"Land ahoy!"
Sirius' shout echoed through the tunnel and startled Regulus; it was much closer than he had anticipated yet he couldn't see what Sirius referenced.
He traced the walls of the tunnel – which were as hard and uneven as the concrete floor – until he came to a turn left and was blinded by a sudden light. He squeezed his eyes shut in an effort to keep out the light and only opened them when he heard Sirius exclaim: "Hogsmeade! We're in Hogsmeade!"
After blinking a few times the light seemed to dim and was less painful and he saw the clear outline of shops of the High Street in front of him. "Wow."
"Can we go to Zonko's?" asked Sirius, and before Narcissa could answer he added: "or the Three Broomsticks or Honeydukes? But Zonko's first!"
"We're not going to Zonko's," Narcissa chuckled. "We're not going anywhere on the High Street."
"Why not?" Sirius whinged.
"If anyone sees you here you'll both be in big trouble."
Regulus had to agree with that—his hands still hurt from all the scrubbing he'd done in detention because of his little trip to Hogsmeade earlier in the year. Why hadn't they used this secret passageway back then? It might have spared him.
They left the High Street, but they didn't go towards the abandoned shack either. They went the other way, up another hill, for Hogsmeade lay in a valley, and reached a cave. A sour looking Lucius stood by the caveside, over a picnic he most likely laid out himself. The cave was decorated with red and blue colours and there were candles floating about. If not for this, Regulus wouldn't have thought it a place for birthday celebrations.
Lucius caught sight of them when they were almost at the top of the hill and sped towards them—well, he sped towards Narcissa.
"Cissy!" he called out, lifting her into the air for a brief moment before giving her a kiss. "I'm so glad you made it." Another kiss, and another...
Regulus looked away from the scene. It was gross, kissing that way. Especially when it was Lucius and Narcissa who did the kissing.
"Of course I could. Anything for you, love," he heard Narcissa say. He still didn't look at the couple but looked towards Sirius, who caught his eye and made gagging noises.
He smiled and tried to suppress his giggling – he was supposed to be mad at Sirius! – but the laughter overcame him as Sirius continued to make kissing noises as well.
"Stop being so childish!" Narcissa chastised them, and he tried once more to stop laughing but he just couldn't help himself. They were so... blegh together, with their over the top lovey-dovey words and embraces and (ew!) kisses.
"Why did you have to bring those two?" asked Lucius, to which Regulus snapped out of his laughing fit and glared at him. First he called Narcissa Cissy, now he criticised their being there... who the hell did he think he was?!
"They, unfortunately, are what we call 'family'," Narcissa said. "Though it's moments such as these I wish it weren't so."
"So dramatic," Sirius said, grinning still.
"Here." She tossed them both a pack of Bertie Bott's. "Have at it. I hope it's full of bogie-flavoured ones."
"Such generosity," he laughed.
He sat down in the grass and opened his package, emptying it in his hands. He threw out all the suspicious green ones—he didn't want to give her the satisfaction of seeing him eat actually bogie-flavoured beans.
A chortling, choking sound to his left made him look up from his sorting—Sirius was grasping at his throat and spit out a brown bean which, by the looks of it, hadn't been chocolate.
He stifled a laugh and asked his brother if he was all right.
"I'm just fine," Sirius replied through gritted teeth.
"What did you get?" he asked innocently.
"Want to taste?" Sirius held out the spit up slimy bean to him.
"No, no, I'm good!"
Sirius inched closer to him in hand and feet and Regulus sprang to his feet to run away. He had no interest in finding out what horrors Sirius just tasted!
They stayed at the side of the cave until nightfall: the air had grown cold and the only source of light – aside from the candles and their lit wands – was the full moon that shone above their path. It was a beautiful sight, and if it hadn't been so icy cold he could've stared at it for hours on end, that silvery, glistening orb in the sky.
"Let's get a move on," Sirius said, nudging his shoulder as he passed him by.
