Love, Lycoris
Lycoris Black. His voice was smooth like firewhisky, and Regulus could see just how he sweet-talked the entire pureblood society into following him. That was a wonderful performance you gave. There was something about his eyes though. If he turned his head just enough, they glinted red.
“Honestly, Lycoris, I don’t understand why you’re so opposed to us being married.”
Thank you, Regulus had replied, and then belatedly, my lord, but there was no anger. Just a raised eyebrow sent a shiver down his spine.
“I mean, it’s simple. Your mother will be pleased, my father will be angry. Won’t that be great?”
He leaned in then. You’re a very pretty thing, aren’t you? Regulus said nothing. I’m sure a lot of these men and women have told you that before though. He reached out his hand and twirled a lock of Regulus’ hair around his finger. Regulus didn’t dare breathe.
“And I mean…. You’re one of my best friends.”
They have, he replied, too terrified and shocked to lie. The Dark Lord smiled, sharp and sweet.
“Sure, it won’t be some kind of passionate, true love situation, but who has the time for those? We like each other. We trust each other. I think that will make a better marriage than either of our parents had. Don’t you agree?
I like pretty things, he whispered, and Regulus felt sick as his lips brushed Regulus’ hand, before he laughed and left Regulus alone in the cold.
“Hello? Lycoris? Are you alright?”
Regulus startles as the world comes into focus again. It’s the weekend, and Barty is there, against his father’s wishes (though not even Crouch Sr. is stupid enough to decline an invite from the Black Family). They’re walking in the forest near Grimmauld Place. His mother rarely lets him out, but she seems to like Barty, for whatever reason, and lets them go to the forest alone sometimes.
“Hm? Sorry, I was thinking of something else.” Regulus doesn’t quite meet his eyes. He reminds himself to relax. The Dark Lord is not here. I’ll deal with it later, he thinks. Later.
Barty grins. “Clearly. You let me get a full 30 seconds of arguments in. That’s a record.”
“I’ll be sure to not let you break it.”
“Come on. It will be fun. We’ll go on holiday every month and make cute little kids.” He winks, and Regulus smiles.
“Barty,” he laughs, but then pauses to consider his words. They’ve had this conversation a hundred times, and he knows Barty isn’t truly serious—he knows what Regulus’ answer will always be. But still, he feels guilty for rejecting his best friend without ever naming a reason. “You’ll make me very happy,” he settles on, and it’s true. Barty is his best friend, even though he can be a pain in the ass, and Regulus has never felt lighter than he does with him.
“Cheers, I knew you’d come around.” Barty smiles, but Regulus knows he isn’t fooled. He knows what’s coming next.
“But…”
“But you won’t marry me.”
“No, I won’t.”
Barty shrugs. “Worth another try. I’ll catch you one of these days,” he finishes, elbowing Regulus in the side, who sighs.
Truthfully, Regulus wouldn’t mind the arrangement Barty has in mind. It’s… ideal, actually. It would give him the best shot at a happy life. But he couldn’t do that to Evan. Evan, who has been head-over-heels in love with Barty since their fourth year. Evan, who always has that pained look in his eye when Barty brings up marriage, especially with Regulus.
For Evan, he thinks, as he elbows Barty back, who groans in pain. He can’t believe he has these two idiots for best friends.
“Merlin, your elbows are sharp.” He rubs his side. Regulus laughs, and he likes the lightness in his chest, the wind in his hair, the smile on his lips. It feels good. He’s so focused on that feeling that he doesn’t notice his hands shaking.
But Barty does.
“Lycoris….” he trails off. “Fuck,” he swears, and looks at the ground. “I take it things aren’t better at home.”
Regulus shrugs. “It’s alright. I can handle it.” It’s not a lie.
“That old hag needs to lay off. This could become permanent damage, you know.”
“It won’t. We’re leaving to Hogwarts in a couple weeks, and I’m taking good care of myself. I’ll be fine.” This, however, could be a lie. He’s not sure, honestly. He isn’t sure of anything.
