Chapter Text
September 1st, 1975
James Potter had unintentionally become quite an expert on bruises.
The way that they dapple and bloom in ghostly purples and blues, still tender to the touch, before fading across skin into sickly yellows, muted greens. Shapes that linger longer than they should; of phantom fingers squeezed too tight, dark crescent moons where a heel had dug in too deep for far too long.
He had seen every variation during the weeks Sirius Black had lived under his roof this summer.
He just couldn’t help himself, even now, his gaze lingering a little too long on the faint lines still haunting the column of Sirius's throat.
Nearly gone. Faded to the type of marks you only see if you know what you're looking for.
His back molars ground together. He forced the tension out of his jaw before Sirius noticed.
James knew that if he came in too hot, too emotional, Sirius would only shut him down with a well practiced smile and a joke. It was a reflex for his friend—deny, overcompensate, bury. Always bury.
The Hogwarts Express rattled over the tracks, a steady, hypnotic clatter made louder in the rare quiet of the compartment. When had it ever been quiet on the train ride to school?
The compartment door slides open suddenly, a familiar voice breaking the silence.
“Please, for the love of Merlin, hide me from them.”
Remus Lupin stepped inside, looking thoroughly put out by his first ever Prefect rounds. His badge glinted faintly on his chest, crooked as though he’d been fiddling with it for the last hour. He shut the door with his hip before taking the seat beside Sirius, letting out a huff of air.
Sirius Black’s gaze flicked from the window to Remus’s tired face, a quick graze, lips quirking. He opens his mouth, surely to make yet another snarky comment about adjusting to having a Prefect in their midst, when his gaze snaps to James, catching him mid-inspection.
“Enjoying the view, are you?” Sirius drawls, light and teasing. He tilts his head just slightly, offering up the other side of his sharp face.
James’s lips curved despite himself. Sirius always had that effect, the smug bastard.
“Pretty hard to enjoy it when your ugly mug is in the way,” James counters, opting for the light-hearted route instead of the ‘when did they stop hurting’-route.
The ‘do they still ache when you think about that night’-route.
Light. Safe.
Sirius bats his long lashes at his dear friend, all exaggerated innocence and wicked grin. “Ahh, the day finally comes," he nods, as if it were obvious all along. "You've succumbed to my charms. Took you long enough mate, but you'll have to get in line, I'm afraid. I'm terribly in demand."
This earns a quiet, tired snort from Remus, his eyes shut, head now leaned against the side of the compartment wall.
He looked, frankly, awful, and it twisted through James's gut to see him like this. Pale beneath the lantern light of the compartment, exhaustion pooling in the dark bruises beneath his eyes, a half-healed scar tracing across the line of his sharp jaw.
The summer moons had been especially cruel to their friend, and the thought twisted James’s gut even further with a helpless sort of anxiety, knowing Remus had been alone through it all again. They had to start the next phase of the Animagus plan, and quickly.
Sirius shifts, nudging Remus’s elbow with mock indignation, but with a softness that was only reserved for the boy. Sirius was always careful, so incredibly careful, with Remus.
Always hyperaware of his pains that he bore so quietly.
Sirius Black could be a hurricane with everyone else, but never with Remus Lupin.
“Something you’d like to share with the class there, Moons?” he drawls, voice dripping with his usual mischief–but the glint in his eye didn’t quite reach the corners, feigned as something else flickered in his expression as he quietly watched Remus.
James, in turn, continues to watch Sirius closely, nearly mirroring that intensity.
The marks were faint enough to be missed by anyone else.
Not him. Never him.
Remus, despite the clear exhaustion on his face, grins wryly as he knocks his leg against Sirius’s own. “Reckon it’s Peter that has something to say, actually,” he muses, redirecting, eyes still shut against the headache that throbbed behind them.
Peter Pettigrew, to the right of James, shakes his head without even looking up from his Daily Prophet clutched in between his fingers, muttering something that vaguely sounds like a “highly unlikely”. His attention was so fully absorbed in the newspaper, James figured that if the Hogwarts Express derailed, it still wouldn't stop the boy from reading.
James shakes his head slightly; how Peter could stomach that rubbish was beyond him. It was always the same: grim reports, half-truths, and fear mongering.
A silence falls again, save for the rhythm of the train, a heartbeat of iron and wood beneath them.
