Regulus Black had been placed on this Earth with the understanding that he should never have arrived upon it at all and that every breath he took was a stain upon a name soaked in Darkness and a degree of nobility lost to the modern world. It was not a welcome feeling, knowing at the age of five or six that your existence was something all parties except yourself wanted nothing to do with. Perhaps that was why he had clung so tightly to his cousins. They, at least, had never seemed to find him a stain upon their family, instead enfolding him into what would become his primary support structure throughout Hogwarts.
How, when presented with that, was Regulus expected to turn his back upon that as well? How was he ever supposed to follow a sibling that forged his own path when Regulus’ was always shaky and ill-formed? Perhaps what Potter and the rest offered Sirius was comparable to what Regulus’ cousins gave him. Perhaps it didn’t matter what bit when the end result was still the same.
“I will talk about who and what I please, Sirius,” Regulus snapped back. “Your disapproval isn’t enough of a deterrent to prevent me from talking about them.” The final word of the sentence was nearly spat out as if it tasted foul, almost as foul as the people he referred to.
“Don’t pretend I wasn’t excited to have a brother,” Regulus retorted. “I’m only a year younger than you, but it may as well have been a century for how little I seemed to register in your life. I picked you every second of the day as a small boy, trying to follow behind you when you had already given up. It just took Potter for you to know that’s what it was. It wasn’t,” Regulus added, bitterness lacing the words like poison, “as if anyone in that house registered me as a Black, least of all you, until you were gone. I simply took the opportunity presented to me.”
Regulus had wanted a family. He had always wanted a family and took it when it was offered with both hands, greedy for the affection he expected and disappointed by the reality. Both strands of the Black family, the Death Eaters… It all slipped away. It wasn’t until Paris that Regulus had something that would qualify, though no name of his nor physical trait would convey that lineage to any but himself.
“It’s never just one choice, Sirius,” Regulus replied, the sudden flare of anger cooling into something almost resembling calm. “It’s multiple choices, made every day, so yes, thank you for some degree of recognition of what it means to do that when living with a giant fucking snake and a snake man.” If it was possible to subsist off of sarcasm, Regulus would never need to eat, and that last sentence would have kept him fed for days for how heavily it dripped with insincerity.
The Black family lived with the motto Toujours Pur. Regulus had long thought they should adjust it to Toujours Peur. It seemed more fitting, given what he had gone through over the course of his life. Running only works if you know you’d be safe at the end of it, after all. Sometimes it takes surviving what should be the impossible to truly be safe. Running always was the cowards way out, but you had to be a lucky coward to do it successfully.
“I am absolutely a coward,” Regulus agreed easily. It was something he’d known for years and what would have been the worst insult for one of those stupid gold and crimson lions was nothing more than a fact of his life. “The day that I am not one is the day that I die.” Precedent did indeed indicate that that was the most likely option, given what happened the last time he tried some degree of bravery. Rolling his eyes as the final question Sirius posed registered, Regulus sighed. It was such a strange thing to focus on. “I’ve been in Paris, if you must know. My father’s family is… Located there and they were quite welcoming.”
There was something in the way Regulus spat the word them that made Sirius’ fist clench instinctively as it returned to his side, fighting the urge to raise it and strike at the younger man. No matter the state of things between the four of them, Sirius wouldn’t stand to have Regulus talk about them like he knew anything, especially James. “James is a better man than you are or ever will be, so keep his name out of your fucking mouth, or you’ll regret it,” Sirius warned through clenched teeth.
Sirius couldn’t help but roll his eyes as Regulus spoke, though, as if he hadn’t adored the younger boy when they’d been children. "I didn’t give up on you until you gave up on me,” he spat back. “I didn’t give up until Mummy and Daddy started filling your head with thoughts that you actually listened to. Because the fact remains, you did listen to them, and all it took was for me leaving and getting sorted ‘wrong’ for that opportunity to present itself. And you sure jumped on it fast.”
It had felt like a betrayal to young Sirius, watching the sorting ceremony as Regulus was called to the stool and the hat decidedly called out Slytherin. Watching Regulus join the table of green and silver when he’d had hopes of them defying their parents together in Gryffindor had been difficult. But it had made clear the fact that they were fundamentally different, and always would be, with Regulus taking after the Blacks moreso than Sirius.
Again, Sirius found himself rolling his eyes. “So you made a few good choices. Wow. I’m impressed, congratulations,” came the sarcasm-laced reply. “Even though, you know, you made the choice to live that way in the first place. Good on you for turning it around, like a decent fucking human.” Another roll of his eyes and a derisive snort followed.
But the next words from Regulus’ mouth weren’t expected, and Sirius’ brows tugged together as he considered the younger man’s admission. At least he could admit to being a coward - something they both knew the be true.
“You’ve been in Paris,” Sirius echoed, almost incredulously, “this whole time. Doing what, exactly, Regulus? Because, frankly, I don’t believe you.” He frowned. “We’ve been fighting this war for years. You just disappear one day, dead, and then show up in Paris until just now. Why? Why now, after all this time?”