"A few seconds really won't matter," he argued. "If they see us we'll get detention anyway—twice, too. Once for being out of bed, once for being out of the castle-"
"Will you please stop talking?!"
"What's with you all of a sudden?"
"Nothing is 'with me'. I just want to go back to school."
"And I just want to admire the moon, is that too much asked?"
"Yes it is!"
"No it's-!"
A noise pierced the sky just then, a sound that was hard to classify. It was neither a scream nor a howl, neither distinctly human nor explicitly animalistic.
Narcissa, who walked a few feet in front of them and had been silent up till that point, looked over her shoulder and told them to follow her and run.
He looked to his now pale brother and neither of them wasted another second. They ran through the cobblestoned streets of Hogsmeade, faster and faster. The cries and shrieks that seemed to come from somewhere inside the village died out as they slipped into the tunnel and went back through the secret passageway to Hogwarts.
The three of them emerged on the fourth floor, closed the mirror and stood leaning against the wall for a good few seconds to catch their breath before Regulus dared speak up. Sirius was trembling and Narcissa was paler than usual.
"What was that?" he asked.
"I think – and this is only a suspicion – that there is a werewolf in Hogsmeade."
"A werewolf?!"
"That's not true, that's not possible," said Sirius weakly. "There's no werewolf. Nowhere."
"As I said—suspicions. Nothing more."
"Well then your suspicions are wrong!"
Regulus hoped his brother was right. A werewolf, in Hogsmeade... that would be bad. Very bad.
-
Nobody had noticed his absence – or at least, nobody had reported it – for he got away with the outing. No detention for him, this time!
Narcissa didn't get detention either, but he didn't know if Sirius escaped for he didn't get the chance to talk to him that Friday. He still had a lot of work to catch up on and his brother wasn't at breakfast, nor at lunch, nor at supper that day.
On Saturday he found him out in the courtyard with that Potter boy. He trailed them for a good five minutes, following them around as they walked and talked (though he couldn't hear what about for he was too far away) until Potter spun around with his wand in his hand, pointing it straight at Regulus.
He backed away a few steps, holding up his hands in defence.
"Woah, woah!" Sirius pushed down Potter's wand. "That's my brother!"
"He's been spying on us," Potter said, though he didn't raise his wand again.
"Haven't been spying," he protested.
"Yes you have!"
"Have not!"
"You've been following us for an hour, at least," said Potter.
"Not an hour—five minutes at most."
"So you have been following us," Sirius said.
"Well," he began, but he didn't get the chance to explain himself.
"Can't you mind yourself for once? Can't you leave us be?" Sirius said, crossing his arms and looking more agitated than he should—it wasn't as if he had been writing to blood traitors or babysitting halfbloods, he'd just been trying to catch Sirius alone. It was nothing.
"I just-" he tried to explain, but again, he wasn't allowed to.
"Just what? You think you can start following me around everywhere just because we had a fun day out? Is that it?"
"No-!"
But again, Sirius interrupted: "Don't bother."
"You know, I thought you were different. I thought we made up after last Thursday. I thought you—you're really just a bloody Mudblood-loving traitor aren't you? You're just a-"
He, again, couldn't finish the sentence. This time it wasn't because of Sirius—he hadn't moved at all. No, it was Potter who interrupted him, by pointing his wand straight at him once more, and yelling: "Don't talk about Sirius like that!"
He got out his own wand, pointing it back at Potter. "Want to duel, do you?"
"If that's what it takes for you to shut up."
"Fine. Wizard's duel. At midnight."
"I'm his second," said Sirius.
"Then Cissy is mine."
"No Seventh Years allowed," said Potter. "That wouldn't be fair."
"Fine. Avery then."
Sirius and Potter exchanged a look.
"Agreed. We'll meet in the trophy room."
He bid them goodbye and ran across the courtyard back inside and to the library where he knew Narcissa to be on a Saturday morning this close to her NEWTs. He spotted her bent over a pile of books at a table in the back and raced towards her.
