black and white

chapter 6 - the letters from no one

Sirius was once more looking at Reg strangely. As if he had grown an extra three heads suddenly.

Albus decided then would be a great time to announce, "we are going to take a break so everybody out. But I want you all back in here in fifteen minutes time. Chop chop!"

The hall was filled with wild theories, scraping benches and a lot of traffic as Regulus, Barty, Dora and Evan joined the queues to get out. Just as they reached the doors, someone grabbed Reg's arm and dragged him away.

The someone muttered "suivez-moi" but did not let go of Reg's robes. Nevertheless, Reg followed.

He allowed himself to be dragged and mentally issued Barty an apology. It wasn't until they stopped moving that Reg noticed where they were. A secret passageway concealed by a tapestry; one of the ones that led to a dead end.

"C'est quoi ça, Sirius? Voulez-vous expliquer ce qui se passe?"

"Vraiment? Regardez, qu'est-ce que vous savez et – attendez pourquoi parlons-nous encore Français?" Sirius frowned at himself before continuing in English.

"Why did you look through the book? And most importantly – you're practically a deatheater! Why are you upset that your master is dead?"

"I'm not a deatheater, nor am I 'practically one'."

Regulus shook Sirius off (for he was still holding his arm), noticing the absence of warmth immediately, and left. He refused to let himself think of the encounter. Instead, Regulus found his friends and sat with them, silently brooding for the remainder of the fifteen minutes.

Eventually the students were let back into the hall and Reg looked around. There were no obvious changes but the teachers looked especially somber. Regulus wondered what they had talked about.

"Fils de pute!" Sirius yelled and regulus knew it was for him. Still, Narcissa shot a rude hand gesture back at him as well as yelling, "va te faire enculer" for good measure.

"Mr Black, miss Black, detention!" Shouted professor Flitwick who had been learning French tirelessly since the first Black he taught appeared in his class.

"Miss macdonald?" Mcgonogal spoke, "would you care to read?"

A girl with short, black, frizzle hair went to retrieve the book after shooting Hyacinth Evans an annoyed look.

She read, "Chapter three: the letters from no one."

Potter let out an excited squeal and dragon scoffed.
"What's wrong, Draco?" Asked luna, quietly.

"Nothing. I can see where Potter gets his need to be center of attention from, that's all."

Dora rolled her eyes. She was thinking that the boy had barely said a word. But then all those from the future had been exceptionally quiet.

Barty muttered, "this is gonna get confusing. We're never gonna know which Potter is which."

Reg shrugged his shoulders as if to say, oh well. Barty grabbed his Reggie's hand and started playing with his rings.

"The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned harry his longest ever punishment."

This was followed by more of Dudley acting like a spoilt brat and Reg tried to tune out everyone's grumbling. Honestly, this harry kid had it easy compared to the horror story he was growing up in! And they had a literal war to worry about as well.

Pausing only to appreciate Harry's snarky comment about some uniform, Reg wonderd why Ginger and not-Dagworth looked just as shocked as anybody else at Harry's treatment. Surely, being his only friends, he'd have told them?

Both muggles appeared to know what hogwarts was just by the wax seal so Reg could only assume that Petunia had been there when Mcgonogal (or whoever it was) had explained everything to Orchid Evans. Still, things only got better for harry while the boy remained ungrateful for it.

The room was suddenly filled with laughter – at Vernon's expense – but no ones delight matched Evans. But the book carried on and soon even Regulus was concerned for Harry safety. Even Barty was.

"Won't he get, like, hypothermia or something?" His whisper carried.

"Not. Helping." Evan whispered harshly back.

But their attention was suddenly refocused. Just as harry got ready to celebrate his birthday –

"Someone was outside, knocking to come in."

Nothing could stop James Potter's joy as he screamed, "a hogwarts teacher! Just in time to rescue my boy and give him the best damn birthday ever!"
He even climbed onto the table.

As teachers swarmed Potter and they were ushered of to bed, Reg laced his hand with Barty's. He caught Sirius's eye through the sea of people and held his gaze for a second. But Regulus didn't know what to say to the brother who had left him so he went when Barty pulled him away. And the moment was lost.

Gone to join other fleeting memories perhaps, or just gone. Gone.

.................................................................

Please excuse the French, I am not a native speaker and just used Google translate.

Let me know what you think.

Sorry for the irregularity of the posting, life's crazy. I'm part Irish but I've lived in England my whole life. One of my Irish friends recently moved back to Ireland after living in America for a few years and his mam is ill. She is *very* ill.
I'm very scared she's going to die.

Anyway, thanks for reading. I know you don't care but it feels good to ramble.

Words: 800