In the dead of a cold, rainy night, lights could be seen through the windows of 12 Grimmauld Place.
Regulus Black was sat at his desk, his left arm shaking from where it rested on the table. It burned, as if sensing what Regulus was planning to do. Regulus dutifully ignored it. Murmuring as he went over the words he already wrote, he tried to think of what else to write. There were just so many words left unsaid, and there was not enough paper in the whole world for all of them. Regulus blinked back tears, refusing to let them stain the paper he was writing on.
Pathetic, he thought.
Regulus was a coward. He may be cold and mean, but he was truly just a coward. Unable to fight for what was right. But he was sick and tired of just standing aside and letting other people die for a war he was helping to start. He couldn't stop it, it was too late, but he could do the right thing. As futile and hopeless it was, he, just once, wanted to do the right thing. Regulus knew he couldn’t change anything, that it was all already written in stone, but it was his own forlorn attempt at redemption. For when he died, then he could say that he at least tried to be a good person. Because he wanted that, he wanted to be good, but a rotten seed will never grow. A flower cannot grow if it has no water, and even though Regulus was no flower, he still needed the same things, the very same ones he was deprived of.
But he had learned, he had learned to feed off of blood instead of water, to grow by the winds instead of the Sun. He had learned, he had adapted, and he had survived.
But what good did surviving ever do him?
Regulus sighed, and finished the letter. It wasn’t supposed to change anything, and Regulus knew it wouldn’t. It wasn’t an excuse, it was an explanation. It couldn’t give them a second chance, but it could explain why it was always going to end like this. Because it was; they were doomed from the start. Still, Regulus regretted none of it, because now he can at least die knowing happiness isn’t just a thing found in children’s books. It was real, and just for a moment, it was his.
“Kreacher,” he called quietly. The house elf appeared, looking unusually sorrowful. He was never jumping from joy, but he wasn’t this crestfallen either; typically, he was just quiet. Scornful, maybe, but not miserable like now.
“Yes, Master Regulus?” Kreacher asked, already fearing the answer. House elves weren’t supposed to have emotions, or if they did, they weren’t supposed to acknowledge them, but Kreacher grew to care for his young Master. He was there when Regulus was born, he was there to watch him grow up. He had seen him go from a delicate child to a callous man. No, not man, because he was still too young to be so. What a wreck of a world they were living in, when you were too young to be called a man but old enough to lie in the arms of death.
“It’s time,” Regulus said shakily. He was doing this for the greater good, he reminded himself. Maybe he couldn’t change anything, but he could help someone who would. Kreacher nodded, took the letter Regulus was holding out for him, and disappeared to send it. Regulus took a shaky breath and rubbed his eyes, feeling the tears collect on his fingers.
Regulus didn’t know where the reciprocant of the letter lived, but he hoped his name was enough for him to receive the letter. It was important to him, a fool’s gold, if you will, that he reads it. Regulus never wished for much in his life, so he hoped that whatever higher deity there was would grant him this one wish. He didn't even know where the letter would be delivered, since the house was under the fidelius charm, but he hoped such magic could not confuse owls. He hoped, with all of his heart, that the letter would be delivered.
Regulus was broken out of his thoughts by Kreacher, who just apparated back. He took a deep breath once again and stood up. Taking his coat from where it was hung over the chair, Regulus blinked back tears before exiting his room and slowly creeping down the hallway. It was dead in the night, and everyone was sleeping, so he had to be careful not to wake his parents. He walked to the end of the hallway and started going down the stairs, jumping over the one that always creaked. Soon, he made it to the front door. Regulus slowly unlocked it, Krecher a step behind him.
He stepped outside.
Halloween was in three days, and some houses had already started decorating. The wind was relentlessly whipping through the streets, howling at anyone who dared to venture outside. Regulus paid it no mind. Kreacher was right behind him, in the tattered bag imitating his clothes. He stepped away from 12 Grimmauld Place so his parents wouldn’t get notified when he apparated, clasped Kreacher’s shoulder in his hand, and disappeared.
The last thing he thought of was the letter his owl was currently attempting to deliver.
~~~
In the early morning, Regulus Black died a slow and painful death. He did not scream, because he had no one to scream for. He drowned, his lungs filling with water and burning away every last bit of him. He died a heroic death, fighting for what was right. Only, in his last moment, as the hands of the undead were dragging him under the surface, he wished he didn’t. He wished he never went on this suicide mission, he wished for another chance at life, he wished he could do it all over again.
He wished he stayed a coward.
Because maybe being a coward wasn’t so bad if it meant staying alive to fight for another day. But Regulus had lost everyone he wanted to fight for, so maybe it was better he died a man of courage than continued living as a coward. But no matter, because Regulus would never again have to worry about such things.
And the saddest part was, he died fighting the same man he would now have to spend an eternity yielding to. Regulus died, but he didn’t really die, because dying meant peace. Instead, he was doomed to forever follow orders of the same monster he tried to stop. No rest for the wicked, they said, except Regulus wasn’t truly wicked, he was just lost. He died the same way he lived; alone and afraid.