"Cissy! You must teach me how to duel!"
"What on earth do you need to know how to duel for?"
"I'm duelling tonight."
"Why?"
"That's not important, will you teach me? Please?"
She pursed her lips. "Not unless you tell me why and whom."
"I'm duelling Potter because he's a prick."
"That's not a proper reason."
"It is to me."
"Regulus..." she sighed.
"What?! He deserves it!"
"I don't doubt he does, but-"
"But nothing!"
She shook her head. "You can't just go around duelling people you don't like."
"He started it. He pointed his wand at me first—twice! So I'm duelling him at midnight in the trophy room. To make him stop. He said he'd stop then. I just have to win."
"You're not duelling him."
"I am! I have to, I-"
"You're not. I am."
His heart skipped a beat. "What?"
Narcissa smiled. "Don't act so surprised. I'm quite capable of duelling, you know."
"But Potter won't accept that. I mean, he said he'd duel me, not you; he'd never duel a Seventh Year, even he isn't that stupid."
"Oh, but he'll be under the impression he's duelling you. I'll tone it down enough to make it believable. It's just impossible to teach you how to duel in only a day's time. It takes years to master the art."
"Only one problem," he said, "he isn't blind. He can see you're not me."
She waved it off with her hand. "A minor detail, nothing to worry about. As you know, there are ways around it."
He frowned. Around what, duelling? But that's not what he wanted—he needed to duel Potter, whether she liked it or not.
"Come now, haven't you been paying attention in Defence Against the Dark Arts? I was under the impression our dear Professor Blackthorn taught all his pupils Ministry propaganda."
His frown deepened. "What do you mean?"
"What kinds of things are they warning you about in Defence? Think!"
All sorts of things, he thought. Professor Blackthorn's lessons were nothing but warnings. Warnings about what the Dark Mark meant, warnings about what Death Eaters supposedly were and the heinous acts they supposedly committed. But they never did anything interesting in class. It was just as it had been with that lesson on the Unforgivables at the start of the year; Professor Blackthorn refused to teach them even simple incantations, even of defensive spells.
He also warned of werewolves and other such creatures – Trolls for instance – but he very much doubted Narcissa meant this, for there was absolutely no way for them to obtain a Troll and it would be extremely dangerous on top of that.
He cursed Professor Blackthorn under his breath for being such a lousy teacher who focused on nothing in great detail, aside from that Polyjuice Potion lesson he hadn't gone to, that was.
The realisation hit him. "Merlin's beard! You don't mean Polyjuice? Doesn't that take forever to brew?"
"It does... however I happen to know that there's still some left in Slughorn's office. He brewed it with the Sixth Years for your Defence class."
"You knew about that?!"
She chuckled. "Of course I did. Why do you think I sent you to the hospital wing?"
"But you could've helped me out!"
"Tone it down, it's not my fault you weren't talking to me."
He felt the heat rising to his head and nodded. "Sorry."
She smiled and started putting away her books.
"What are you doing?"
"Well, if we want to duel tonight we need to get that potion," she replied matter-of-factly.
"We can't just steal from Slughorn!"
"Regulus, it's Slughorn. Even if he caught us, he's more likely to reward us for our resourcefulness, or invite us to his 'Club', than get us detention."
"He gave me detention for going to Hogsmeade the first time!"
"That's different. You're not supposed to be in Hogsmeade."
He huffed. "We're not supposed to steal, either."
"It's not stealing if we don't get caught."
"But it is, and we will be caught!"
"Good luck beating Potter then," Narcissa said, and she got to her feet, ready to leave.
"Please just help me," he pleaded. "I don't know how to duel."
"I offered to help," she said, "and you obviously do not want it."
He sank into an empty chair and put his head in his hands as he heard her walk off in the distance. He couldn't steal from a teacher that already hated him! She just didn't understand that he wasn't about to waste more time doing useless chores in detention when had could just learn how to duel and be done with it.