James just couldn’t stop cataloging every fading bruise on Sirius, every shadow that didn’t quite belong, every place where the skin still looked too tender. He forced himself not to stare openly, not to drown in the fury curling low and hot in his stomach.
He had spent the last three weeks wanting to tear 12 Grimmauld Place down with his bare fucking hands.
But they could keep Sirius safe, here, with them. It’s what they did for each other, these boys. Protected one another, no matter the cost. That was the rule, unspoken but iron-clad.
His family couldn’t get to him there, not at Hogwarts.
Outside, the countryside rolls past in a flash of greens and golds, scattered trees and hills lazy in the distance; unaware of all of the pain tucked tightly away inside this small, cramped compartment.
Sirius finally breaches the quiet, nudging James’s foot with his own. When James looked over, Sirius was watching him, really watching him, something complicated swirling behind his grey eyes.
“Parting gifts,” Sirius muses, gesturing lamely to himself, his arms lifting briefly in his lap as if to say ‘here I am, take it in’.
“Parting gifts,” James echoes, voice soft and dry. James's voice goes soft without meaning to, a sick sadness panging through him.
Sirius's lips curve into a sort of feline smirk. The signature Sirius Black grin, wielded like an armor. Another wall that he builds. It says: Stop worrying, I'm fine. Don't look too closely.
“Should see the other guy,” he teases, though both boys knew that “the other guy” in fact remained unscathed. Unbothered, even. Tucked away safely in the shadowy belly of Grimmauld Place at this very moment.
Sirius leans back, letting out a long, exaggerated sigh, as if dealing with James’s concern were truly the worst of his problems. “What can I say? Can't leave the Noble House of Black without a few keepsakes. Besides,” he adds, eyes cutting towards Remus, “you’re not the only one counting scars here, mate.”
A pang of something goes through James’s chest at that. So many scars. So many nights none of them talk about. He swallows something like desperation down like hot coals.
Resisting the urge to hover, and desperately needing some levity, he turns slightly towards Peter, who was still half-buried in his newspaper, one hand now digging in the Bertie Botts box laying on his lap.
“Well? Any pearls of wisdom from our resident Prophet expert?” he asks, trying his best to keep his tone light.
Peter muttered something indistinct again, barely lifting his gaze.
James shook his head with a sharp laugh, slightly annoyed. “Brilliant, Pete, truly,” he mutters, elbowing him sharply in the ribs. “Honestly, if we relied on you to get us out of a paper bag, we’d be stuck there forever.”
Peter blinked, startled, the newspaper held like a shield before him. “I–hey! At least I’m reading! Besides Remus, that's more than you lot can say!”
This earns a muffled snort from Sirius, who turns his full attention to Peter, looking uncannily like a kneazle eyeing down a mouse. His hair, still untamed from the summer, fell into his grey eyes as he shook his head in mock disappointment.
“I mean really Pete, we barely see you all summer and this is how you greet us? Where’s the love? Where’s the camaraderie?” Sirius clutches his chest in mock agony, his raising voice causing Remus to peek an eye open at the fools before him, lips twitching.
Peter relents slightly, looking affronted but not lifting his eyes. “They’ve been publishing some… really fascinating stuff lately,” he protests weakly, earning a matching set of eye rolls.
Sirius stretches his long legs across the compartment, propping his feet up right smack between James and Peter, looking much more like himself as he delves into the dramatics. “Fascinating stuff, Pete? Who knew “Ministry Reviews Cauldron Thickness Standards—Again” was what got you going?".
James couldn’t help grinning now, despite the bruises and exhaustion, despite the nearly unbearable weight on his chest.
Peter grumbles something rude but James catches the ghost of a smile anyway.
This felt right. Real. Familiar. Four boys in one cramped compartment, tripping over each other with affection disguised as insults. This was theirs.
James just couldn’t help the way his eyes flicked to those pale bruises smattered across his best friend.
Pushing himself upright suddenly, grey eyes sharp, Sirius catches his eye once more, clearly over the melodrama of it all. “Oh come on, James, my boy. Stop brooding for five minutes. It doesn’t suit you. Look outside! Look at the world rushing by. It’s ours for the goddamn taking.”
James caught the edge of that grin, the one Sirius has worn for years–reckless, impossible—and he feels that knot of tension in his chest loosen ever so slightly. “Yours, maybe.” he offers, voice low, but smiling still, he can't help it.
