Chapter Two, Year One
Sirius
"Are you going home for Christmas, Sirius? Remus?" Peter asked as we waited for the quidditch game to start. It was bitingly cold today, stinging my cheeks. There was a thick layer of snow on the ground, fresh from the night before, and it made the quidditch pitch look like the frosted top of a white cake. It was disrupted only by Hooch, lifting her knees high to charge, not unlike a deer, across the field.
"Yes, to my grandparents." There was something deceptively pleasant about Remus' tone, and it made me narrow my eyes as I continued to watch Hooch carve a path towards the center of the pitch. If I remembered, I'd ask him about it later. If he let me corner him alone. Not that he had been doing that much, recently, considering how James and I had been dousing him in pranks during all waking (and sometimes sleeping) hours.
"Sirius?" Peter nudged me with his shoulder that had grown to twice its regular size due to his thick sweater, winter robe, and wool blanket. All I could see of his round face was his red nose and eyes, sticking out over his scarf and under the brim of his gigantic Gryffindor wool cap. It was rather endearing, but also made me start to sweat from imagining just how hot I would be under that many huge layers.
"I think I'll be staying here for Christmas." I wrenched my eyes back to the quidditch pitch as the words of my parents' howler echoed in my ears…
"GRYFFINDOR?!" The Howler had arrived mid-breakfast precisely one week from the housing ceremony. It had startled everyone else but me, as I had recognized the starched, thick white parchment and slanted, sharp handwriting on the envelope. I had expected it sooner, though it was no less humiliating. "YOU DEFILE OUR NAME WITH YOUR REBELLIOUS, CHILDISH ACTS. NO BLACK WOULD EVER CHOOSE THAT DASTARDLY, DESPICABLE HOUSE, AND YOU, SIRIUS, ARE A BLACK NO LONGER! THE ONLY CHILD OF ORION AND WALBURGA BLACK AT HOGWARTS IS OUR REGULUS! IF YOU WANT TO BE A WORLDLY BOY OF HOGWARTS AND GRYFFINDOR SO BAD, YOU CAN STAY THERE, HOLIDAY AND ALL! WE ARE REVOKING EVERYTHING THAT WE HATH GIVEN YOU AND ARE PASSING IT TO REGULUS, HENCEFORTH IMMEDIATELY!" Not that I had much to pass to Regulus, but it had still hurt to give him the clothes, the shoes, my lovely owl Patricia…
"I'd ask my parents if you could stay with us, but I don't think they'd take kindly to someone who accepts me." Remus wrapped an arm around Peter's shoulders and squeezed. I bumped him with my own shoulder, smiling down at him, trying to mask my own disappointment.
"Don't worry about it, Pete, really." I glanced up at Remus, hopefully, but he gave me a shake of his head without meeting my eyes. Hogwarts for holiday, then.
Regulus
I was irreparably stupid for climbing upon a broom and trying out for Slytherin's quidditch team, but Cissy had said it was a good idea, that I was a fantastic flier, and now here I was, last game before holiday, facing down the bloody Gryffindors in what could only be the coldest weather of the year. If I sneezed, I was sure my snot would turn to icicles before it even left my nose.
It also didn’t help that James bloody Potter was flying in this match. He was obnoxiously loud and obscenely annoying in our dual-house classes, but he somehow managed to triple that factor on the field. Not to mention that whenever he passed by the Gryffindor stands he would reach down to clap his hand against my ex-brother's.
I had been trying not to see him, to notice him, to recognize him, the past couple months. My ex-brother no longer had a name. My ex-brother was a faceless, heartless, soulless creature who deserved no love and attention from me.
That didn't stop me from staring at the back of his head and pleading with him to just turn around, just look at me, just talk to me, just tell me you're coming back. Just tell me you were faking it and you'll actually be moving into Slytherin in the new year. Please, please, please.
"Something the matter?" The Gryffindor seeker, a rather frail girl who very well could've been a Black in another life, flew up to sit in front of me. The snitch, bastard that it is, floated innocently just far enough behind her for her to not hear its buzzing. Taunting me. Haunting me. Like him.
I kept my face still, calm, and smooth as I stared blankly back at her. I hadn't even bothered to learn her name. Why would I talk to her on the battlefield?
"You can talk to me, you know. Up here, the world doesn't matter." If only I could think like that. If only I could look out at the white sky, the blanketed castle and forest far below, the blurred crowds, the faint cheering, and see a world apart from me. If only.
I stared blankly back at her. The world would always matter to me, no matter where I was. That was me, Regulus Arcturus Black. That was me, an heir to a throne I hadn't wanted. How could a prince, a king, choose to ignore the world that their every word, their every choice, affected?
I whipped my head around, as if I sensed the snitch, and leaned forward to fly towards the falsity. The seeker zoomed past me, and I snagged the snitch out of the air behind her head. As I flew down, my house erupted into cheers. I chose to find Cissy's eyes, Sev's eyes, Evan's eyes. Their victory. Their joy.
And through the booing of Gryffindor's stands, I could hear his voice, loud and clear. "You'll get 'em next time, James!"