Holly

Holly, red and green, blood staining the white berries crimson. Where both stemmed from the same branch, where both will meet their ends.

//

Andromeda was seventeen, when she ran away from home.

Her mother had trapped her in her own room, modifying the wards so she couldn't escape through the window.

Or so she thought.

A quick Tempus informed her of the time ─ 2:30a.m. She had officially became of age one hour and forty five minutes ago. Her family had to be asleep by then.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath ─ it was time to act.

She understood the deal she struck with her father well. She had until her seventeenth birthday to choose a suitor of her own liking, or her father got to choose for her. Andromeda knew her father intended for her to wed Sirius, her cousin, and while the two got along well, that just wouldn't do. Heck, Sirius was six years and two months younger, not to mention their obviously close family ties.

Marriage Vows were strong,  almost unbreakable, and Cygnus and Druella Black were confident that they could keep their second-eldest daughter contained until then, volatile though she may be.

Like how people was prone to forgetting about Narcissa's temper with the cold, unbothered mask she wore, people often forgot Andromeda's quick and fierce wit, nursed by the fire of her bold passion.

She was, after all, the Black daughter who passed all nine of her OWLs with seven perfect Outstandings, and the protégé of Madam Pomfrey. One should never underestimate a Slytherin with talent and skills to back her schemes.

And she had been scheming, ever since she was twelve, putting aside as much pocket money she could while not alarming her parents, producing a hefty sum over the years. She'd exchanged the money into Muggle currency one Hogsmeade weekend after sneaking into Hog Head's Floo with a handful of Disillusionment and Confundus Charms, and bought a plot of land in the Muggle world Scotland under a faux name.

It was miles away from any human settlement, but she wasn't a witch for nothing.

See, the problem with the deal itself was that Andromeda did find a suitor she liked. It was just that she knew her parents would never accept Ted Tonks, a muggleborn, so why waste breath bringing him up? It would only serve to raise suspicion, and give her family a target once she mysteriously disappeared. On principle, she had never broken the deal.

She checked the contents of her trunk once more, and cast a Lightweight Charm onto it once she was done. She had saved a lot of food into it, shrunk and put underneath a multitude of Stasis Charms, since food was the one thing she couldn't just conjure or transfigure.

She was set to go, with only the wards in her way.

Well, no matter, Andromeda thought as she reached for her wand inside the sleeve of her robes, and traced the delicate Aspen wood along her fate line, grinning when the wards chimed and glowed softly blue under her touch.

Andromeda may not consider herself a Black daughter anymore, but the wards certainly recognized her blood.

"Shhh," she cooed, as she felt a rush of magic delve deeper, towards the inbuilt alarm system. "Listen and bow down to me, to the humming music coursing through my veins. Obey me and heed my commands, for it is this very blood infused into your walls."

The wards quietened and stilled, as if holding its breath for further instruction. Chuckling at its resemblance to an excited puppy, she channeled her own magic, and gently nudged the wards away from the windows, the spellwork hastily rearranging itself as she did so.

The locks on the windows gave way, and Andromeda flung them open, far wider than strictly necessary, and relished in the rush of fresh evening air flowing in.

"Andy?"

The door to her room stood ajar, and somehow that had slipped past her in her moment of excitement. Her younger sister, Narcissa, stood in the doorway, rubbing her eyes. Her long waves fell past the waist of her silk pyjama robes,  champagne gold in stark contrast with the rosemary hues.

"You're leaving," she said, more of a statement than a question, as her grey eyes found the open window.

Andromeda swallowed and nodded, her throat tightening too much to allow a verbal response.

She held out a hand— an unspoken question.

Narcissa smiled, but took a step backwards. Andromeda could see the sadness in her eyes as she looked up again. I'm sorry, her sister mouthed.

Andromeda tried to smile back, but it ended up as more of a grimace. It's all right, she whispered, her voice lost to the songs of a nightingale outside.

Her sister watched as she leapt out of the forth story window, her black wizarding robes billowing around her like feathered wings. For a split second she looked ethereal, suspended in midair as she reached the highest point of her trajectory.

She disapparated without ever reaching the ground.

(Andromeda saw the article on her cousin's sorting on the Witches' Weekly, the next day. Huh, she thought. Pity I wasn't there to witness it.

Well, she couldn't have everything, she supposed. At least, with her skin sealing over where her fate line had once been, smoothed out and unblemished. She was Andromeda Tonks and she had taken her destiny into her own hands. Molded the soft clay and refused to let any Higher Being to tell her what to do with her life.