Barty looks sad, like he knows the truth. Regulus sighs. There was no way he could hide this from Barty, who he knew would worry. He hates it when people worry. He tells as much to Barty.
“We love you, Lycoris,” he says in response, and they’ve also had this conversation a hundred times, but it never gets less heart-stopping when Barty says that sacred four-letter-word. “Of course we’re going to worry.”
Regulus rolls his eyes, but the lightness is back, and he intends to keep it. “Enough of this depressing talk.” Then he gets an idea. “Last one to the lake gets thrown in!” He smirks when he takes off, not even a second after he finishes. Distantly, he hears a call of You bastard! before he hears Barty’s footsteps behind him. He laughs.
With his feet pounding on the ground and heart in his ears, Regulus wonders what he’d do without them, these people who… love him. The list isn’t very long: Barty, Evan, and Narcissa. He resists the pang in his chest when he realizes he doesn’t know if Sirius belongs on that list. He hopes Sirius knows that Regulus is definitely on his list, but the pit in his stomach tells him that Sirius is probably as uncertain as he is.
What a mess we both are, he thinks, and then realizes he’s breaking his own rule of no depressing talk.
He turns his head around. Barty is making progress, but not enough. “Come on, Crouch! Thought you were better than this!”
“It’s not my fault you’re a bloody seeker!”
He sees the lake and stops abruptly, intending to inform Barty that he’s won and will now be throwing him in the lake, but when he turns around, Barty hasn’t stopped running. Regulus recognizes the gleam in his eye.
“Barty!” He yells. “I’m sorry, I take back everything—Hell, I’ll even marry you—”
But nothing stops Barty from crashing into Regulus—and plunging them both into the lake.
When Regulus resurfaces, coughing out the water in his lungs and drenched to the bone, he sees Barty wearing a smug grin.
“You bastard,” he says, the familiarity of the words not lost on him, but the effect is slightly undermined by him coughing up more water. He settles for a glare and splashing Barty in the face.
Barty splashes back, and the rest of the afternoon is lost to a water fight of Slytherin proportions.
“Barty,” he starts, when they’re laying on their backs under the shade of a magnolia tree, waiting for their clothes to dry. Regulus has been putting off this conversation all afternoon, but it’s getting late, and he’s running out of time. “What do you think of the Dark Lord?”
He feels Barty shrug. He’s shirtless and in his boxers while Regulus is wearing his soaked undergarments. He eyes Barty’s chest in carefully-veiled envy. “He’s a blood supremacist and a dictator-in-the-making. Envisions the Wizarding World to be something entirely different than it is now—something dominant and powerful and overtaking. He wants to change things. So,” and Regulus can hear the grin in his voice, “Everything my father hates.”
Barty’s mother died when he was five, but according to Barty, his father has been a “self-obsessed, egotistical dickhead” since the beginning. Regulus has met Crouch Sr. on only two occasions, but can say that Barty’s description is accurate. Crouch Sr. is power hungry, obsessed with image, and a tedious perfectionist.
In short, not a very good father.
Regulus is quiet. “Do you think you’ll join him?”
Barty’s voice is too casual. “Probably.” Yes.
It scares Regulus, sometimes, how much Barty hates his father. Not because Crouch Sr. doesn’t deserve it, but because Barty is willing to destroy anything—including himself—to spite his father. Regulus still remembers when Barty intentionally failed every single one of his exams, then came back to Hogwarts covered in bruises and smiled like he hadn’t a care in the world. Evan was devastated—didn’t talk to Barty for weeks. But Regulus only shook his head as he healed Barty’s bruises, even though Barty knew how to himself. He just didn’t care enough to.
He talked with Evan, privately, right before the 5th year term ended. If Barty joins the Death Eaters, he won’t make it out. He’s too erratic, too unstable. It will consume him. They had to talk him out of it.
Which is easier said than done.
Barty tries to hide his manic side, but Regulus has known him far too long. There is something dark and dangerous under Barty’s laughing smile and easy love. He’d never turn it on Regulus or Evan, but everyone else? Himself? Regulus knows Barty will go as far as he has to.
