At eleven o'clock sharp, the train pulled out, rolling north through England's winter under a grey sky.
The view outside shifted from London's slate rooftops to yellow pastureland, then to the brown hills and thin snow of the Scottish Highlands.
By four in the afternoon, the Hogwarts Express was pulling into Hogsmeade station. The sky had gone dark, and lamps glowed along the platform.
Regulus stepped off. Cuthbert and Alex trailed behind, Hermes bringing up the rear.
Carriages stood in a line outside the station. Thestrals bowed their heads before the shafts, invisible to most of the students filing past, who only noticed the carriages moving on their own.
The four of them climbed aboard. The carriage rolled up the long drive, trees swaying in the night wind on either side.
The castle's outline emerged in the distance, its windows burning warm yellow, rising higher, growing denser.
The carriage stopped before the front steps. Students poured out, climbed the stone stairs, passed through the oak doors, and flooded into the bright expanse of the Great Hall.
Noise, warmth, greetings and laughter from every direction.
Regulus took a seat near the middle of the Slytherin table.
Cuthbert sat to his right, Alex and Hermes across from him, Lina and Samuel beside Alex.
Conversation hummed around them, cutlery clinking softly against porcelain.
Dumbledore rose from the center of the staff table, his gaze swept across all four tables.
He spread his arms. The Great Hall quieted by degrees.
"Welcome back." His voice was warm, carrying to every corner. "I hope each of you had a restful holiday, and that you've brought back more than new robes and new textbooks."
Scattered laughter.
Dumbledore waited for it to settle, a smile at the corners of his mouth, though those blue eyes behind the half-moon lenses had grown a touch more serious.
"Holidays are always a pleasant thing. I'm told some of you had an especially eventful one this year."
A few low laughs from the upper-year Slytherins.
"But the new term has begun, and I believe we are all prepared for what lies ahead."
"The world outside is changing. Some of you have already felt it. Your parents may have mentioned certain things at the dinner table. Others may have chosen not to."
The hall fell quiet.
"In the days to come, you will hear many voices. Some will be loud. Some will be persuasive. Some will tell you what is right, what is necessary, what is inevitable."
His gaze didn't rest on any single table.
"I will not tell you what to believe. But I hope that when you hear those voices, you will first ask yourselves one question."
A pause.
"If no one had told me what to think, what would I think?"
Dumbledore raised his goblet. "Happy new term."
A chorus of replies rose from the hall. Goblets clinked together, and the warmth and noise came rushing back.
Regulus lifted his Pumpkin Juice and took a sip.
Dumbledore's words hadn't been subtle. The meaning was plain.
The situation outside was tightening. Voldemort's infiltration hadn't gone public yet, but it was accelerating.
Dumbledore couldn't tell students that someone was recruiting their parents. What he could do was plant a seed early, before other voices drowned it out: find your own voice first.
Last year had been about principles. Goodness, justice, responsibility. This year was a warning: use your own mind.
The situation was moving, and Dumbledore's words were moving with it.
The feast wound down in a wash of noise.
Students filed out of the Great Hall in waves. Regulus followed the Slytherin procession downward, through cold corridors, down stone steps, the password spoken, the wall splitting open to reveal the common room entrance and its green-tinged firelight.
He'd barely crossed the threshold, hadn't taken two steps inside.
A crowd closed around him.
---
The common room held more than double its usual crowd. The sofa area, the hearth, the corners, the corridor leading to the dormitories. People everywhere.
Not crammed together. Slytherin didn't do that. But the room was packed, the air thick with murmuring.
The door opened. Regulus stepped through, and the group nearest the entrance turned first.
They stood flanking the doorway, half-blocking the passage, robes pressed against robes, shoulders bumping shoulders.
One glance told him everything. All Pure-bloods, but none from the Sacred Twenty-Eight.
Minor and middling Pure-blood families, crowded to the front, faces bright with eagerness, practically leaning toward him.
They had the Pure-blood name. Some assets, some standing. A shop in Diagon Alley, or a mid-level post at the Ministry of Magic. But on the power map of wizarding Britain, they didn't register.
They stood at the front because they were the most eager, and because they had no dignity to maintain.