She mailed off her first assignments of the year to be found under an anonymous submission. Her professors would recognize her handwriting and grade her accordingly. She never returned to Hogwarts, until 3 May 1998. She returned to collect the lifeless form of her daughter, as a widowed woman.

She returned as Andromeda Tonks née Black, a pureblood and a proud blood traitor, with  her head held high.)

//

Regulus knew, at the age of eighteen, that he had had enough.

Slytherins locket, he thought, the nub of his quill digging so hard into the pieces of parchment that he was in real danger of snapping his quill in half. Such was the irony of life, he supposed. Where it all began, a thousand years ago in a flurry of dreams and and hopes and magic, would be where it all ended.

Regulus was not a seer, nor had he taken Divination, but he had never been more certain that Hogwarts would be the place— if the Dark Lord ever met his demise.

"Hogwarts," Sirius had breathed, as if the word was magic on its own. He flopped down onto his bed, staring at the pendant lamp on the ceiling in an almost dreamlike manner. "I know this," he gestured vaguely at the walls of Grimmauld, but Regulus knew he meant the pureblood society at large. "Is all that you know- was all that I knew, but there's an entire world out there."

"Isn't there," he has said, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice. He had written Sirius daily throughout his brother's first year, but whenever Sirius replied, his letters were filled with this and thats about his new friends. Friends Regulus had never met, that probably didn't even know he existed.

Regulus was used to having his brother all to himself. He wasn't so chivalrous a person to feel guilt over his blatant jealousy.

Sirius' gaze snapped onto him. "Reggie─"

"Don't," He whispered, cutting him off. "You deserve to be happy too." Those were empty words, spoken without meaning.

His brother opened his mouth, before shutting it again. Regulus was fairly certain that this was the last time he had ever called him 'Reggie'.

Regulus had missed his chance, had let the envy blind him. Admitting that he missed the voice whispering "good night" and read him beside stories when their parents wouldn't, was not something he could do now. He was too old yet barely a man, toeing at the line of adulthood while wearing the heart of a child.

But such was war.

Holly, Regulus thought. Red and green, blood staining the white berries crimson; red and sanguine like the sunset, the hues of the Gryffindors.

What was all thebloodshedfor? He wrote in his journal, like he always did when his thoughts whirled like a raging cyclone. Justice? New world order? Revenge? And he tore the page off and crumbled the sheet, throwing it carelessly onto the floor.

He caught Kreacher tidying after his mess out of the corner of his eyes.

Dear Sirius, he wrote instead, then frowned and crossed out "dear".

DearSirius,

I hope you have been doingokay. It has been a long time since we have last spoken,I would even go as far to say a letter is long overdue-I would like to inform you that something of utmost importance has happened, or will happen.I have found what I believe to be key to-I am about to do somethingutterly stupid and recklessthat I hope would be beneficial.Regulus Arcturus Black, you are utterly pathetic. So much that you can't even draft one singular letter properly. What an heir for the House of Black.

A frustrated noise escaped his throat, and he threw the letter into the fireplace, watching the flames lick and devour the paper. Sirius has been dead to him, ever since Regulus was fifteen. Just as he was dead to Sirius.

What business did he have, writing to a dead man?

Dearest Mother, he wrote instead, but there were no words to say, no love to be missed between them.

To the Dark Lord, he wrote at last, and it was almost depressing how easily the words came to him.

To the Dark Lord,

I know I will be dead long before you read this, but I want you to know that it was I who discovered your secret. I have stolen the real Horcrux and intend to destroy it as soon as I can. I face death in the hope that when you meet your match, you will be mortal once more.

R.A.B.

His eyes lingered on his signature as he reread the letter, satisfied with the language. Regulus Arcturus Black. Regulus the lion's heart, brightest star of the Leo constellation. Sirius Orion Black, Sirius the dog star, whose animagus form was a dog. (Of course he'd notice that no one has ever seen the black stray often hanging around the Marauders without his brother.)

For the second time that day, he laughed at the irony— no, the sheer absurdity of it all. Oh, Mother, what were you thinking when you named me- us? This all sounds like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A prophecy.

The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches

born to those who have thrice defied him,

born as the seventh month dies...

The Dark Lord had thought himself undefeatable, and so had laughed off the matter when Snape had presented his memory. Regulus was brought up the proper way, and knew better than to fight a prophecy.

Dumbledore was a strategist, and therefore was likely withholding the information. The Horcrux, on the other hand, would prove to be invaluable intel.

He hesitated. It wasn't like he could just write to his former headmaster.

Sirius, he began instead, then crossed out the words, nearly tearing the piece of paper in half.

