had died this day. It wasn't always the case.
Rufus Scrimgeour could say he was kind of pleased with his day so far.
The fact that some masked fool had tried to sneek in the Black main property, leaving a literal arm behind him for the Department of Mysteries to study, at the beginning of the day, had been a great start, too.
The Minister for Magic should have known this day was too good to be real.
Scrimgeour had been about to walk out of his office, about to go home, when the news hit him flat in the face.
There was a kid named "Black" at Hogwarts, this year.
A young boy with silver eyes.
And from what Scrimgeour knew, there were only two people who could be the boy's father. Either Sirius Black had somehow gotten out of Azkaban twelve years ago without anyone knowing about it, only to go back there afterwards – which, frankly, didn't seem all that plausible – or Regulus Black wasn't as dead as everyone seemed to think.
Not that a body had ever been found. So yes, Regulus Black could be alive. It was possible.
Only, it didn't explain how the Black family tree had told the world otherwise... Unless Arcturus Black had meddled with that too. It wouldn't be a surprise. The Blacks were a bunch of damned and dangerous lunatics who, unlike most lunatics, didn't lack a brain.
Some even less so than the others. Arcturus, Alphard and Sirius Black all fell into that category.
Moreover, they couldn't care less about the law. All that mattered to these people was whether or not the end justified the means in their own books. If the latest Lord Black was more or less agreeing with the laws, it was only because he didn't share his family's points of view on many things.
Scrimgeour wouldn't count himself lucky on that point yet.
Now, ignoring that Arcturus Black had possibly tricked everyone into thinking his grandson was dead, it still left the question of "Where-the-Hell-had-Regulus-Black-disappeared-to-all-this-time?", with the added bonus of "Do-we-have-to-worry-about-his-activities?".
Because even if no one could affirm that the youngest Black had been a Death Eater, there was more than a lingering question to it. Everyone was certain it was the case, they just couldn't prove it.
Then again, it had been the case with his older brother too, and how wrong had they been!
Even if the Minister for Magic was convinced of Regulus Black's guilt, he couldn't exactly act upon it. Not without anyone wondering if, perhaps, he wasn't doing the exact same thing to the youngest brother, as what had been done to the oldest.
Really, what Scrimgeour would be able to do, it all depended on Lord Black's reaction. If the older brother backed him up, it would all go smoothly. Or, as smoothly as possible. With purebloods, nothing was ever smooth. And with the House of Black, it was always worse than not-smooth.
But if Sirius Black decided he wanted his little brother back more than he wanted justice, then everything would either go to hell, or Scrimgeour would be forced to let the youngest Black go free.
Not free of surveillance, obviously, but free nonetheless.
While the Black lord was obviously against anything death-eaterish, while the Minister for Magic was certain that Sirius Black stood against everything his family represented during the last decades, Rufus Scrimgeour also knew that, in the end, Regulus Black was the man's little brother. And Black had already lost so much...
Nothing said that he wouldn't want to keep this one little reminder of happier times.
Perhaps, even, Lord Black would think he'd be able to turn his little brother back into a good boy.
Sirius Black was as rational as a man could be, but there was a limit to everything.
Freaking Blacks.
Scrimgeour grumbled something incomprehensible, and turned around to look at the two aurors who were always tailling him, just in case.
"We are going to Hogwarts. Now."
Savage and Fell shared a long-suffering look, both having met with Sirius Black since his return. They had seen the hassle that it was, dealing wih the current Lord Black, and they didn't envy the Minister at all. If Black decided that he'd keep his brother, then there was nothing the Ministry would be able to do.
Not with what they had on Regulus Black right now – meaning, only suspicions.
The Minister for Magic and his two aurors walked across the ministry at such a pace and with such faces that everyone simply stepped out of their way. People wondered what it was about, this time, but they never quite guessed. After all, it wasn't an uncommon sight these days.
It took only a minute for them to use the floo network out of the ministry, and into Hogsmeade. There they walked out of the public chimney, and the aurors shared a glance towards three people they knew to be involved in some unsavory activities, but who, for now, were only sharing a butterbeer inside the Three Broomsticks. Their eyes met through the glass window, but it didn't go any further.
The three possible Death Eaters were surely wondering what the Minister for Magic was doing here at this hour. They weren't a threat right now. Especially not as they had quite certainly gotten their own children to the boarding school this afternoon, and so hadn't bothered hiding their identity.
