Chapter Text
The first thing Regulus saw when he finally opened his eyes was his mother's already cooling corpse.
The first thing he thought when he saw her was 'too bad I couldn't have been there when life left her'.
He always wanted to be the one to kill her for everything she did to him and his brother, and in a way, he did.
When he finally came to his senses he was completely taken by the shock of the situation he was currently in. He raised his right hand and brought it to his face to gently touch his cheek. When he touched warm, solid skin, he was shaken.
He was alive.
He died, he knew that. He was dead in that filthy cave created by the man he had been forced to follow. Killed by an army of hundreds of inferi who had taken great pleasure in tearing him apart and drowning him, all the while having one of the worst potions ever created in his stomach.
He had felt the life leave him very clearly that day.
But the fact that he was there, alive and well, could only mean one thing.
The soul tethers had worked. They had worked. Him and James were successful.
Just to be sure he looked at his mother's hands and indeed, there it was. The ring. His ring. At least it had been his when he was alive. The ancestral ring of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. The ring his father had worn all those years and which would normally have gone to Sirius if he hadn't run away. Regulus had become the heir to the Black family after his brother had been disowned, so he had got it instead.
He had to admit that the ring was absolutely beautiful. Completely black with a dark purple glow even in the dark. And of course with the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black's coat of arms on one side and the family motto 'Toujours Pur' on the other. Not a scratch on it even after centuries.
And although he hated most of his family, he was still glad when his father gave him that ring before he died.
After all, what better way to use something so precious to his family than to have it that make possible he come back if the worst happens.
When he lifted his head he realised how exhausted he was, as if his legs were unable to keep him upright. His eyelids were heavy and his head felt like it was filled with cotton wool, he couldn't think straight. He just knew that he was so exhausted that if he didn't sleep now he would die again.
Dying of exhaustion this time. He didn't even know if it was really possible, according to some Muggles it was.
So without paying any attention to his surroundings or the fact that there was his mother's corpse only a few meters away from him, he slumped into the nearest armchair and fell asleep immediately.
(…)
Regulus was awakened by a loud noise near him, a loud crash … like glass breaking.
Despite himself, he couldn't help but think of his childhood memories. That familiar sound that he knew all too well. The sound he heard every time his mother had fits of anger and broke things, either on purpose or because her curse had missed one of her sons.
Breaking glass was the anthem of his childhood. A week never went without the sound of a vase or a vine glass smashed into a thousand glittering shards.
Once Walburga had thought that punishing him with glass she had just broken was a good idea, she had even told him that she had never thought of it with Sirius and that it would be a first. She had then grabbed a large piece of broken glass from a glass she had thrown at him because he apparently wasn't standing up straight enough, but it had crashed into the wall next to his head. He'd been terrified, but there was nothing he could do when she'd slashed his cheek with it. A nasty cut that had taken Kreacher a long time to heal and then hide.
Another time when she'd been drunk and accused him of being too 'lacking' compared to Sirius, she'd simply flicked her wand and sent a dozen sharp pieces in his legs because she thought he was too small and an heir should be imposing. 'Your brother was a blood-traitor but at least he had charisma and wasn't useless like you,' she had told him.
The sound took him back to the time when the shards of glass and his mother's punishments haunted all his nights.
Before he could fall too far back into all that, he reminded himself that he had already overcome his nightmares and refused to let his mother stop him from living the life he deserved. He would no longer let her poison destroy his life.
So he turned his head sharply in the direction of the noise to see what had caused it.
There in the doorway of the room stood his oldest and most loyal friend, Kreacher. A silver plate and broken glasses lay on the floor. He looked at Regulus with wide eyes before his eyes began to fill with tears.
"Oh, Master Regulus has come to haunt Kreacher." he began to cry out, tears rolling freely down his wrinkled face. "Kreacher tried - he really tried Master Regulus, b-but it's impossible! It won't break, Kreacher tried everything. Tried everything!"
Regulus didn't understand what he was talking about at first, his brain too slow and disordered to really understand anything.
When did he fell asleep in this armchair?
He felt like he had forgotten something important. Maybe more than one thing.
Before he could think about it any further Kreacher, still whining, began to bang his head so hard against the wall to punish himslef that the door shook.
Regulus suddenly stood up to stop his friend from hurting himself for no reason, but as soon as he was on his feet he was clutching the top of the chair he'd been sitting in seconds ago. He was so dizzy.
He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths before opening them again. His vision was still a little blurry but returned to normal after only a few seconds.
He took a cautious step and when nothing happened, took another. He walked slowly towards Kreacher before gently grabbing him by the shoulder and turning him towards him so that he would stop hurting himself.
Kreacher's eyes widened even more and he recoiled so violently that he fell to the ground.
"Master Regulus is dead. What Kreacher sees is not real! Has Master Regulus become a ghost?" he asked in horror, before crying harder. "Kreacher is sorry, Kreacher should not have left Master Regulus in the cave. Kreacher is a bad elf!"
Before he could hurt himself again, Regulus spoke softly and calmly, and was surprised to find his own voice again. "Kreacher I forbid you to hurt yourself. And no, I am not a ghost." He gently touched the ground as if even he wasn't sure of that, and was reassured when his hand didn't fall through. "See?"
Kreacher looked at him with a mixture of surprise, confusion and awe, before saying. "But that's impossible, Master Regulus is dead. Kreacher saw the foul creatures take Master Regulus into the lake."
Regulus thought quickly about what he had just said, his mind still completely disoriented and lost.
He died?
Foul creatures?
A lake?
And suddenly it all came back to him so suddenly and violently, as if he'd taken several bludgers to the head while having the worst hangover of his life. The overload of information and memories was so great that he couldn't take it in and fell to his knees and dry heaved.
He remembered everything. And there was a lot to remember.
He focused on the most important things that would help him reorient himself.
Sirius. His brother.
Pandora. His best friend.
Kreacher. His loyal friend and the one who somehow raised him.
Voldemort and the Death Eaters.
The Horcrux. The cave. The Inferi. His death.
James.
James.
James!!! His husband. One of the most important people in his life. And James means...
Harry.
Oh Merlin Harry!
"Kreacher," he croaked. "I am Regulus and I have a lot to explain to you, but for now I order you not to ask questions and simply follow my orders." He hated ordering Kreacher around but in this case he really had no choice. "First of all what day is it today?"
Kreacher looked at him suspiciously before answering. "Friday."
"The date Kreacher! The date!" he replied perhaps a little too harshly but right now it was the least of his problems.
"May 7, 1982."
And Regulus stopped breathing.
1982
May 1982
He had gone to the cave and died there in November 1980, a few months after his son was born.
Oh Merlin. That means Harry must be almost two years old now. He felt like crying. He had missed so much. Probably his first words and his first steps. His first birthday!
And James. What could he have been thinking? He must have known Regulus was dead, just as he knew he wasn't gone forever.
And the war?
How was it now?
Was it over?
If so who had won?
And Sirus. His brother with whom he had finally managed to become close again after all these years.
He wanted to scream until he couldn't because his throat would hurt too much, almost as much as he wanted to cry, but no, he didn't have time to feel sorry for himself, he had to get back to his family.
How would they all react? He had been dead for almost a year and a half.
"Kreacher" he managed to gasp. "Where are James and Sirius?"
He looked up just in time to see the surprise and confusion on Kreacher's face and he felt an overwhelming sense of dread.
"The blood-traitor is dead and the traitor Sirius is in Azkaban."
And for the second time in a few minutes Regulus stopped breathing.
What?