Dignity was a luxury reserved for those who could afford it.
Further back, in the sofa area by the hearth, the Sacred Twenty-Eight sat.
Some held cups. Some murmured to one another. Some sat still, eyes flicking toward the door once before pulling away.
They wanted to come over too, of course. But they couldn't pile up at the entrance with the lesser families. That would be beneath them. So they waited.
As for the half-bloods, not a single one. In a moment like this, no half-blood dared push forward.
The doorway had become the focal point of the entire room, and every gaze converged there. The half-bloods stayed in the far corners, watching from a distance, envy and longing written across their faces with nowhere to hide.
Regulus took it all in. His expression gave nothing. His stride didn't slow. He met no one's gaze, and walked straight ahead.
The group at the front faltered. They'd had their lines ready.
Hope you had a good holiday, Mr. Black. Was your break pleasant? We heard you did something remarkable...
But Regulus passed through them with his eyes fixed forward, pace unhurried, no different from any other day.
A tall, thin upperclassman near the front, hair slicked shiny, had already raised his hand, fingers spread, reaching for Regulus's arm or a handshake.
Regulus's gaze swept across his face without pausing, without avoiding. The way you'd look at a piece of furniture.
The hand froze in midair. A companion grabbed his elbow and pressed it down, pulling him back half a step.
The crowd began to compress backward.
No one called out. The front row retreated on its own, those behind them jostled back, while people further still tried to push forward, and the middle churned into a knot.
But the front gave way faster. Along Regulus's path, bodies parted to either side, opening a corridor from the door straight to the hearth and sofas.
Narrow. Room enough for two abreast. Lined with faces on both sides.
Regulus walked at the head.
Cuthbert followed at his right shoulder, excitement tamped down and tamped again, the curve of his mouth held to what he considered a dignified range. At some point his stride had synchronized perfectly with Regulus's, left-right, left-right, shoulders open, chin slightly raised, doing his best impression of someone accustomed to this kind of attention.
He knew none of these people were here for him. But he walked at Regulus's side, occupied this position, and basked in the same collective gaze.
He loved it. Loved it enough that he had to pinch his thigh to keep from grinning.
Alex held the left flank, eyes forward, ignoring both sides, his expression faintly resigned. He didn't enjoy being stared at, but he knew this wasn't the time to slip away through the crowd. Keep your head down and follow.
Hermes brought up the rear, his sullen face broadcasting why the hell am I part of this. Hands jammed in his pockets, eyes locked on the back of Regulus's head, the people around him roughly as interesting as the bricks in the wall.
Two steps behind them, Lina Costa and Samuel Vance followed.
They knew their place precisely. They wouldn't walk level with Cuthbert and Alex. They were in the procession, but they didn't claim rank.
Both came from families completely cut off from the wizarding world's information networks. Once they left Hogwarts, the only way to learn anything was the newspaper, and their families didn't get the newspaper.
Lina's subscription money went to rent. Samuel's father occasionally picked up a stray copy of the Daily Prophet left behind by a customer at the shop.
So a brief holiday, and everything that had happened outside, they'd missed entirely.
It wasn't until opening day, arriving at the station, that they sensed something had shifted.
Those Slytherin Pure-bloods who'd never bullied them but had never acknowledged their existence either, were nodding at them now.
Still no one spoke to them. Half-blood was half-blood. The proud Pure-bloods still looked down on them. But there were nods.
Compared to the total invisibility of before, the difference was staggering.
They didn't understand what had changed, but they had a guess. Something to do with Black.
They'd asked Alex at the feast. He hadn't gone into detail, only sketched the broad strokes.
Roughly: Black had gotten into a fight over the holiday. And after the fight, he'd burned down the other person's house.
The house was Lestrange Manor. The person was Bellatrix Lestrange.
The two of them exchanged a look and asked nothing more.
Now, trailing the group, Lina fought to keep her mouth in line, her eyes blazing.
She loved this. Being seen by everyone. Walking in the procession. The crowd parting on both sides.
She knew they were looking at Black. But she was here. She was seen too.
Samuel walked in silence, his gaze passing over the shoulders ahead to settle on Regulus's back. Something flickered in his eyes, brief, and was tucked away.