It would be too risky for them to act now.
It took almost one hour to reach the castle, and get an interview with Dumbledore. It was the first day of school, and the kids had to go back to their dormitory before the Minister could waltz in. If they got lucky, the headmaster would have kept his newest problem student near. There was no doubt that the Ministry would intervene, after all, and it was so much easier to simply leave the boy waiting than to go and get him once he'd be out of the Great Hall...
But when Scrimgeour entered the Great Hall, there was no child in sight. Only the headmaster and the four Heads of House, in a quiet discussion.
Snape looked like he was taken by a bad case of diarrhea, but it was nothing new, so there was no point trying to read something from him. The Minister for Magic, former auror, shifted his focus onto the others. He didn't bother with Albus Dumbledore either, because the older man was simply unreadable in his best days. So when the headmaster was on his guard, Scrimgeour just knew there was nothing to find.
The three other professors, on the other hand, weren't as guarded.
Minerva McGonagall seemed a bit tense. Filius Flitwick glanced at the aurors and the Minister every now and then. And Pomona Sprout was wriggling her hands.
It was odd, to realize that all this agitation came from only one child.
One child who went by the name of Alshain Black, though. In the current situation, it made more sense than it could seem. The Blacks were radioactive.
Scrimgeour reached the professors with a scowl on his face, just thinking about it.
"I need to speak with the child, Headmaster."
Albus Dumbledore looked at him for a moment, before answering, with steel in his eyes.
"No, you don't."
"You will let me speak with Alshain Black, Headmaster, or Merlin help me I..."
The elderly wizard lifted a hand.
"I already spoke with the child, Minister. He has been most cooperative, by the way. All you need to know, I will tell you. But you will not interrogate Alshain Black, not today, not at this hour. Your aurors may come back later in the week, at an appropriate hour of the day, if you wish. But if you try to force my hand, I will personally see you out of my school."
Scrimgeour gritted his teeth, but didn't complain. Not yet.
He was used to the headmaster's obstinacy. And it would always be time to ask to see the kid again, if Dumbledore didn't tell him everything he wanted to know about Alshain Black and his father. If he insisted now, on the other hand, the old wizard could simply refuse to speak, and since he had the authority to make him leave the grounds...
"What can you tell me, Headmaster?"
The elder wizard spared a thoughtful glance at his colleagues, but soon enough he was back into a starring contest with the Minister for Magic. There was no doubt that neither of them would back off. Where Cornelius Fudge would have looked away, Rufus Scrimgeour never did.
"Alshain Black's father suffers from amnesia since a long time, but his description matches a member of the House of Black, more particularly Regulus Black. Just over six feet, long black hair, silver eyes, a red scar running through his left cheek and well into his neck, and a few others on his arms and legs, from what Alshain told me. No idea as to the origin of these scars."
Savage snorted from where he stood, just a few meters away.
Albus Dumbledore arched both eyebrows, and looked at the auror, who suddenly became squirmish.
"Do you have something to comment on, Auror Savage?"
The younger wizard cleared his throat, ill-at-ease all of a sudden.
"It's just, ah, that I have a pretty good idea of how Regulus Black could have gotten these scars, considering that he really doesn't remember a thing, which I'm not really buying, at least not until I get a look at him. The youngest brother wasn't exactly known for his muggle-friendly attitude, back in the days. Just as the oldest brother wasn't exactly known for agreeing with his family's views."
Snape mumbled something there, but as much as Hannah Fell would have liked to hear what the "reformed" Death Eater was saying about either of the Black brothers, the auror didn't manage to hear anything.
Minerva McGonagall intervened here, looking stern as always, and perhaps a bit pissed at the other auror.
"The last time the Auror Office made assumptions, an innocent spent twelve years in Azkaban, Harold Savage. I have nothing against you doing your job, but I think you'd be able to better judge Regulus Black if you went to see him in person, rather than to simply babble on a situation you know nothing of, and that you should thus investigate properly."
Scrimgeour raised a hand to stop Savage from saying anything, even if the man only seemed miffed enough to pout. The Minister for Magic couldn't say there was no logic in McGonagall's words, and he could hear in her tone that she wasn't defending the youngest Black, despite what it could sound like. It was more likely that the witch was still sick with what had happened to her former student, and didn't want a repeat.
