PART I REGULUS
War is a strange thing. It bends the rules of normal life. Of normal morality. Warps everything to revolve around it. It had never occurred to Regulus that a body could be used as a weapon. He had somewhat assumed that, as a society, they were all agreed that certain things were sacred.
He was wrong.
The Ministry refuses to return the bodies of the dead Death Eaters to their families without a comprehensive list of names detailing everyone who was part of the attempted coup. No one, of course, agrees to supply such a list and so dozens of bodies go unclaimed. Unburied. Unmourned.
And Evan Rosier is one of them.
His mother waits a week before she decides to have a funeral anyway. Dozens of people dressing in black and attending the Rosier home where a large portrait of Evan is suspended in the middle of the living room, winking and smirking at everyone who walks by. Regulus finds it hard to breathe every time he sees it. Doing his best to avoid it all together.
Somehow he ends up on the stairs with Barty, passing a flask of firewhisky back and forth. They don't talk. There isn't anything to say. There have been speeches all day, from family members, friends. Neither Regulus nor Barty get up. Regulus has no desire to showcase his grief. Besides, he barely recognizes the Evan everyone else is talking about—the perfect son, perfect student, perfect friend—Regulus loved Evan. He really did. But "perfect" is not the word he would use to describe him.
Mrs. Rosier had pleaded with Regulus to tell her about her son's last moments. And so he had, hands shaking in his lap the whole time. He had told her about how well Evan had fought, how he'd saved Regulus, how brave (not idiotic, or delusional, or selfish) he had been to take on Alastor Moody. How he'd almost won. How he'd died quickly and peacefully—though he isn't entirely sure that last one is true. Nothing about that moment had felt peaceful to Regulus.
He did not tell her that he held Evan in his arms. That he let him go. Left him behind.
The thing that hurts most. Well, besides all of it. Is that he doesn't think that Evan would have done it. Left him behind, that is. He never had before.
He's passing the flask silently back to Barty when Cerci appears. He'd lost her sometime after they made it through the line of people offering condolences. He's said "I'm sorry for your loss" so many times today he's not sure he knows what the words mean anymore.
"How're you two holding up?" she asks, her eyes soft, running them over. He isn't sure what they look like. Probably pathetic. He feels pathetic.
Barty holds up his hand, palm down, and wiggles it. Cerci gives him a small smile.
"Fair enough. Why don't we get out of here huh? Go get some food? My treat."
"There's food here," Barty says, though he doesn't even sound like he's making an argument, more just stating a fact.
"Yeah, but I feel like you two could benefit from maybe not being here anymore."
Barty makes a noise that might be a laugh or a scoff, Regulus can't tell. Cerci's eyes finding him, asking a question.
"Reg?"
He holds her gaze for a moment before looking over at the doorway to the living room, just the edge of Evan's portrait visible.
"Yeah," he says finally, voice rough. "Yeah lets go."
He isn't paying attention to where Cerci is taking them, doesn't think Barty is either, the pair of them asleep on their feet. Death is one of those things—you have nothing to compare it to—which makes it very difficult to hold. Evan is dead.
