---
Regulus Black had hated his brother
But even through the hate, there was love.
Maybe that's why, when casting a Patronus, the only kind memory was his brother’s. His brother’s laugh, the way he’d been the only light in that wretched house.
Only damned Sirius Black.
Maybe that’s why the disappointed look on his brother’s face still tore at him.
Maybe that’s why the absolute pain and fury in Sirius’s eyes when he learned Regulus had taken the Dark Mark cut so deep.
He hadn’t wanted it—not once in a million years. But Sirius didn’t know that. Didn’t know the person Regulus was. Not in a long, long time.
Didn’t know that his brother wasn’t capable of the cruelty bred in the House of Black. That he’d bargained, he’d begged, not to have the black ink seared into his skin. That he could still hear his mother’s screams, the wand pressing into his flesh. That the walls closed in every time he looked in the mirror.
But none of that mattered.
So Regulus had taken one look at his brother’s face and cut it off.
In the dead of night, he’d taken a simple knife and sliced through. Through the image of a coiled serpent and skull staring back at him. He tore into himself until all he could see was red, all he could feel was searing pain- along with the disappointment of the people closest to him.
All alone. Because he deserved to suffer, didn’t he?
---
Maybe that’s why, when Sirius came to confront him one last time and demanded to see that wretched mark that had sealed his fate… well, he did.
He could’ve bitten back. Should’ve. He should’ve deflected. But something in him was tired- too exhausted to care. Worn down by the weight of his miserable existence.
So he extended his hand, wrist disfigured and mangled, but… no dark ink. No trace of the emblem of hatred Sirius expected. No, there was only a wound. Flesh distorted, torn in ways that would never heal. He had made sure of that.
Sirius’s eyes remained locked on him, as if struggling to process what he saw. And just like that, any trace of anger or resentment vanished, replaced by pure horror. He wasn’t furious. He wasn’t disgusted. No- he was frantic in a way that resembled care.
But that did not make sense. Regulus Black did not deserve care. He deserved apathy and hatred, and until now, it was the only thing he had ever known.
---
He didn’t meet Sirius’s eyes. He couldn’t.
What would he even say?
That your disappointment in me cut so deep, I had to rid myself of it? That even when you loathe me, your memory haunts every part of me? That I seek your approval like the pathetic mess of a human being that I am?
No-
No.
He couldn’t say that. He wouldn’t allow himself to.
So what was he supposed to do when Sirius looked at him like that?
With desperation bleeding into his voice, as if he was scared.
As if he cared.
He couldn’t have that. Sirius couldn’t care now- not when Regulus was at the jaws of death.
So he stood his ground. Forced himself to speak. Spat out every cruel thing he could possibly say. Uttered every single curse under the sun. Dragged up every horrible thing he had done, every sin, every stain upon his soul. Anything to remind Sirius of who he was. To remind him that the person standing in front of him was a monster.
It was a plea.
Hate me again. Leave. Leave before I disappoint you again.
Because that is all I am good for.
Because he feared love- feared the way it could destroy him beyond recognition.
But his brother had always been a stubborn bastard.
Sirius didn’t move an inch. He just stood there, staring at him, his piercing gaze unraveling Regulus Black’s humanity without even trying.