Frankly, Scrimgeour didn't want one either, if not for the same reasons.
If they arrested Regulus Black, he wanted it to happen the right way, so that no one could contest the decision. The Ministry didn't need another trial of Black vs. the administration.
So, he asked the only reasonable question, one that followed directly the transfiguration professor's speech.
"Did the child say where we can find his father?"
Dumbledore waited an instant before answering, his eyes expertly assessing the Minister for Magic's mood.
"Alshain, his mother, and Regulus Black live in a suburb of London. Apparently Regulus has been going by the name Cadfael White since he woke up, without memories, on a beach where Amanda White was spending her holidays."
Scrimgeour raised an incredulous eyebrow as Dumbledore produced a piece of paper with the address on it. Regulus Black had married a woman named "White" of all people? Life must be mocking the man, if so, because this was too much irony.
The Minister for Magic nonetheless pocketed the address. For all the irony in the situation, it didn't mean it was false. No one would be stupid enough to invent such a story, right?
"Thank you very much, Headmaster. Now, if you would excuse me, but I have an interrogation to supervise..."
"Wait another moment, Minister."
Albus Dumbledore's voice rang in the Great Hall of Hogwarts, and cut Rufus Scrimgeour in his action of turning around and walking back out of the castle. The Minister for Magic slowly pivoted, again, on his heels, and took all his time to stare at the various professors present before his eyes went back onto the headmaster's tall frame.
"Is there something else I need to know, Headmaster?"
"Before you storm into the Whites' residence all wands blazing, you should consider that Amanda White is a muggle."
This, if nothing else, got a reaction from the Minister and his aurors. They simply stared, unable to speak, at the elderly wizard, as if he had just told them that You-Know-Who had had a change of heart and decided to become a ballerina.
And before anything else could be said, Hannah Fell's report book buzzed.
"Flume. Isn't he supposed to on break?"
Scrimgeour noted that he should perhaps speak with Robards about Flume's timetable. One of the youngest aurors, the guy was "forgetting" to get some time out lately, as if his constant presence at the Office or on the field would make him more useful.
"Sirius Black just came into St. Mungo's with a stranger who looked terribly like his younger brother Regulus Black. Right now, the guy is being taken care of for various remaining scars from what looks like inferi-related injuries, if the healers are right, as well as for a probable head trauma. Flume doesn't know what happened to him, but if this is really Regulus Black, he says he's more than surprised he survived."
Savage and Flitwick had gone white as a sheet when they heard the words "inferi-related", and frankly, Scrimgeour himself didn't feel very well. If that was the reason for the scars, Savage's theory would take a heavy hit.
The people who had been victims of inferi during the first wizarding war weren't usually Death Eaters, but more likely those whom He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named wanted, not only dead, but torn into pieces. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to consider that the traumatism left by such an attack could cause amnesia.
Scrimgeour sure as hell wouldn't want to remember being attacked by a bunch of inferi. They tended to grab you and never let you go unless someone managed to destroy the head or the heart. Whatever had happened to Regulus Black, if the healers were right, he had surely been caught by a large number of inferi, and the only way he could have gotten away would be a lucky apparition, at a moment no inferius was touching him...
It took a while, but eventually Scrimgeour barked an order to his aurors, who protested loudly but obeyed nonetheless.
"I'm going to St. Mungo's, and you two are going to see Amanda White. You check her house for anything remotely suspect. Then you take her with you to the hospital. I'm certain she'd be relieved to see her husband, and perhaps her presence will make Regulus Black more open."
"But, Minister, we cannot leave you alo..."
"You can, and you will. I am more than able to fend for myself, thank very much, and I want to know the bottom of this story. These damned Blacks are always making it difficult for us, but I won't let this situation turn sour. So we are taking care of it now, and we aren't losing time over my security."
Savage and Flume glanced at each other in dismay, then back at the Minister for Magic. The look Scrimgeour gave them was apparently enough, because the witch of the duo immediately took the address he was handing them, and in a matter of seconds, they were gone.
Before leaving himself, Scrimgeour turned around to look at the professors.
"What House did you say Alshain Black was Sorted in?"
Dumbledore gave him a pleasant smile.
"I did not share this information, Minister, but the young Mister Black is now a student of Slytherin House. He made his entry rather remarkable, as it is, since he basically told young Mister Malfoy that his mother is a muggle and he would not tolerate any insulting words from anyone, before proceeding to utterly ignore the ones who protested."
