As Narcissa heard Sirius's screams, something inside her fractured. Shattered. Broke into a million pieces.
She couldn't do it.
She couldn't sit by as her baby cousin was tortured.
She couldn't sit idly Seen But Not Heard, Silent and Listening, Idle and Pretty, while Sirius Orion was screaming through the walls of her house.
Her Sirius.
No matter how disowned he was, he was her Sirius.
The Sirius of her generation.
So she stood up.
Some broken, shattered anger inside her clawing its way out from where it had been sitting in wait her entire life.
He was her baby cousin.
Disowned or not she had hugged him and healed his scraped knees as a child.
Disowned or not he was her cousin.
She felt like she had shards of glass inside her chest and she wanted to scream and sob or break something.
His screams tore through the walls of her house like knives into her heart.
She had never heard him scream like that.
She had heard him scream before, of course.
She had grown up with him after all.
She had heard him scream when he was startled, or angry, or just plain being loud.
(He was always plain being loud.)
She had heard him scream when Bella jumped up behind him, or when there was a particularly threatening spider, or when he was fighting with his parents.
She had heard him scream and shout and yell and startle and rage.
But never like this.
Never anything like the shrieking sobbing screams of agony pulled from him by Bella's wand, Bella's spells, Bella's Cruciatus.
Never anything like this.
So Narcissa was given a choice.
A choice between her disowned cousin. The former heir of her house. The boy she had hugged and cried with. The child she had consoled and hugged before magicking away his scraped knees and bruises as a child. The boy she had drawn weak smiles from when he was sad for years.
(She remembers that she once promised herself she would protect him.
Back before Andromeda had left. (Don't think of her) Before Bella became a death eater. Before Reggie was dragged into the war. (He's just a kid. What was aunt Walburga thinking sending him into this?) Before Sirius ran away.
Before any of this had happened and everything was still okay.
He had gotten in a fight with some neighborhood muggle boy (neighborhood muggle brat.) and gotten a rather painful black eye and split lip.
She had kissed his forehead and healed him, and promised herself that she would protect him.)
She was given a choice between the boy she was told to hate for years now. Who she couldn't mention without receiving angry looks and being scolded. The teenager who had betrayed their family and their bloodline. The disgrace who was a blood traitor, and shame on the tree. (Like there weren't other disgraces. Like Andromeda.)
And all the tradition, all the rules, and every unspoken law that she knew.
Narcissa was given a choice between Sirius Orion Black and everything she had ever known.
A choice between her husband. Between her family (he was her family). Between Bella and the rules and her entire life.
A choice between the love she still harbored for a traitor. And the rest of her family.
A choice between love for a disgraceful traitor, and everything else.
But disowned or not Sirius was hers.
She could only have one. Her social standing, or Sirius living another day. Another week. Another month. Another year.
And when she looked at it like that?
The answer was rather obvious.
Him dying was out of the question.
And if he stayed here? Well. There wasn't much hope for him living.
As Sirius's screams echoed through the walls of her house and into her head, Narcissa made her choice.
To hell with tradition.
To hell with Bellatrix.
To hell with Voldemort himself.
Something inside her had shattered and she couldn't sit idle. Something inside her has broken beyond repair.
She couldn't let this continue.
Narcissa stood up, and walked towards that room.
She was holding her wand so tightly her knuckles were white.
No one stopped her.
No one even gave her a second glance.
This was her house.
That was her cousin.
That was her sister torturing her cousin.
To hell with his disownment.
To hell with the rules.
To hell with it all.
She had held that boy as a child and she had read him stories.
Narcissa took a deep breath, convinced of the action she was about to take, and pushed open the door.
Bella whirled around to see who entered.
There was a sickening expression of glee on her face
"Cissa! Come to join me in torturing the traitor?"
Bellatrix's smile made her heart hurt.
Made her teeth clench.
Made her angry.
Sirius was prone on the ground, shaking and shaking as wretched sobs shook his trembling frame.
Bitter choking sobs as his nerves screamed.
"Yes," Narcissa said quietly. Then pointed her wand at Bellatrix.
"Cissa?" She asked.
Narcissa wanted to use Cruciatus. She wanted to bring Bellatrix to her knees.
She wanted to make her writhe in agony like she had Sirius.
To elect revenge.
But with Sirius prone on the floor, she couldn't bother with that.
"Stupefy," She whispered and Bella's eyes went wide as she was thrown back.
"Expellimarius." She said a bit louder. A bit more confidently.
And Bella's wand flew across the room.
She stared at her. "How dare you-"
"Oh be quiet Bella. He's our cousin and you hurt him." She snapped. "Stupefy."
And Bella was unconscious.
And well, there was absolutely no turning back now.
Narcissa made sure Bellatrix wouldn't be leaving anytime soon.
She felt almost numb as she bodybound her sister and cast a silencing spell.
She felt.. Nothing somehow as she looked down at Bellatrix.
Then she turned to Sirius and let her heart shatter.
Narcissa knelt next to Sirius, gently brushing his hair from his eyes.
He flinched away.
Narcissa wanted to cry.
"Hey, Siri." She whispered ever so quietly. Voice somehow hushed like every ancestor she had was glaring down at her for betraying them.
Like if she spoke quiet enough, they wouldn't hear.
"I'm going to get you out of here."
Sirius's face was drenched in tears. Every few seconds his body jerked, spasmed, and a sob tore itself from his lips.
Cruciatus truly is a terrible spell.