It’s Remus who responds, having sat up, nap attempt decidedly abandoned. “I swear, you lot are impossible.” His sandy blond hair sticks up in an entirely endearing, entirely Remus way.
“Ahh there he is!” Sirius exclaims, squeezing Remus’s knee, catching his eye, grinning. “Peter I swear to Merlin if you don’t put that fucking newspaper down—“
Peter mutters something that sounds an awful lot like “authoritarianism”, but the affection bleeds through his grumbled tone, and he does have the right sense to finally drop the paper onto his lap.
A headline peaks out at James, just barely catching his eye in his peripheral: Ministry on High Alert After Several Attacks on Muggleborns.
“Alright lads? Fifth year,” Sirius sighs, leaning back against the seat, long fingers absently picking at the frayed edges. His voice is low, like a promise. “Can’t you feel it? The possibilities? The trouble waiting for us around every corridor?”
There were big, impossibly big things that they absolutely still needed to talk about.
Just not now. For now, they were allowed to enjoy this.
They were here, and they were together, and that has always been enough.
Wasn’t it?
“I reckon that’s some sort of new record,” Sirius chuckles, sliding onto the Gryffindor bench in the Great Hall. The enchanted ceiling above displays an illusion of the night sky, swirls in shades of purples and blue, a soft cloud floating by here and there. The hall hums in that familiar way, students still buzzing with summer stories, goblets clinking, professors watching from the front in various states of amusement or dread.
Peter nods sagely as he slides into the seat across from Sirius, next to James, hand immediately reaching out for a sweet bread roll from the stack before them. “That took what, thirty seconds, give or take?”
It had taken, in fact, only forty-five seconds for James to make a complete fool of himself in front of Lily Evans, thank you very much. They had been in the Great Hall for less than a minute, the first meal of fifth year, but James just couldn’t help himself.
He never had been able to when it came to the red haired Gryffindor, not since the day he first laid eyes on her when they were eleven years old.
Some would call it devotion, others a curse. Sirius calls it excellent entertainment which is, frankly, rude. A fool to some, a hero to others, and a disaster to most, that was James Potter.
Remus shakes his head, already ladling stew from the feast spread on the table before them. The house-elves had truly outdone themselves this year with the welcome feast, stretching down the table in glittering heaps of gold and silver platters.
James makes a mental note to give them his highest compliments the next time he makes a late-night journey to the kitchens.
“My condolences, James,” Remus muses, voice serious. “I reckon it was a good run.”
“Brilliant. Amazing. So glad to be back at school with my great, supportive friends.”
“Oh, we’re supportive,” Sirius says, reaching over the table to ruffle James’s already disastrous hair. “I support your ability to humiliate yourself in increasingly creative ways. It’s practically an art form.”
James bats his hand away. “Hands off, you menace.”
Sirius grins—really grins—and there’s a glint in his grey eyes that finally, finally looks like the boy James grew up with and not the brittle version Grimmauld Place had carved over the summer. That alone eases something warm and familiar in James’s chest.
Still, a groan spills from James lips as he hits his head once, firmly, on the table, leaving his head down. His shoulders slump dramatically, shielding himself from his best friend's jabs. “Someone just…put me out of my misery.”
Sirius snorts deeply at that, brushing his hair out of his eyes. It really had gotten quite long over the summer. “Mate, at this point, you are the misery.”
Peter chokes on his bread. James’s forehead thumps on the table a second time.
“Careful,” Remus murmurs, pumpkin juice in hand. “You’ll concuss yourself.”
“Tell us,” Peter says, leaning forward. “What exactly went through your head there?”
“It wasn’t that bad,” James mutters, head lifting slightly. “Could’ve happened to anyone.”
Sirius raises a brow, chuckling. “You, James 'Watch-this-Lily' Potter, walked into the Great Hall, saw our sweet Evans across the room, and thought...what? That she’d have a swoon if you did a little ruffle of your hair whilst waving?”
“It was going to look charming!” James protests.
“Mate, you elbowed yourself in the face.” Remus adds, not unkindly.
“And knocked your glasses clean off.” Peter continues through a mouthful of roll.
“Fucking impeccable aim, though,” Sirius muses. “If you’d meant to punch yourself, I’d have given you full marks.”
Another pained groan from James at that. “I panicked,” he whines, face dropping into his hands, black hair sticking up in all directions from his very obvious tugging.
