Chapter 2
Regulus held his breath.
He exhaled slowly.
He inhaled deeply.
Repeat.
He had been facing his door forcing himself to breath since the old grandfather clock downstairs struck 12. He didn’t know how much time had passed since then.
Shit.
Maybe this wasn’t going to be such a good idea.
His parents would know where he was headed. They would find him and drag him back.
And God. Regulus didn’t want to know what would happen then.
But he had to try.
His school trunk was packed next to him and for the first time Regulus had really thought about what he was packing. What was most important to him. What he would need. For the first time he hadn’t packed schoolbooks. Instead filling the space with as much of himself as possible.
With a last deep breath, he gave a last look around his room. Stripped of his personality, not that there was much there in the first place, and reached for the door.
Turning the handle, he stepped into the dark corridor outside. The house was eerie at the best of times but with only the light at the end of his wand to guide him the house looked downright haunted. The shadows jumped at him as if to keep him in the house forever and the closer Regulus got to the front door the louder the thumping in his ears became. His parents, out at some fancy dinner, left at 23.00 and would return at 02.00 and head straight to there room. Only to discover Regulus gone when he failed to present himself at breakfast. By then he would already be safe behind the protective enchantments at the Potter’s.
Hopefully.
As he entered the living room, at the end of the entrance hall, he pictured his parents coming home early. The shock on their faces as they notice Regulus morphing into anger as they realise what he was attempting to achieve and the punishments that would follow. A shudder ran through him as he turned into the living room. Walking to the fireplace he took the pot of floo powder off the mantel piece and took a handful.
With a last deep breath before throwing the powder into the flames.
“The Potter Estate”
The feeling of travelling by floo was something Regulus was not used to, his parents preferring apparition as a more respectable form of travel.
He stared through each fireplace that whizzed past, catching snippets of each person’s lives through the décor on the walls. And for a brief moment he wished for a life like that of the ones he witnessed: filled with warmth and happiness.
And then he fell out onto a worn rug with a hard thud. The bright colours hurting his eyes from so long in a house bleached of them.
And then…
“Reggie?”