He'd lose. That was it, he'd lose and Potter would torment him about it—Avery would torment him about it for decades to come. Sirius would torment him. Nobody would ever take him seriously again in his whole entire life. He needed a plan B, and he needed it fast enough for him to duel at midnight—and win.
After a few hours of pacing up and down the library, going through some books on Defence Against the Dark Arts he found in the library only to shut them after a few pages because they may as well have been written in Mermish. It was far too advanced for him.
He stood up and went down to the Common Room. He'd have to find Avery in any case, but to find him would be to tell him he had no idea how to duel; to tell him he needed his help. Avery would never get rid of that smug smile afterwards. It was a disaster waiting to happen.
At least the school year was almost over. They only had a month or so left, then came the holidays. Surely Avery wouldn't taunt him about this next year? They'd be older then, wiser. Nearly grown up.
Avery wasn't in the Common Room. He went to the boy's dormitories and was about to enter their dorm to check if Avery was there, when there was a loud bang and a crash coming from his right.
He jumped up and there was another loud bang. Everything in his body was telling him to run and hide, to get away from this. Cold sweat was already dripping down his back as he walked a few doors over to where the crash had come from.
He pressed his ear up against the door and heard another crash, then: "SWEET MERLIN ON A HIPPOGRIFF WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"
He heard the footsteps yet hadn't been prepared for the door to swing open and was flung across the small corridor, landing headfirst into the wall behind him. The pain that followed was blinding and all-consuming, and when it ebbed away everything was eerily quiet.
The door was closed once more.
He scrambled to his feet and, in a split-second, decided to inch closer and closer to the door. He pressed his ear back up against the door—nothing.
He put his hand on the handle and pulled. The door opened with a soft creaking sound and the room behind it was in perfect condition, it was in a better state than his own dormitory despite the obvious sounds of something crashing and breaking before. But all the meds were made and there was no mess on the floor. Nothing that was supposed to be in the dorm was missing. Everything seemed to be perfect.
But that's exactly what made the hairs on his back stand up. Whatever was going on, he didn't like it.
He backed away out of the dormitory and closed the door shut again. He read the names on the placard before hurrying back into the Common Room:
Second Year:
E. Rosier,
S. Snape,
A. Werth,
L. Wubben.
He spent the rest of the day trying desperately to put the event out of his mind and to focus on the bigger problem—that night's wizard's duel. He couldn't let his mind be occupied with other things, not when he had to think. Why was it so hard to just duel Potter and Sirius? Why couldn't he just know how to duel so it would be easy? Why had he ever challenged them?!
He considered telling on the pair and getting them detention just so he didn't have to duel and he'd be done with the whole situation, but he'd never hear the end of that—maybe if it had been just Potter he could've got away with it, but not with Sirius there. Impossible.
There wasn't much of a different strategy beyond hoping for the best, however, especially when he still hadn't found Avery by the time they had supper, and didn't spot him in the Great Hall either. He even asked a few classmates – only the good kind, there was no way he was talking to halfbloods –, but none seemed to know where he was.
He checked the dorm, he checked the Common Room, he checked the library and the school grounds, but Avery was nowhere to be seen.
Night fell and with ten minutes to midnight, Regulus cast one last glance at Avery's empty bed before leaving the dormitory. He couldn't just not show up, he'd just have to think of an excuse for why he was alone. Maybe he could tell them Avery was ill, and couldn't leave the hospital wing—but they could check that, they could go to the hospital wing and see it empty (or at least without Avery). Unless Avery really was in the hospital wing, for that was one of the few places he'd neglected to check.
Oh, he was an idiot! The hospital wing was the only logical place for Avery to be, with him not coming back at night to sleep, him not being at supper... but he couldn't go check now and he couldn't fetch Avery. He was on his own because of his own stupid mistakes.
He took a turn towards the trophy room. He could do it alone, he didn't need Avery. He was old enough to fight his own battles.