The Minister rolled his eyes.
"Just like his uncle, then. Great. As if we didn't have enough problems with the adult Blacks."
Scrimgeour left Hogwarts with a growing headache, and what felt like a permanent scowl on his face. He should have known this day couldn't be that good. He shoud have.
When he entered St. Mungo's, it didn't take him long to find where the latest Black scandal was happening. Regulus Black's room had basically been quarantined by the healers, not because his case was potentially contagious, but because Rita-Skeeter-clone-n°1, a red-headed witch who revealed in juicy news, and Rita-Skeeter-clone-n°2, a smallish woman with the apparent ability to sniff out selling stories, two journalists who had gotten the job after the original Rita Skeeter had left the field without explanation, were already lurking around, and let's not speak about the curious onlookers.
Scrimgeour finally noticed Marcus Flume, standing just outside Regulus Black's door, and right next to Sirius Black, who was sitting on a bench in the corridor...
Looking blank.
The Minister for Magic had no idea what to say, other than that Lord Black was looking alarmingly blank.
Immediately he took the auror by the arm, and whispered not to be overheard.
"Black was the one to bring his brother in, right?"
Flume stared at the Minister for a moment, trying to figure out which Black was "Black" and which was "his brother", considering that both were Blacks and both were each other's brother.
"Yes... From what I've been told, they arrived about thirty minutes ago, Lord Black almost dragging his confused brother all the way from the entrance to the nearest healer. Then he forced Regulus to show his arms, which were red with old lacerations that didn't want to heal up, and he said something about memory loss. There was a bit of a commotion at some point, because someone recognized the younger brother, and then it all became very confusing, their words, not mine. The healers are saying it is really Regulus Black, and his injuries are filled with, wait for it, sixteen-years-old inferi residue, which would explain why it's this red even after all that time. They are checking him up, right now."
"You said he had to roll up his sleeves. No Dark Mark?"
Flume seemed flustered by the question, but really, it was more about the state said arms had been in last time he had taken a look. It was nothing like a big, gapping fresh wound, but it looked painful enough.
"No, Minister. I've checked myself, but all there is is a whole lot of scar tissue on his arms, and not only his arms, because the legs are no better, and there is some more across his torso and his back. Otherwise he looks healthy, but it's still rather yucky..."
Scrimgeour did not arch an eyebrow at the youngster's choice of word, but that was because he was too busy keeping an eye on the oldest Black. He didn't like the look in the man's eyes.
Or rather, he didn't like the absence of any look in the man's eyes.
Besides, said not-look still managed to be quite eerie, even when it wasn't here.
"Did you check Lord Black for any controlling spell? Could his brother have, I don't known, imperiused him not to act upon his reappearance?"
Flume glanced at Sirius Black, still sitting, motionless, on his bench. The mere sight made him shiver, and he looked back at the Minister for Magic.
He had rarely seen someone so still – who wasn't a corpse.
"A healer examined Lord Black when the agitation died down, but there is nothing. Perhaps he is just shell-shocked..."
The auror didn't seem that convinced with his explanation. He had seen a few shell-shocked people in his life, and none had ever reacted like that.
Sirius Black seemed simply not to be there. He wasn't numb or panicked, he wasn't reacting slowly. No, when Marcus Flume had asked him for details, he had given them right away, a story about how he had been searching for his brother since his family tree had reacted oddly to the update. Black seemed totally alert and well, in a way, but at the same time he didn't seem here.
There was no tone to his words. No light in his eyes.
It was as if his body and brain were on autopilot, while Sirius Black, soul-side, was locked away.
Which was pretty suspicious considering that his possibly-a-follower-of-You-Know-Who of a brother had just reappeared. Sure, the youngest Black brother didn't have a Dark Mark, but it was safe to consider it didn't mean anything more than that he hadn't been one of the closest Death Eaters. Only a handful of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's followers were marked, in fact. The ones who were either clever enough not to get caught, or dedicated enough that they didn't fear being branded and recognizable.
Flume could totally understand that the Minister for Magic would see Black's unusual attitude as a cause of suspicion for the other Black's actions.
The auror caught sight of the healer who had looked at Lord Black earlier on, and gestured to her to come and see them. The witch looked uncertain for a moment, but it didn't seem like she had a patient to look at right now, because she eventually joined the auror and the Minister for Magic.