“You might die. If you join him.”
Maybe to a regular person, this would have been reason enough. But not Barty. “I might.” He agrees with his own death like he’s talking about the weather.
Sometimes, Regulus thinks that if it wasn’t for him and Evan, Barty would have killed himself a long time ago. The ultimate punch in the gut to the darling reputation his father worked so hard to built.
He tries not to think about that one for too long.
“What if I join?” There’s an immediate pang of regret. Regulus wishes he phrased it differently as soon as he said it. There’s only one way Barty will respond to that.
Laughter. And then—“I think the Dark Lord is too misogynistic to let that happen.” His stomach twists. Later, he pushes, later.
Regulus makes sure his voice betrays nothing. He and Evan have a plan, and he’ll be damned if he lets his own emotions get in the way. “He let Bella join, though.”
“Well, I don’t think you plan on fucking the Dark Lord anytime soon, do you?” Regulus doesn’t know why that comment makes his stomach twist even more. Or maybe he does. Later.
“There’s talk,” he continues in an even voice, “that those two twins, Alecto and Amycus, are joining too. And Adara Nott. So.”
Barty turns his head. This is news to him. “So…. you could join. If you wanted.”
Regulus turns his head too, giving a humorless smile. “Yes.”
“But you won’t.” Barty frowns, and there is genuine distress in his eyes, which makes Regulus feel worse about what he’s going to do next. He’s been dreading it all summer—it’s been sitting on his chest like a weight. Barty is going to hate him, after this.
“If,” he starts, and he thinks his eyes betray him because Barty’s face shifts from concern to fury much too quickly. But still, he gives the final blow. “If you join, I will.”
He’s quiet. Shocked, that Regulus will stoop so low, but honestly, Regulus doesn’t think he should be. If their places were reversed, Barty would do the same for him in a heartbeat.
“Fuck you,” he says, low and dangerous. Regulus just smiles. Sometimes, Barty reminds him of Sirius.
“We need you, Barty.” He needs you, Regulus wants to say, but doesn’t. He promised Evan he’d stay out of it.
“I don’t fucking care, Lycoris, this is fucking unfair!” He’s shaking, with all his rage. Regulus sees a glint in his eyes. Not quite red, like the Dark Lord, but something.
Maybe he should be scared. Maybe he should be terrified. Most people are, when they see Barty like this—and Barty is like this much more often than Regulus likes to admit. But here’s what people miss: through it all, Barty is careful not to raise his voice or make any sudden movements.
The people on his list—Barty, Evan, Narcissa. Maybe even Sirius. They did more than love him. They taught him how to love back. And he needs them to know. He needs—he needs them to know that he’s on their lists.
“I love you, Barty,” he whispers, and Barty stops his anger. Regulus has never said it back before.
There is a long moment of silence. The sky is dark now. He didn’t notice.
“I know you do,” Barty says finally.
“You’d do the same for me.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
“Please, Barty.” His voice is more weak than he’d like.
Barty cocks his head. He studies Regulus, and softens when he sees something.
“I’m not going to hate you, you know. I’d be a fucking hypocrite to.”
Regulus releases a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Oh,” he says.
Barty shakes his head. “You wanker. Did you think you could get rid of me so soon?”
“I just thought—”
“Hush.” A pause. “I’m still mad at you. But I get it. Fine. I won’t join.” He looks at Regulus. “And you won’t join either.”
Regulus grins. “I won’t,” he whispers. “Let’s go home now. It’s getting late.”
Barty nods, and gets up. “Is this what you were thinking about so intently today? When I was proposing to you?” He holds out a hand for Regulus, who takes it.
“Please, Barty, that was hardly a proposal. And yes,” he lies, “It was. I was praying I wouldn’t have to bring Evan into this. Then you might have actually murdered us both.”
Barty looks confused. “What do you mean?”
Regulus levels him with a look. “What, you think Evan would let you and me pledge our allegiance to the Dark Lord all by ourselves?”