~~~
The letter arrived a day before Halloween.
James Potter planned to never open it. He was happy, he had a wife and a son, and even though they were in hiding because a Dark Lord was after them, James was happy. So what if some days he stared into the sky and thought about what it would be like to just fly away? He would never do that, he loved both Lily and Harry too much to just leave them like that, but sometimes, he simply wondered. Sometimes, he stared into the distance and wondered if there was any way this could have ended differently. He wondered, if he could go back, what would he do? He loved Lily, he truly, honestly did, but it was getting harder and harder to remind himself of that. James wasn’t stupid, he knew that his life was in danger, and that anything could happen at any moment. Somehow, that knowledge only made him wish he could change something.
Because if this was it, if this was the end of his road, he at least wished to spend it with him. To see those dark curls once more, to run his fingers through them. To stare into those lovely grey eyes, and forget. To hear that voice, the same one he fell in love with all those years ago.
He loved Lily, and it wasn’t that he loved him more, it was just that for him, he fought. And for her, he hid. That, that was the difference.
So when the letter arrived, James planned to just burn it, and leave that part of his past finally behind. But he couldn’t bring himself to do so. James thought he deserved some closure, and he knew Regulus, he knew he wouldn’t be writing to him if it wasn’t some kind of explanation or something. Maybe this was what he needed to finally get over him, maybe this was what he needed to move on. He avoided even opening the letter for the whole day, his mind running through scenarios of everything that could be written in it. That night, when he went to sleep, James dreamt of him, of all of their moments spent together.
Eventually, morning came, and with it Halloween.
James still didn’t open the letter, even though he ached to.
The day passed in a blur, James getting lost in his thoughts more often than not. Sometimes, when he shook himself out of his head, he saw Lily staring at him with a broken look on her face. But as soon as he opened his mouth to say something, she just turned her head and went away. James wanted to scream that he loved her, for he did, but he also loved him.
In a sense, both of them were haunted; one, by the love that could never be, and the other, by the love that could be, but never will be. In a sense, both of them will die without their love, one which was already gone and the other which mourned the ones lost.
Maybe love wasn’t enough, after all. Maybe love was love’s greatest enemy and it’s bane.
Soon enough, evening came. Lily was feeding Harry in the kitchen, and James was in the living room on the couch, staring at the letter in his hands. He didn’t tell Lily about it. He didn’t want to ruin what he and Lily had, because whatever was in that letter, it changed nothing, it was too late for them, and James knew he had to know that.
Even though the letter wasn’t signed, James would recognize that handwriting anywhere. The letters, all elongated and skewed, but still looking as elegant as ever. James knew the exact way he held his hand as he wrote, the exact way he lifted his hand to put a dot on letters like ‘i’. He knew exactly how those skillful fingers held the feather he was writing it, the way his knuckles flexed when he moved the feather. He remembered staring at those hands as they wrote, mesmerized by the way they moved.
James sighed and shook himself out of his thoughts.
He tore open the envelope.
Just as he was about to take the letter out, the doorbell rang and he heard Lily asking if he could get it. He got up from the couch, leaving his wand behind. The closer he got to the door, the colder it felt. A slight creaking could be heard, the door of the front yard moving back and forth in the wind. It felt unnaturally similar to walking towards Death. James got to the door and tried to see through the peephole, but all he could see was dark robes. It was almost freezing now. Too late had he realised what was happening. Too late had he realised that, this was it.
“Lily! Ru-”
The door burst open. Green light flashed before his eyes.
James didn’t even have the time to scream before his body hit the floor with ‘thump’.
~~~
James Potter never did read the letter.
It went unnoticed by everyone who visited the house that night. From the Dark Lord, to James’ best friend Sirius Black, to Rubeus Hagrid, to the Aurors who were sent there. In the midst of all the grief and the shocking news of the defeat of Lord Voldemort, nobody cared enough for a piece of paper left unread on the coffee table.
Neither Regulus nor James ever got to say goodbye. They will meet again, but not for many, many years. When the Dark Lord is defeated, and when Regulus would finally be free from his curse, they will see each other again, but until then, James will spend a lifetime searching for the other half of his soul, for the one that branded his heart and left it stranded. He will not find him, not for a long, long time. Not a whisper from either will find peace in their demise, because there is no peace without love, and there is no love without war. Neither will ever truly be happy, not until they reunite with the one that makes them whole.
The letter, years later, will be found by none other than Harry Potter, James’ son. He will learn that, once upon a time, there was a man named Regulus Black, who loved his father more than anything, who stopped being a coward for him, who had died trying to protect him. Harry will also be proven that once again, love is the weapon that Voldemort did not have, that that was the reason he won. Because love is the strongest of them all, for it makes cowards brave, and the brave ones cowards. It makes people die, but it makes them happy. It dares people to care, it dares them to see.
Harry will learn that, once upon a time, there was a man named Regulus Black, who was never truly a coward.
He loved, and those who love were never cowards.