His eyes jumped back and forth between Bellatrix's fallen body and her.
Panicked, wide and bloodshot.
His hair was greasy and looked to have blood in it. Making it clump together.
He looked terrible. Nothing like the properly dressed boy he had been growing up. Nothing like the far more rumpled teenager he had been before he ran.
He looked exhausted, hurt, and terrified.
"Ciss..Cissa?" He croaked, voice breaking and cracking apart in his throat.
He sounded so scared she wanted to sob.
This was so wrong.
All of this was wrong.
"Yes dear, It's me." Her voice was quiet. "I'm here now. You're okay."
Narcissa pulled him up gently against her.
He tried to pull back and away but couldn't manage it.
"Why?" He asked between shuddering sobs.
Between attempts at pulling away.
Between the involuntary shudders the effects Cruciatus sent through your body.
"Because I love you." She said quietly. No longer a faint whisper. "Because Bella is.. Bella is insane. And because I love you."
Sirius didn't respond but he stopped fighting as much she pulled him against her.
His back was against her chest and Narcissa's heart was beating wildly.
She had betrayed Bellatrix.
She had betrayed Lucius.
She had betrayed the Dark Lord.
She had betrayed everyone.
But as Sirius looked at her with trust in his eyes she didn't regret it.
She couldn't.
He was her baby cousin. He was hers.
"You're going to be okay," She spoke now. Louder than a shaky whisper and in defiance of her terror over what she had just done.
She stroked his hair out of his eyes. He let her.
'Let her.' As if he could do much other than shake.
"You're going to be okay. I'm here now and- I'm. I'm here. And I won't let them hurt you. I promise." Her hands were shaking as she hugged him. "You're safe."
They sat there for a few minutes. Until the worst of the jerking spasms from Cruciatus stopped.
Until he stopped sobbing so hard and was able to speak.
Until the immediate effects of Cruciatus were done with.
"Can you stand?" Narcissa asked after a moment.
"No," Sirius replied so matter of factly she could almost envision that this scenario was anything other than what it is.
"You're going to have to."
"I know," Sirius muttered as he leaned back against her.
And they sit a moment, and then Narcissa exhales slowly. "I love you, Sirius."
It's a declaration this time.
A promise even.
Sirius makes what could have been a sound of agreement, or a sound of pain, but doesn't really respond other than that.
"We need to go now." Her voice is quiet. Clipped.
It's a fact that they need to go.
Before anyone gets suspicious.
Before anyone comes to check.
"Yeah." He sounds so exhausted and hurt she wants to cry.
But she doesn't.
They don't have the time for that.
Narcissa pulled him up slowly, feeling like shattered glass.
Sirius is shaking on his feet as Narcissa pulls him up.
Practically swaying until she had his arm securely over her shoulders.
Most of his weight is on Narcissa. And he is rather heavy, (so much older than the little boy she would swing around by the roses) but by now there is so much adrenaline in her veins she hardly noticed the weight.
She summoned Bella's wand from where it was flung, and pressed it into Sirius's hand.
Sirius can feel the power resonating with him.
It makes him sick.
But Bella's wand had always worked just as well for him as it worked for her.
Her wand was familiar in his hand just as his own was, despite him not having held it in well over a decade now.
He had stolen this wand so many times.
He had learned to cast charms with this wand.
The wand that had just been used to torture him.
It reacted to his magic like coming home and Sirius hated it.
(He tried not to think about how the spell wasn't nearly as strong as when Walburga cast it. He tried not to think about how much worse it would have been if the wand didn't like him personally.)
Narcissa leads him out of the room, and into a secret hallway.
Because well, of course there is a secret hallway.
"I'm going to fetch Regulus. He has plans of breaking you out later, I can tell, also.. I can't exactly carry you far."
Sirius nodded and braces himself against the wall. "I-" His voice gives out as he shudders.
He looks a mess.
Narcissa tries and fails to wipe her eyes discreetly.
But then Sirius smiles at her, and that's right.
That smile is right.
Everything about this might be wrong because Sirius is hurt and Bella hurt him and she can't not remember all the smiles and hugs and gifts and moments between the 5 of them and Bella tortured him.
But his smile was right.
And that's what truly mattered.
She presses a kiss to his cheek. "I'll be back, I promise."
"I know."
It isn't long until she's coming back with Regulus.
He hadn't been hard to convince to their plan.
She was right about his plans to rescue Sirius himself.
Regulus is nervous.
He hadn't properly faced Sirius in years.
And well.. This isn't exactly the reunion he had pictured.
There was far less yelling than he had expected. Far fewer spells flying.
He didn't exactly expect Sirius to be the one hurt, when they met again, expected him to be the one bleeding and begging for sanctuary, but well.
When had he ever been good at predicting things?
He stares at Sirius for a long shaky second before pressing forward and hugging him.
He had too.
He hadn't hugged Sirius in years, but he had to.
Sirius is visibly shocked, but his arms coil around Regulus wordlessly as he hugs him back.
Regulus pulls back quickly. Less than 10 seconds.
He's fidgeting with the hem of his robe and looking anywhere but his brother.
(Because Sirius is and always will be his brother. No matter what they say.)
Sirius offers a weak smile and Regulus looks as if he might cry.
Narcissa puts a hand on Regulus's shoulder.
"So, we're apparently rebels now," Narcissa said and was proud that her voice was only shaking a little.
"Yeah," Regulus said quietly. "Apparently we're rebels."