"Healer Heathcliff, could you tell the Minister what you told me, about Lord Black's state?"
The woman glanced briefly at Scrimgeour, then at Sirius Black, before her gaze fell back on Flume. A twitch disturbed the right corner of her mouth when she looked at the Black lord, and she grimaced at Flume just before answering.
"Everything checkable, I checked. He hasn't been subjected to any kind of magic, dark or not, lately. He has used a vast amount of power, though, but nothing with mental effects. Whatever caused him to end up this unresponsive emotionally, Black did to himself. Personally, I think he couldn't cope with his brother's return, and he just shut everything down in here."
She pointed to her own head, and shook it right afterwards.
"How he did that, however, I have no idea. Mental power, probably, perhaps occlumency. I'm not really surprised, considering what happened to that journalist who tried to get in his head after the trial. It took us one whole week to sort her out, and she will still have problems with his memories for a while. Black got it all in his head, too, but he's mostly stable, it has to say something about his mental strength."
The healer's eyes flittered back to the silent man on his bench, and she cursed under her breath. It made Flume jump in surprise, and Scrimgeour frown. The witch pushed her way to the oldest Black, and tried to get him to come with her. The wizard only looked at her mildly, and stood up only to head for the public restroom.
He was bleeding from his nose, his ears, and a bit from the eyes too.
"I am perfectly fine, Healer Heathcliff. I may have overused my magical abilities sooner in the evening. There's nothing you can do, but to let it bleed."
"Bullshit there's nothing to do! I don't want to have to deal with two Blacks in St. Mungo's, just because you aren't being carefull enough. You know what could happen, if you're wrong and this is worse than you think it is?!"
"I'd have started convulsing about twenty minutes ago if I was wrong. I will just go and clean myself up."
"But..."
Black was already walking away. At the sight of the tears of blood on his face the curious crowd parted up. The healer tried to follow him.
Scrimgeour relaxed a bit when the man walked away, letting go of a tension he hadn't even been aware of. There was something really, really eerie about this Sirius Black, and he didn't like it.
The Minister for Magic looked at the room where another healer was dealing with Regulus Black's old wounds. He really had to speak with the wizard, but he just knew that he wouldn't be allowed in without a family member or another legal representant. Not with the suspicions that fell onto Black.
He was about to resign himself to waiting for however long it would take for the older Black to come back, without ghastly trails of blood on his face, when the onlookers once again parted way to let someone through. Scrimgeour was almost certain he heard a shriek or two as it happened.
And indeed, it was Bellatrix Lestrange's ghost making her way to the room. Now wonder someone had shrieked. The Minister himself tensed at the sight of one of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's most dedicated followers, even deceased and supposedly saner as she was.
Scrimgeour did not envy Sirius Black for having the ghost dumped on him. Even if the two somehow managed to put their disagreements aside, it still was bad publicity.
He was quite surprised that the ghost would be out in the open so soon after her death...
Then the Minister saw who was walking behind the ghost, and he understood.
Andromeda and Nymphadora Tonks had certainly been told about their returned cousin by their deceased sister / aunt. The eldest member of the House of Black alive didn't seem to care about her sister's inconvenient reputation, totally focused on her youngest cousin who had suddenly been brought back from the dead. Nymphadora Tonks, on the other hand, glanced at her aunt now and then with an uneasy look on her face.
When the two witches reached the door, there was a moment of silence, which was used by the two oldest in the corridor to stare the others down. Then Andromeda Tonks née Black gave the Minister a tight smile, and pushed the door to her cousin's room open. The ghost of Bellatrix Lestrange simply avoided any eye contact. She wasn't one to back down, but it really wasn't the time to get kicked out of the hospital.
Nymphadora Tonks gave a wan smile to Marcus Flume, as her colleagues entered the room too.
"I have no idea what I did to end up in this family, really."
Flume answered her through gritted teeth.
"You surely were an awful person in a previous life."
"Surely. Like, boiling-babies-for-a-beauty-cream awful."
The wizard refraigned from snorting in derision.
"Smile, Tonks, it could be worse."
"How so?"
"You could have been born in the Crabbe family."
The witch shuddered at the thought, and glanced at her mother, her ghost of a psychopathic aunt, and her estranged cousin. Speaking of which, where had her other cousin gone to? Wasn't he the one who had brought his younger brother in to begin with?
