turnaround time
As Lord Black, Sirius has more resources at disposal, and he brokers a deal with Dumbledore. He lends them Grimmauld Place, one of the Black family properties, as headquarters for The Order of the Phoenix. Being a former Black family hideaway, it is protected by complex warding systems, so Voldemort is blissfully unaware of Sirius’s role in the Order.
Sirius also slips in an offer to help the Order strategize attacks. He frames this as a favor, but this gives him direct access to all their goings-on.
Lastly, he demands that he not be sent to fight on the ground, ostensibly to protect his role as Lord, but in reality, to avoid an encounter with his siblings, Blair in particular.
“I don’t want to hurt you by accident, sister,” he teases Blair.
“As if,” she retorts. “You better be afraid of me.”
Their teasing aside, Blair is immensely proud of Sirius for making sure their plans come together. She is aware that her impassioned brother does not enjoy thinking things through and has to train himself to strategize. She is pleasantly surprised that he is good at it.
She laughs at the many ways the three of them have changed and the many ways they haven’t.
-
Once Sirius settles into his new role, Blair and Regulus decide to finally offer themselves as spies to the Order.
He brings them to Grimmauld Place on the night of an Order meeting, Regulus and Blair tucked under James Potter’s Invisibility Cloak, of all things. James is unaware of the reason why Sirius borrows the cloak, and Sirius mutters under his breath that he hopes James will forgive him.
After a significant amount of shouting and cursing, with Blair and Reg too far away to understand, Sirius finally ushers them in, pulling away the cloak as they enter.
The room is occupied by Mad-Eye Moody, and a significant number of people they went to Hogwarts with: Lupin, Potter, Evans, Hestia Jones, Frank and Alice Longbottom, the Prewett twins, Severus Snape (oddly enough) and to her delight (and horror), Dan Humphrey. She pushes away her anxiety as she realizes that Dumbledore trusts the Order enough for them to make major decisions without him, very much unlike the Dark Lord.
When they reveal themselves, Blair and Regulus are met with a stunned silence followed by a loud chorus of hisses.
“Black, you have betrayed us!” Moody growls.
“I know at least one in this pair is a Death Eater,” Fabian Prewett barks.
“Padfoot, what?” Potter looks hurt.
Blair thinks then that perhaps Sirius has made a mistake in inviting them here.
Regulus, ever the diplomat, speaks first. They have agreed on this, and they know that Blair speaking first would most likely offend the group. Her reputation as a pureblood princess has, after all, never been disputed.
“I don’t know if this will convince you, but why do you think we would wait until our parents die to spy on you? We want to do this. We wouldn’t risk our hides going here otherwise.”
Sirius grunts his assent. “Would I offer you all my home if I knew my siblings would betray you?”
Dan Humphrey speaks quietly, “I can vouch for Regulus.”
The room falls silent. Blair wonders if this is from shock or if Dan commands a level of respect from his peers.
“Oh yeah?” Hestia Jones challenges. Blair realizes it is the former.
“He was a Slytherin,” Frank Longbottom scoffs. “They’re both Slytherins.”
“A Slytherin just like me,” Dan insists. “And me,” Severus Snape interjects.
“I’ve known Reg since we were 11 and he has never spoken a word against muggleborns like me or uttered any discriminatory bullshite. He is Sirius’s brother through and through.”
Dan smiles. “I would trust Regulus with my life, and I know we should welcome him into the Order,” he says with conviction.
“What about the girl?” Moody points at Blair. She stifles the urge to glare at him.
Dan’s smile falters. “I can’t vouch for Blair.”
Lily Evans stands up. “I can.”
Potter, looking shocked, stands up to pull his sweetheart away. Lily fixes him with a stony glare. Severus, to Blair’s amusement, looks at Lily with a bit of longing.
“I was patrolling the Simmons Estate when Blair and two other Death Eaters arrived - Dolohov, I think, and Mulciber?” Lily looks at Blair questioningly. Blair nods.
“I was, of course, outnumbered. At risk to her life, Blair approached me and provided a distraction that gave me enough time to escape.”
Lily Evans looks at everyone in the room. “So if we accept Regulus Black into the order, we have to accept Blair Black too.”
Potter looks around the room and quite suddenly, bursts into laughter. “Well,” he says blithely, clapping Sirius on the back. “We already have Lord Black - why not get his siblings as well?”
It takes at least another hour or so, an hour where the twins reveal their Dark Marks, let them know the extent of their work in the Dark Lord’s circle, and appraise them of what they know about Voldemort’s future plans, but ultimately, the group is convinced.
That evening, Blair and Regulus are inducted into the Order of the Phoenix, with much less fanfare than the night they are marked.
-
Somehow, in the midst of all the chaos, Charles Zabini proposes to Blair. He presents her with an ornate gold band, dripping with more diamonds than even Cissa has on hers. He tells Blair that she’s always been the one for him, that he has been drawn to her from the moment they ride the Hogwarts Express together, that he only ever bollocks things up because he so desperately wants her.
He kneels in front of her, fixing his heated gaze on her. He looks at her almost imploringly. He promises to provide her with the life she deserves.
Blair feels a certain sense of longing, letting her mind drift to the possibility of marrying him.
She thinks that maybe, in another life, Charles Zabini is the one for her. The words Victrola, Empire, and Bonnie & Clyde come to her unbidden. She doesn’t understand.
Regardless, she is in this life, and in this life, Charles Zabini feels all wrong. She is wholly Daniel Humphrey’s, whether or not he will take her back.
She lets Charles down with a modicum of regret.
-
That night, she, Sirius, and Regulus drink to this future they had once planned for. They laugh good-naturedly at Sirius’s narration of Charles Zabini’s solemn meeting with him as head of house. Sirius reassures her that he had told Zabini that whoever marries Blair is solely her choice.
They toast to their parents, whose destructive behavior bound the siblings together even more closely. Sirius, Regulus, and Blair, have managed to let something fruitful grow from their toxic childhood.
They drink, also, because they don’t know how long they have left with each other, and they wish they had more time to be normal siblings, and not lost children fighting in a godforsaken war.
They fall asleep on the sitting room couches that night, serene in the magic that Sirius wraps around them.