“That much was obvious,” agrees Remus, mouth twitching.
“Ah, but the true pièce de résistance was when you bent down to retrieve said glasses—” Sirius's eyes sparkle wickedly. James is just glad to see him in such a good mood.
“—and smacked my head on the bloody bench,” James finishes miserably. “Yes. Thank you. I was there.”
“Lily was also there,” Peter says, far too cheerfully.
James makes another tiny, dying whale noise.
"And she,” Sirius continues, drawing this all out like a performance onstage, “with all the grace and compassion of a saint, leaned down and said—what was it again, Moony?”
Remus clears his throat, pitch slightly raised, a little raspy. Honestly, not too bad as far as Lily Evans impressions go. “‘Do you need the hospital wing, Potter?’”
“She’s never going to take me seriously,” James sighs. “I had a plan this year. A strategy. I was going to be composed. Mature. Charming!”
”Aw, don’t threaten us like that now, James.” There’s a teasing lilt to Remus’s voice.
Sirius barks out a laugh so loud a group of second-years sitting nearby flinches. “Mate, you walked into the Great Hall, saw the girl you fancy, and immediately performed self-inflicted assault. Safe to say you're physically incapable of being normal around her.”
Remus pats the top of his head softly. “Fifth year’s off to a strong start, mate.”
James stares down the hall, in the direction of Lily, looking vaguely like a puppy that’d been left outside all by itself. However, the truth is that James Potter does not embarrass easily. Never has. He’s a boy built out of too much sunlight and not enough fear of humiliation. He trips, he stumbles, he crashes into things, but he does it all with the certainty that life’s too short not to throw yourself at the things you want.
Sirius follows his gaze, sighs loudly, and tosses a bread roll at his face. It bounces off James’s cheek with a soft thwump before rolling across the dark wood.
“Stop staring, you prat. You’ll singe her robes.”
“She looked so concerned,” Peter adds. “Like truly, deeply ‘should we get a healer’ concerned.”
“Shut up,” James says weakly.
But he’s smiling now, even if it’s tired and crooked, and Sirius grins back at him, all sharp warmth and loyalty.
“Cheer up,” Sirius says, reaching for the pumpkin pasties. “It genuinely can’t get any worse.”
Remus hums. “Now you’ve doomed us.”
Peter nods gravely. “Never say it can’t get worse.”
The enchanted ceiling above flickers with distant lightning in the night sky, like even the castle itself knows better than that. Even the colors darken ever so slightly, a deep indigo with stars sharpening like pinpricks in velvet.
A low hum ripples through the room as the students at each table chatter animatedly amongst themselves. The flames in the braziers lining the stone walls leap just a little higher for a brief moment, just enough to draw everyone's attention to the front of the room, where Albus Dumbledore had risen from his seat.
Robes shimmering faintly in the candlelight, the Headmaster makes his way to the large podium sat squarely before the professor's tables.
"Welcome to another year at Hogwarts," he begins, eyes sweeping the hall fondly, but also searchingly.
James feels a little shiver go down his spine, origin unknown. Something about the man always left him vaguely unsettled.
"As always, it brings me great joy to see these tables filled once more. I trust you have all enjoyed your summer holidays, and are prepared for the discoveries and challenges ahead of you this year."
Dumbledore goes on to make several announcements regarding the upcoming school year, a few staffing changes, a note from the custodial staff. James barely hears any of this, of course.
Towards the end of the speech, however, his attention is caught fully.
"It would be irresponsible of me to not speak plainly," Dumbledore says, the warmth in his voice cooling into something taut. “The wizarding world beyond these walls is… shifting. Ever changing. Many of you may have heard whispers, rumors of unrest, of individuals who seek to sow fear and discord. While I will not dignify these whispers with elaboration, I wish to remind you that Hogwarts remains, as ever, a place of safety, unity, and learning.”
Sirius’s joking grin is gone, replaced with a sharp, alert focus. Remus sits very still, fork paused halfway to his mouth. Peter swallows hard, blue eyes wide. Their Headmaster goes on to encourage reporting of anything troubling, whether that be strange messages or unfamiliar faces.
“But for now, my young witches and wizards, let us not borrow shadows from the outside world. Tonight is for food, for laughter, and for the comfort of friends you’ve not seen in far too long. Eat well, rest well, and prepare yourselves for the year ahead.” Dumbledore inclines his head, returning to his seat as if he hadn't just absolutely brought down the vibes in the room. A few of the other professors step forward with some general start-of-term announcements, and then conversations resume amongst students.