Her mother seemed to be thinking the same thing, because she asked right after the healer finished explaining Regulus' state. And once she had taken a good look at her cousin's left forearm, too.
"Where is Sirius?"
Flume grimaced, but answered nonetheless.
"Lord Black started bleeding all over his face, I think he went to clean himself up."
Andromeda raised an eyebrow, high, at the news. Sirius would never have gone away from the room where his possibly-up-for-jail brother was sleeping, even if he had almost been gutted, which wasn't the case. Just bleeding a bit should not have sent him away. Sirius' most defining trait was perhaps his stubbornness. And since he couldn't care less about a bit of blood...
The Minister for Magic intervened then, far from oblivious to the disbelief on the Black witch's face.
"It may be out of character, Mrs Tonks, but Lord Black didn't seem quite like himself when we saw him. He seemed... worryingly unresponsive."
Andromeda didn't get it right away, but it sure didn't take long for her to groan her frustration.
"He did it again, that idiot..."
"What did he do, exactly?"
"Oh, he only stopped everything: feelings, personal attachments... The limits of occlumency, really. No one would be insane enough to do that, and it's the second time already Sirius did it. Last time he did it, it was after the Whomping Willow incident. He freaked out about every single person in Hogwarts for two or three months, before his friends convinced him to go back to normal. He does that because, as always, he values efficiency over being true to himself."
The witch stared at the sleeping figure of Regulus Black for a moment.
"Sirius certainly thought he didn't have the luxury to be emotionally unstable right now..."
As it was, said not-emotionally-unstable person walked into the room right at that moment, accompanied by the aurors Hannah Fell and Harold Savage. As well as by a beautiful woman with scarlet-bright-red hair and large blue eyes. For a moment Scrimgeour wondered what a Weasley was doing here, then he remembered that the Weasleys were more on the orange side of red hairedness. The muggle woman was wearing a blue poncho sweater which somehow made her fit in with the wizarding community.
It took him a moment to realize that the woman was most likely Amanda White.
Then the Minister for Magic noticed the way Savage was clenching his jaw, and that Fell had a disturbingly hand-shaped red mark around her throat. Both were sending uneasy looks at the muggle woman, and Scimgeour couldn't for the life of him guess what had possibly happened at the Whites' house.
Amanda's eyes immediately went to her husband, and before anyone could tell her otherwise, she was sitting next to the bed, holding Cadfael – no, Regulus' hands. The healer, who was still administering a special ointment onto the reddish scars, tried to protest, but he soon let it go when they crossed gazes. His guts just told him he'd better leave her alone if he didn't want anything unfortunate to happen.
Like, she had that Mad-Eye-Moody look in her eyes right now, the one which said "back off before I decide to break half the bones in your body with a hairpin", feminin version.
Even if they weren't on the receiving end of said look, Savage, Fell and Flume reacted just the same way as the healer: by taking a step back.
Muggle or not, Bellatrix mused, she already liked the woman.
The Minister for Magic, instead, took one step towards the woman. Regulus Black's wife...
"If you please, Mrs Black..."
That got a surprised look from the Tonks, who had been wondering who this stranger was. And it got absolutely nothing from Sirius, who was so deep in the muddy waters of his own mind that the surprise simply slid off him. Figures.
Amanda gave the Minister for Magic an amused smile.
"You can call me Mrs White, if you'd rather. We've done with it all these years, since Cadfael... Wait, Regulus, isn't that his real name? Since Regulus didn't remember his family name. I don't mind either name."
Truth be told, Regulus and Amanda had worked on calling him by his true name ever since he had regained his memories, though not in front of Alshain.
Regulus had finally told her everything she needed to know about his past, during the last month. Accepting that her husband had been part of a racist and terroristic group hadn't been easy, but there had been hints, over the years, fragments of memories wihtout real meaning, which had nonetheless told the Whites that Cadfael's past hadn't been stark white. Amanda hadn't been that surprised, and really, she hadn't been surprised either, when Regulus had told her that his near death had happened because he had backed off.
Maybe she didn't know Regulus' past that well, put she knew Cadfael, and they were one and the same. She knew her husband. And she knew his regrets were sincere. That he still had nightmares about the errors from the past.
Amanda was well-placed to know that the true monsters were the ones who never had nightmares.
She tightened her hold on her husband's hand.