Realization dawns on Barty, who swears and mutters something suspiciously like the jury’s still out on those murders , and Regulus smiles.
That night, he sends Evan a letter about how he managed to convince Barty not to dye his hair green (code, of course), and ends it with Love, Lycoris. He writes another to Narcissa, asking what kind of toys Draco would enjoy, and ends it the same way. He meant what he said. He needs them to know.
And then, five glasses of firewhisky in, he writes another letter. To Sirius. This one, he doesn’t send, but carefully transfigures into a silver pendant and hides in his desk. It’s just three words, but Regulus thinks there are too many things he needs to say and not enough words in the world to say them, and that was all he could confidently write down. So he settles on three words, one of which he had never said aloud until today, and hopes it’s enough.
And, because he’s drunk, he tells himself he’ll give it to Sirius, once they’re back in Hogwarts. Then he laughs. The Black family madness is finally catching up to me, he thinks.
He pours himself another glass. He really isn’t sure of anything these days.
In the morning, he takes a hangover potion before breakfast and waits for his mother at the table. When she comes, he sits up straight and pretends he doesn’t know what’s next.
“How was it, with the Crouch heir?”
He never gives too much detail. “It was fine. We had a good time.”
She eyes him with disinterest as she stirs her cup of tea. “Has he brought up marriage?”
“No.” The lie is so easy, it almost feels like the truth.
“It’s no matter. What I said has come true. Already, marriage offers have poured in from the Greengrasses, the Macnairs, and many others.”
He nods. He didn’t expect any different.
She pauses. Regulus knows her well enough that she is going to say something unexpected, and wants his full attention. He gives it.
“The Dark Lord wants your presence tomorrow, at the Lestrange Manor. A private lesson he said,” and Regulus does not understand the look in her eyes when she continues, “to help advance you in your studies. He…sees potential in you. Wants to help nurture it. For the cause.”
Regulus has a thousand things he wants to say. I can’t join the cause, Mother, I promised Barty, is one of the more stupid ones. I don’t want to go, is one of the more dangerous ones. But for a moment, he thinks about what would happen if he told her his discomfort. That… that he didn’t like the way the Dark Lord looked at him. That he doesn’t feel safe around him. That he can’t breathe around him.
But his first name is Regulus—not Sirius—so instead, he says, “Of course I’ll go, Mother. It’s an honor.”
He thought she would nod, or smile, or maybe even look proud, but instead, she looked at him for a long time. Like she wouldn’t see him again.
“Men can never resist red,” she murmurs, and Regulus knows she didn’t mean to say it. He holds it close to his heart, like all his Mother’s secrets, and silently begs her to give him more.
She fixes him with a look that means she is going to tell him something he needs to remember. He can recall her earlier lessons with perfect clarity. The first was when he was eight, and they were at the Macnair mansion. Walburga wanted the prized Macnair owl, whose talons were so sharp they could cut glass. She tasked Regulus with retrieving it, armed only with dragon hide gloves and a lesson on how to be quiet. Regulus was rewarded with a single, thankfully not deep, scar on his collarbone and a kiss to his forehead. The next was at nine, on how to cry on command. That mudblood was looking at me weird, he’s a creep, please, take him away! Then ten, on how to make men underestimate you. Your daughter is so smart, Walburga, how ever did she win in Wizard Chess against my sixth-year son? Eleven, how to flirt. If you teach me that spell, I’ll do whatever you want. Twelve, how to be the perfect woman. Of course you’re the best quidditch player in all of Hogwarts. Thirteen, how to lie. Of course I'll marry you. Fourteen, how to forget. He’s not your brother anymore. Fifteen, how to kill. Avada Kedava. But you have to mean it.
He waits, but Walburga says nothing. And then, for the first time in a lifetime, he sees his mother change her mind. “Go to your room,” she says softly, and if they were different people, Regulus thinks it could have sounded like it was said with love. She stands up, back rim-rod straight and mouth set in a line, but before leaving the dining table, she addresses him.
“Wear black to Lestrange Manor.” Then she is gone, and Regulus is alone again.