Holly, red and green, blood staining the white berries crimson. Was Regulus bleeding still because he hadn't forgiven his brother, or was he bleeding because he hadn't forgiven himself?

Regulus shivered involuntarily. His thick, dark cloak had done nothing to block out the cold seeping steadily down to his very bones. Kreacher was a whimpering mess directly opposite him, as he retrieved the anchor, nudging the magical boat into action.

He suppressed the urge to comfort his house elf, and instead fixed his eyes on the murky green water.

Focus. Don't feel, don't feel.

The potion in the basin couldn't be banished, charmed levitated, transfigured or altered by any magical means. On a hunch, Regulus made Kreacher try as well, though the house elf had little more success than he did.

The only way out, is through.

"Kreacher," He summoned a goblet and ran his tongue over his dry lips. "No matter what I say, not matter how I behave, you are to ensure that I finish the potion. When I tell you to leave, you are to go home immediately and never speak of this to anyone. You are to make sure I finish the potion no matter what I tell you next. Understand?"

The potion burnt the back of his throat as he tipped the goblet back in one drink and fished for another before he lost his resolve. It was viscous and tasted of iron, in the way blood was, pungent like death and held the duality of hellfire's heat and chill.

The effects were immediate ─ the edges of Regulus' vision blurred and voices of a time long past rang in his ears, screaming and pleading for mercy, for help, for a kindness not seen.

He was dimly aware of Kreacher's doe eyes trained on him as he raised the second goblet to his lips.

By the forth or fifth goblet ─ Regulus had lost count ─ his mother's voice joined in the chant. It hurt, to hear her refer to himself as Orion or Sirius again, because hewasntenoughwasntenoighwasntenough ─

Regulus pushed past that and swallowed. At some point in time, his knees had given out, forcing him to kneel in the shallows in front of the basin. It was fitting in a cruel way. From the day he'd received the Dark Mark, Regulus was no longer his own person. He would die kneeling to a Lord he no longer believed in.

"Hey, Reggie," an all too familiar voice greeted, and Sirius swam into view in all his thirteen-year-old glory.

"You're not real," Regulus hissed, curling up more into himself ─ he was so cold. "You're not Sirius. He's dead."

"You think the dead we loved ever truly leave us?" Sirius laughed without humor, as he tipped his brother's head back gently and pressed the dreaded goblet against his protesting lips. "Grow up, Reggie. I made a promise, and I intend to keep it."

"Don't… want to" he mumbled as he tried to turn away from the goblet, as best as he could.

"C'mon Reggie, just one more gulp ─ that's it! One more, just one more."

Regulus blinked back tears as more potion was forced into his protesting system.

"Kreacher," he said, gaining a small window of clarity as his goblet scrape against the bottom of the basin. "Get the locket. Keep it safe and with you. Destroy it. Now leave."

"Master Regulus ─" Kreacher started, flinching as the wards around the small island came down and the Inferi stirred.

"─ GO!" he roared, surprising even himself with the volume. His elf disappears with a loud crack, his magic leaving behind a small cloud of illuminance in the dense green fog.

Regulus turned slowly to face the approaching undead.

His survival instincts screamed at him to run, to lift his wand arm, to do something, anything ─

─ But he was so tired.

So he closed his eyes and didn't struggle as the first pair of withering hands clasped around his ankles.

Regulus' eyes found the night sky for one last time.

The black canvas was spelled dark and starless, but even that didn't deem the brilliance of the brightest.

Sirius.

"Reggie! Look at what I can do!"

He was five, when his brother came up to him with a beaming smile, holding up his hands to show off the flickering ball of fire sitting in his palms.

"It doesn'tmatter. I will always, always protect you, understand?"

He was seven, the year when Mother's mental started to deteriorate. Sirius took the blame for him when he knocked over an antique vase.

You promised, Regulus wanted to scream, though he ought to be over it already. But you still left me. Then, three years ago. Now, three years later.

"Come with me," and Sirius was sixteen, his bruised lips bloody. "Because I won't be back."

"You know I can't"

Because I am obligated to the family, he had tried to tell himself. Because I know responsibility.

Regulus could recognise now that that was not the case. Deep down, he had wanted Sirius to beg him, to show him that he truly cared for and wanted him, that the invitation was not only a polite formality.

Holly, red and green, blood staining the white berries crimson; siblings drowning in a river of sorrows. The only way to move on, is through.

It was not a giddy happiness. It was raw, burning pain, but somehow Regulus was confident he could cast the charm he never could, wandless or not, with the belated pride he felt for his brother. He was free— not safe, because no one was safe in a war, but free to act on his heart's whims.

Expecto Patronum.