He took a deep breath and walked towards the trophy room. Would Potter and Sirius already be there? A look at his watch told him there were still three minutes left to midnight. What if they didn't show up at all?
"Well, well, well, what have we here?" a familiar, raspy voice breathed down in his neck. His heart sank as he slowly turned around, his eyes confirming what his ears already knew: Filch.
"I'm sorry, I didn't-"
"Save your tears for later, you're coming with me."
"I mean, I hope you-"
But Filch yanked him along, leaving him no room to say anything more through his protests of pain. It wasn't fair. Had Potter and Sirius done what he hadn't dared? What he hadn't wanted to put Sirius through? Did Sirius care so little about him he'd tell on his own brother just so he wouldn't have to duel, even when the odds were in his favour?!
He let himself be dragged off, all the way to Filch's office where he spent the rest of the night scrubbing and organising as part of his detention. Oh, how he wished he could get back at Potter for this. He'd pay for this. How, he wasn't sure, but he would.
It wasn't until the early hours of the morning that he arrived back in his dormitory, after Filch had dragged him to Slughorn – after he had served detention with him – who had even taken some points off him and lectured him on what a good night's sleep was worth. It was rather ironic to withhold a student said good night's sleep by lecturing on it, but that was who Slughorn was.
So when the morning alarm woke him up and he had only got about two hours of sleep, he was exhausted beyond exhaustion and quite relieved to find it Sunday. He rolled over and shut his eyes again, and when he next opened them it was noon.
He left his bed for what it was, took a long shower and got dressed before making his way upstairs to the Great Hall for lunch (which would be his breakfast). He was halfway through his toast when the Bulstrode girl showed up on his left, grinning stupidly. At first he was determined to ignore her, then her friends started gathering.
He slammed down his toast. "What?" he snapped.
The girls only giggled so he repeated himself: "what?! What're you staring at me for?"
"Just know we think you're a little hero," Bulstrode said with an ever-growing grin. Her friends nodded solemnly, apparently happy to let her speak for them all.
"OK..." He picked his toast back up but the girls didn't leave. He shot them another glare.
"You're very brave for going after Potter." Her friend he knew to be Emily Mather broke the silence this time, which earned her foul looks from the others in the group.
Going after Potter? Him? So that's what it was about. They knew he'd gone out last night—had one of his dormmates told them he hadn't been there for most of the night? He wouldn't put it past them. Perhaps it was even one of them who had alerted Filch.
"Psst—there's Kitty," another girl said, pointing to the girl who just entered the Great Hall.
"Who cares about Sharp? We're got Black!" Bulstrode hissed back and the girls giggled once more.
He ignored them to the best of his abilities for the remainder of the lunch and brushed past them to leave the Hall. He looked over his shoulder once at the doors, but to his relief they hadn't followed him and he stepped into the Entrance Hall in peace—or so he thought.
Sirius stood there, fuming. There was no way around it, Sirius was angry. Mother-angry, not Father-angry. Sirius' eyes could kill in a state such as this one if he wasn't careful.
He tried to walk past him, but Sirius kept him from doing so, pressing him against the wall. His face was inches away from his own as he growled: "you're lucky you're my brother."
"It's not my fault-"
But Sirius' hand smothered his words. "Don't fucking bother. And don't bother coming near me or my friends ever again—you hear me? Stay away."
Sirius released him and he nodded. "All right," he started, but Sirius was gone before he could go on.
He sank to the floor, trembling slightly. Had something happened with Sirius last night? Maybe Filch caught them as well, or perhaps another teacher had—it couldn't have been Filch, he reasoned, for he had spent all night in his office. But for Sirius to lash out as he had done for something entirely out of his control...
Unless, of course, Sirius thought he had something to do with it. But surely he'd know better than that? Surely Sirius would know he would never do something as bad as putting him in detention? Wouldn't he?
The Great Hall started to empty and he got back to his feet, following the stream of Slytherins down to the Dungeons. He was tired, defeated, and now his own brother suspected he was up to no good. This year just couldn't get any worse.