Regulus had told her to be frank with the magical authorities. He had told her that he deserved everything that would come his way. That she shouldn't lie, not even to help him.
But here they were, and Regulus was being treated, not thrown into jail yet. Amanda had been in the military, and she knew enough about extremists to say that even if they were wounded, they would never be left in a hospital without precautions taken. She didn't know much about magic, but still, it seemed like there were no precautions taken here.
And the two aurors had said – just after the little misunderstanding which had ended up with her almost strangling the suspicious people asking about her husband this late in the night – the aurors had said that Regulus wasn't accused of anything yet.
He'd told Amanda to be honest, but she wouldn't let her husband pay for something he had more than already paid for. Alshain needed his father, too.
Amanda only took a moment to look at the faces of the other people in the room. Four were wearing an uniform, whom she knew to be aurors. One was the man who had just called her Mrs Black, and whom she recognized from Regulus' newspapers to be the Minister for Magic. The others seemed to be related to Regulus.
One of them was the auror witch with bubblegum pink hair. She was the one who looked the less like Regulus, but there was something that remained in her facial features... Amanda couldn't quite tell what it was, but she could see something of her husband in the young woman.
The second was an older woman, who looked both like Regulus and like the previous woman, probably her mother. Same jaw as Regulus, same nose, but with angles a bit less sharp.
Of course, Amanda couldn't see Bellatrix. Muggles couldn't see ghosts, except under very special circumstances. But if she had been able to, she'd have noticed, past the likeness between Bella and Andromeda, even more similarities between the ghost and her husband. The ink-black hair, the posture, and something in the facial expression that reeked of accidental haughtiness.
And ultimately, there was the one person she could just peg as Regulus' brother, and not only because she had seen his picture in the newspapers too. In a way, Sirius Black seemed to be a higher definition image of her husband. Perhaps he was one inch or so shorter than his younger brother, and his stature in general seemed a bit more lean; but aside from that, the older Black brother had the exact same features Regulus did, only, sharper and smoother at the same time. Which was odd to think about, but eitherway. Just, more harmonious – not that it mattered much to Amanda.
What really got her, thought, was the dead look in the man's eyes. It didn't correspond with what Regulus had told her about his brother; it didn't even fit the photographs she had seen.
Amanda looked back at her sleeping husband.
How would she react, herself, if Alexander reappeared without warning after years of being thought dead? She had no idea.
Perhaps it explained why Sirius Black seemed completely absent right now, even if his body and mind worked all right.
Amanda looked back at the Minister for Magic, and started talking.
She told them about how she had found a wounded and unconscious man on a beach during her holidays, years ago, how it had turned out that he had almost no memories, how he had chosen the name Cadfael, not because of how it sounded, but because the meaning reminded him of something. How she had kept visiting him during the next month. How she had decided to stop working to take care of him.
How the stranger had gradually made her fall in love, and how he had eventually told her that, even if he didn't remember much, he at least remembered one thing: how to do magic. How she hadn't believed him at first, until he had made a shadow show just for her in the light of the morning.
How they had gotten married, a bit unsure of what they were doing, Cadfael always wondering if he hadn't left another family behind. How they had never managed to get anything out of his head, and how they had eventually let go of the hope to find his past back, one day. How he had nightmares, sometimes, which made him scream in his sleep.
How Alshain had been a bit of a surprise, and how they had welcomed the unexpected chid nonetheless.
Amanda kept to herself the bit about the last months, about Regulus' memories coming back.
She hoped it wouldn't fire right back at her.
But she needed her husband to be free – if not for herself, at least for their son.
She saw the glint of doubt in Andromeda Tonks' eyes, but the older woman didn't say a word about it. She only glanced suspiciously at Regulus' brother, as if he had all the answers. But Sirius Black only stared back.
There was something here, Amanda could tell, that wasn't quite normal. But she didn't know the Blacks well enough to say what exactly.
Then a terribly annoying journalist opened the door and tried to ask a question, before being violently pushed back by Harold Savage. Andromeda almost rolled her eyes, gritted her teeth, and stood up. The next instant, she had a perfect smile on her face, directed at Sirius.
"I do trust you not to do anything stupid, Sirius, but not to act like a decent human being in the state you got yourself in. So I will be the one to handle the journalists this time. Nymphadora, make sure he doesn't do anything irreparable."
And just like that, Andromeda Tonks walked out.