Emergency Family Meeting
The way that Regulus clung to the front of James's shirt was worrying. James watched as the occlumency that usually covered Regulus's stormy grey pupils bled away, leaving behind the brightest of silver that was tinged with worry.
"I don't know how she's done it," Regulus was all but mumbling to himself. "But she must've stolen it. The one time I do something for myself and I-"
Regulus abruptly stopped talking and removed his hands from James, taking several steps away from him and running his hands through his hair like mad.
"You're going to have to slow down, Reg," James approached slowly. "Tell me what's happened."
Sinking into the edge of the bed, Regulus held his head in his hands and didn't bother to look up as he began to speak.
"I kept the time turner. I wasn't supposed to, and I very nearly destroyed it. But something in me just couldn't bring myself to do so. At the end of it all-" Regulus paused, taking a very deep breath and releasing it. "I needed to know that I could go back. Just once, just in case."
James had a habit of making everything about himself. That was a fact that he had accepted years ago. But to hear it from Regulus was something else entirely, and the heat that raced up his spine was clear enough to understand.
"But Reg," James said, sitting next to Regulus so their legs touched. "how would she have gotten it? There's no way that she breached the wards of the castle without someone knowing. She also hasn't been using much of her magic; her magical signature isn't even registering at the ministry."
But it was clear to Regulus that it wasn't taken during his time at Hogwarts. There was only one place that Bellatrix Lestrange could have taken it from.
"Not Hogwarts. Gringotts."
"There's no bloody way she broke into Gringotts! It hasn't been broken into since-"
"Since we broke into it?" Regulus finished for him. "I don't think she broke in at all."
Gringotts was an unusual place, fueled by an ancient magic that wizards still did not fully understand. Ran by the goblins, the vaults were linked to family lineage and blood magic.
"She has full access to the Black family vault. Until she is officially disowned from the bloodline, she can go in and out as she pleases."
James stared Regulus down. "And you just...left the time turner inside the vault?"
"I left my trunk in the vault! She shouldn't have known it was in there. The fact that she did..."
Regulus let the end of his sentence trail off as he got lost within his own mind. Since his return, most of his posessions had remained at Grimmauld Place or Gringotts, both of which were magically protected by some of the oldest and most devious blood magic known to wizardkind.
It was possible for Bellatrix to get into Grimmauld, depending upon if the house had decided to reject her or not. But because she continued to be a member of the noble house of Black, it was also possible for her to walk through the door at any moment.
"Alright," Regulus nodded, straightening himself and his clothes from his minor breakdown. "I know what we must do next."
James watched as the piercing silver faded back into the familiar grey and Professor Black was back in control of himself.
"And what's that?" James casually asked.
But Regulus had already pulled his wand from his robes. James felt a tug in his chest at the sight of Reg's Deerhound.
"Please relay this message to Lupin and Sirius. Emergency family meeting. Grimmauld in 5."
The dog almost looked as if it nodded before bounding through the walls of the castle.
"Emergency family meeting?" James asked, smiling. "Something you lot do often? I'm dead chuffed to be included this time."
Shooting him a look, Regulus took hold of James's wrist and began to pull him through his living quarters.
"In a hurry, are we? I was hoping to at least get a proper snog in."
"You truly are insufferable, Potter," Regulus said as he drew to an immediate halt to turn and look at James.
With a short sigh, Regulus let go of James's wrist and grabbed the side of his face instead, bringing their lips to touch. Pulling his hand from his pocket, James held Regulus's waist in a state of shock at the sudden show of affection.
He was trying, Regulus was. It was difficult for him to shove down the metaphorical and magical walls in his mind to let someone in after all those years, especially when that person was James Potter.
But for years Reg had promised himself that if ever given the chance, he would treat James how he was meant to be treated. Properly, and for a very long time.
When Reg pulled away from James he could see that the end of his nose was now tinged with pink, his eyes seeming to be glassed over.
"Glad to see my charm hasn't completely wore off, then," Regulus laughed under his breath. "Now fix yourself before Sirius sees. He'll take the mickey out of both of us and you know it."
Without another glance in James's direction, Regulus stepped into the floo and was whisked back to his ancestral home, hoping to Merlin that it wasn't too late.
Remus was teaching when the patronus found him.
"Emergency family meeting. Grimmauld in 5."
A hush fell over the class as it heard Professor Black speak through the spectral dog, some of their jaws going slack. It was his final class of the day, a class of first-year hufflepuffs, and he had already made up his mind before the dog vanished.
"Class dismissed. No homework."
He had his briefcase packed before the last student left the classroom.
Remus, of all people, was used to the antics of the Black brothers. Although he would never admit it, he adored the fact that the two had become somewhat amendable to one another over the years.
Most of the time it was Sirius calling for an Emergency Family Meeting, causing Remus to rush home only to find the two brothers bickering over something small, like what to do with the box of house elf heads that they found while clearing out the attic.
"I don't understand why we can't just burn the blasted things!" Sirius had demanded.
"Because they deserve respect!" Regulus had countered. "We will bury them in the garden as they should have been long ago."
Remus slept on the couch that night after agreeing with Regulus.
But it was always Sirius who called the meetings, on the rare occasion Remus would as well. But never, in Remus's memory, could he remember Regulus being the one to call. Whatever was happening was important, and there wasn't a moment to lose.