James lets out a breath, trying and failing to shake off the creeping sense of unease. He glances at Sirius, who hasn't taken his eyes off the Slytherin table since the Headmaster sat down.
"Reckon Dumbledore wouldn't warn us like that unless it was serious, eh?" Remus sighs, a slight crease between his brows.
Peter shifts in his seat, finally looking up from his meticulously torn napkin. "Do you think...like, you know? Like, dark wizard stuff?" His voice is small, nearly apologetic, like even saying it out loud will make them appear.
Sirius snorts but it's humorless, sharp. "That's a safe wager there, Pete."
"Great. Just what we needed. Another year, another warning about things we can't do a damn thing about yet," James huffs, trying to loosen the ever tightening knot in his chest. What was wrong with him? Why was he so on edge?
"So grim today, mate." Sirius leans back, eyes shadowed but voice steady.
"I just...hate that feeling, y'know? Like the castle's the only safe place left, and even here it's not entirely safe." He forces a laugh, though it sounds hollow, bouncing uncomfortably off the stone walls of the hall.
Remus sets down his fork with quiet deliberation, choosing his words. “The thing is,” he says, “whatever’s coming, we’ll have each other. That’s the point. Keep our heads, keep our wits, and watch each other’s backs. It won’t be easy, but…” His gaze flicks over to Sirius, who’s still scanning the Slytherin table with sharp, calculating eyes. Definitely looking for someone.
James feels a sudden warmth in his chest at those words, at Remus always being so impossibly reliable even as the ground shifted beneath their very feet.
Sometimes, it was easy to forget in the chaos of it all just how much he trusts these three boys before him.
How deeply and truly he can count on them, without ever needing to say it.
Though, really, could James Potter ever truly resist?
"Moons, I think I’m in love with you," James nods resolutely, leaning forward slightly and offering up a square of butterbeer fudge, knowing full well that Remus had been slyly hunting for one as soon as the desserts had appeared.
Remus nods simply at that, plucking the sweet from his hands with his long fingers. "Aren't they all?"
"Oi! What about me?" Sirius demands, voice half-joking as he waves a hand towards himself. "I haven't forgotten your train ride perusal, after all. I deserve a fudge!"
"Insufferable, truly, mate." But James is laughing.
“Speaking of insufferable,” Peter says, side-eyeing Sirius in a way that has James chuckling, “did you see Slughorn’s face when he announced he’d be teaching NEWT-level Potions again? I swear the man looked ready to adopt half the Slytherin table.”
“Oh, he will,” Remus says. “He always does.”
“You’re one to talk, Moony,” Sirius counters. “You’re like Slughorn’s golden child. He practically throws rose petals when you walk in.”
Remus blushes faintly. “He appreciates good essays. That’s all.”
James steals one last quick glance across the hall, and there’s Lily, like she's been dipped in the last light of sunset, every flicker of flame catching in the copper of her hair as she laughs at something Marlene McKinnon was saying.
Some problems will never be solved with spells or strategy. Some battles are fought with entirely different weapons.
Hogwarts, in James's opinion, always smells faintly of breakfast, parchment and ink, and the lingering tang of magic that seemed to come from the very stones themselves. Like the air after lightning, except gentler, older. It's a heady combination, one that he'd bottle if he could.
Morning sunlight filtered in through the high arched windows, dust motes dancing lazily in the soft beams, vaguely magical in their own right. Maybe they were. At Hogwarts, even dust could have secrets.
He inhales a little deeper, feeling that familiar hum of Hogwarts sink into his bones, settling behind his ribcage. James always felt a little different being here—as if the castle itself pressed a warm hand between his shoulder blades, nudging him forward.
James and Sirius strode down the hallway briskly, bags slung haphazardly over their shoulders, the only two of their group in this stretch of the castle.
Remus had Prefect duties, drawing the short wand to patrol the corridors for the morning shift, while Peter's timetable this year had, by some cruel twist of fate, somehow put him in the Herbology greenhouse immediately after breakfast.
The corridor around them hummed with the sounds of their peers shuffling to their respective classes, the scrape of shoes across stone, excited chatter from students of every year.
He caught himself glancing at Sirius out of the corner of his eye, the sharp lines of his best friend’s face softened in the morning light, hair nearly to his chin in all it's untamed glory.