Stepping through the hearth at Grimmauld, Remus was the third person to arrive.
"Prongs!" Remus said. "What a delight to be able to finally include you in our family affairs."
"Would've been here sooner, Moons, but someone didn't invite me."
The very pointed response was largely ingored by Regulus as he slowly paced the length of the library, waiting for Sirius to arrive.
What felt like eons to Reg was just but a few seconds as Sirius Black emerged from the green flames of the fireplace, brushing the soot from his collar.
"And what is the emergency, Regulus? Prongs not snog you good enough after breakfast?"
"We have a problem."
The tone was harsh, indicative of the past version of Regulus and enough to dampen Sirius's playful nature immediately.
"What's happened?"
Regulus paused, a hint of shame clear on his face. "I didn't destroy the time turner."
"But you handed it over to the ministry," Sirius said, confused. "They were supposed to destroy it."
"It was a decoy," Remus accused. "You kept the real one."
The look on Reg's face told Remus the answer, so Regulus remained mute.
"That's not much of an emergency," Sirius mused. "We can just destroy it now, or put it away in the vault for safekeeping."
It was James that spoke then. "The problem isn't that he kept the time turner."
"Then what is?"
"The problem is that our dear cousin Bella has stolen it from beneath our noses, Brother."
Sirius's face paled, "She's been here?"
"I never properly disowned her from the line. Did you?" Reg asks.
"Well, no. I didn't figure that would be a need. She was locked up in bloody Azkaban 2.0 for years."
"She's been missing for five years, Padfoot," James added. "But she's back on the Ministry's radar."
"But how would she be able to get into this house with none of us noticing?" Remus asked. "I'd like to think we aren't that unobservant."
"It's not that," Regulus shook his head as he poured himself a glass of firewhiskey. "The house would have done her bidding, given that she's more loyal to our line than either of us. Despite the fact that the house is unplottable, she can apparate directly in. I'm concerned that much more and she will turn the house against us. Pureblood families don't take very kindly to unmarried, gay wizards, after all."
Regulus's tone was biting, and Sirius seemed surprised. "She really has the power to do all of that?"
But Regulus groaned in response. "I told you to read the manuals on the house when you took over being Head. You never bothered, did you?"
"Of- of course I did!" Sirius defended. "Just been busy, that's all."
"So what's the solution here?" Remus asked, shutting the siblings down before it evolved into a full-blown argument. "How do we keep her out of the house and what are we doing about the time turner?"
At this, Regulus sat his glass down forcefully, the bottom of it letting out a sharp noise as it made contact with the glass of the bar cart. "I thought this was over."
It was meant to come out steady, a statement that was almost an irrefutable fact. But instead, it came out much more broken than Regulus had meant, his voice cracking towards the end.
James moved towards him then, largely forgetting the other two people in the room. He, of all people, knew what the war had done to Regulus. For Merlin's sake, Regulus had died to end it, and now he was faced with the inevitable possibility that Bellatrix Lestrange could undo it all with one turn of the time turner.
"Regulus," James spoke low, laying his hand on the other wizard's shoulder. "This isn't your fault."
Regulus quickly shrugged James's hand off and turned sharply, looking at them all with a glint of rage. "But it is! I was so bloody obsessed with you that I kept the time turner and didn't destroy it. The one time that I was selfish, and now everything is about to be undone. I have to fix this."
Storming away, Regulus was through the floo before either of the three could stop him, the green flames taking him back to his living quarters at Hogwarts. James, Sirius, and Remus stood and watched as the flames died out, and it was Sirius who spoke first.
"Always so dramatic. I haven't the first clue where he gets that from."
But James wasn't feeling up to laughing, staring at the empty space where Regulus had just stood. Because despite the fact that Regulus felt responsible, so did James. It seemed as though no matter how hard he tried to fix the past, something was coming along and mucking it all up.
"It's not your fault either, Prongs," Remus's voice broke him out of his thoughts. "The only one who's to blame here is Bellatrix. Show us what you know of her last whereabouts."
And so, despite the fact that James's heart was aching, he produced the familiar folder that held all of Bellatrix's known secrets, locations, and plans, and ignored how badly he wanted to follow Regulus through the floo.
Regulus shut down his floo the moment he was through it, not wanting to risk someone coming after him.
They were good like that, those Gryffindors. Pushing and refusing to allow Regulus to isolate himself away and wallow in his mistery.
But it wasn't misery that Regulus was making friends with as he blew into his office, producing the ancient tome that had come from the Headmistress.
He had vowed to leave dark magic behind.
But life wasn't that simple.
His face remain unchanged as he pulled a dagger from the drawer of his desk, unsheathing it silently. He wrapped his right hand around the sharpness of the blade before pulling it quickly against the soft skin of his palm, the four inch cut blossoming with blood.
Regulus opened his hand and looked at his own blood, pooling in his hand. He was Regulus Black, one of the last remaining members of the Black family, and he had grown soft.
He placed his hand palm-down on the front of the book, letting his blood to seep through the leather cover. The book glowed purple, accepting his offer and allowing him to open it to the first page.
Sometimes he wondered if it was fate that brought the Black family back to dark magic.
Sometimes he wondered if it was simply a curse.
But truthfully, Regulus Black felt that he was simply returning to his roots, letting the darkness swallow him once more.