He looked…different. Not just older. Untethered. Free in a way that made James both proud and a little sick with worry. No longer tied to the noble and ancient house of Black.
But James saw the moment it happened, when Sirius's posture stiffened, attention snapping like a blade locking into place. His grey eyes, bright and cold and edged in an emotion James was never quite able to translate, narrowing slightly.
He had just zeroed in on who had just rounded the corner ahead of them, heading right towards them.
Regulus Black.
The younger Black brother moved with a precision that was almost alarming, so controlled in his steps. There was a tautness that set him apart so distinctly from the rest of the students in the corridor.
He moved like his bones had been carved from expectations, so deliberate and contained.
Merlin, this wasn't going to go well. James's stomach sank.
And of course Sirius, instantly coiled tight and not missing a beat, doesn't hesitate. Rather, he angles his shoulder, clipping into the younger Black as they go by.
Light enough to pass as plausibly accidental to an observer, a bit of brotherly animosity to some. But James felt how heavy it was, a pointed purpose to the blow. The quiet, festering ache beneath it.
"Oi! Watch where you're going, eh Reg?" he snaps, tone sharp and slightly mocking, just a touch too loud above the hum of the corridor. There was a practiced cruelty to it, the kind only ever used when he was hurting so badly that it was spilling over the edges. A few nearby heads turn.
Regulus, to his credit, barely even flinched. Just shifted his stack of books, a controlled, dull patience in his eyes. He didn't crack.
"Really, Sirius," his voice is softer than his brothers, but his words carried a much, much sharper edge. "Must you always make a scene?"
James swallowed. Hard.
Over the years, James had only interacted with Regulus a handful of times, in passing. Brief, clipped bursts, if at all. Quick glances, a polite greeting once, maybe even twice.
A pale, guarded face in the corridors, grey eyes that mirrored those of his older brother.
Dark curls, kept much shorter, by his ears.
Sirius vehemently had kept the group far away from the orbit of Number Twelve-out of embarrassment at first, then out of bitter necessity as things had so rapidly deteriorated.
James had never spent a summer in Grimmauld Place. Never found himself wandering it's shadowed, claustrophobic halls in easy conversation with Regulus Black. Had never seen him long enough to understand him.
But he saw him now.
And it was impossible not to.
James slowed, tightening his grip on the strap around his shoulder, his mind narrowing as the noise of the corridor fades. For just a moment, the hurried students, the echoing footsteps, the distant clatter of a dropped book, it all dissolves into a dull hum.
Leaving only Regulus, and that insidious mark on his jaw.
Not fading at all actually, but fresh. There it was, a deep purple bleeding into inky blue, unmistakable across the edge of Regulus's jaw. And James's stomach clenches, something tugging at his chest with an insistent gravity, hot and acidic.
For a heartbeat, James feels that inexplicable pull. Instinct flaring, screaming to step forward, to offer something gentle. To shield. To undo.
Letting Sirius barrel ahead muttering venom under his breath about Grimmauld Place and “smug little prat”, and words far harsher, heavy with weeks of unspoken pain.
James wasn’t ready. Not yet. He still hadn’t found the right moment to ask Sirius the questions burning holes in him. About Grimmauld. About leaving. About the brother he'd left behind. After he had turned up over the summer, it had been clear that he didn't want to talk about it. So James hadn't pushed.
He hesitates, heart thudding, meeting the eyes of the youngest Black brother. So much like Sirius's, but colder. Guarded. Older than they had any right to be.
His gaze flicks to the bruise, for a fraction of a second.
But Regulus notices, something flicking in his gaze. A shadow, a barely perceptible tremor beneath that perfect Black composure. Shame? Annoyance?
Loneliness?
He could almost convince himself it wasn't there. But he knew. He felt it.
Another second passes, a quick beat. James opens his mouth, words clumsy on the tip of his tongue, something, an are you okay? or, Merlin help him, you don't deserve that.
But he doesn't get the chance.
Because Regulus turns sharply on his heel, continuing on down the corridor without a single backward glance.
Leaving James Potter, heart pounding in a state of horrible confusion for several seconds before he forces himself to follow after Sirius.
But for the rest of the morning, he can't shake the image of that bruise.
Or that look in Regulus Black's eyes.
Or the way something in him had reached toward it, toward him, before he had even realized it.