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Part One: Regulus
James Potter’s hand clamped around Regulus Black’s wrist like a bloody manacle. He tugs him forward without even glancing back to see if he was keeping pace.
“I can walk on my own,” Regulus hissed, trying to dig his heels into the carpeted floor of the corridor. The Fat Lady blinked at them as James shoved the portrait open, muttering the password so quickly that it came out as a blur of sound.
The Gryffindor common room was warm and bright, packed with clusters of red-and-gold clad students sprawled over armchairs. They’re talking too loudly and laughing at things that weren’t remotely funny. Every head seemed to turn at once. A Slytherin in their midst was as strange as a hippogriff landing in the middle of the Quad.
“Potter,” Regulus growled under his breath, feeling his cheeks heat as a few second-years gawked at him, “this is ridiculous. If someone sees—”
“Someone already has,” James said, grinning infuriatingly as he shouldered past a table of fifth-years. He gave them a cheerful wave as if dragging Regulus Black into Gryffindor Tower was the most natural thing in the world.
Regulus tried to wrench free. “I’m not—”
“Oh, you are,” James cut in, tugging him toward the boys’ staircase. “You think you’re wriggling out of this, but you’re not. We’ve got work to do.”
Regulus’s voice rose with incredulity. “Work? Here? I have my own house, Potter. With my own common room. And my own dorm. And we agreed—”
James stopped just long enough to glance back, brown eyes dancing. “Yes, your own common room. Where you’d get hexed the moment you sat down with the wrong people. And all of your friends are in Hogsmeade right now. I checked.”
Regulus glared at him, but James only winked and dragged him up the winding stairs.
By the time they reached the door to the sixth-year dormitory Regulus was silently seething. He was mentally composing several cutting letters to the Head of House about Gryffindor arrogance. James pushed the door open without ceremony and all but shoved him inside.
The room smelled faintly of parchment, ink, and teenage boys. Four beds, four trunks, and the unmistakable sound of quills scratching across parchment filled the air. Regulus sighed at the familiar room, disliking the memories deciding to make themselves known.
Sirius was slouched backward on his bed, boot heels dug into the blanket. One hand was flipping a quill end-over-end like a knife. Remus and Lily sat cross-legged on the floor with Peter wedged between them. The three of them were bent over a large, blank sheet of parchment spread across the boards. A half-empty ink bottle teetered dangerously close to Remus’s knee.
All four pairs of eyes swung up at once.
Sirius’s smirk flickered into shock. “What the—” He sat up abruptly, quill falling forgotten onto the bedspread. “Reg? What the hell are you doing here?”
Regulus, flushed but determined not to show it, lifted his chin and fired back smoothly, “I could ask the same. Your friend here didn’t give me details before kidnapping me.”
That earned him a few startled snorts of laughter. Peter’s nervous giggle, Lily’s quick puff of amusement, and even the corner of Remus’s mouth twitching upward. Sirius’s expression darkened. “Don’t get clever with me,” Sirius warned. He swung his legs off the bed. His boots thudded against the floor. “What’re you doing here?”
“Ask your friend,” Regulus said, yanking his arm free from James’s grip at last and smoothing his sleeve with deliberate precision. He looked pointedly at James. “He seems to think I belong here.”
“You do, for the night,” James said cheerfully, plopping down beside Lily and nearly knocking the ink bottle over in the process. “We’ve got a problem. And Regulus has a brain, whether you like admitting it or not.”
Sirius opened his mouth. Then he closed it again. His glare flicked between his brother and James, suspicion and irritation crackling like static in the room.
Peter scratched the back of his neck. “Um…what kind if thing can he even help with?”
James grinned. “The magical, complicated, map-making kind.” He gestured at the parchment on the floor. “We need all the help we can get with what we’re building.”
Regulus’s eyes narrowed. He stepped closer, curiosity outweighing caution. He peered down at the blank sheet. “Building? Or ruining? Because from here it looks like a lot of nothing.”
“Not nothing,” Remus said quietly. He shifted so Regulus could kneel beside him if he wanted, though he didn’t invite him outright. His tone was careful. Neutral. “It’s…experimental magic. We could use another perspective.”
“Experimental,” Regulus repeated, arching a brow. “You dragged me into Gryffindor Tower for experimental magic?”
“Yes,” James said simply, plucking the quill Sirius had dropped and twirling it between his fingers. “You’re good with runes and Arithmancy. Don’t bother denying it, I’ve seen your essays. And if we’re going to pull this off, we need precision. The kind of precision Gryffindors,”—he shot a grin at Sirius—“sometimes lack.”
Sirius threw a pillow at his head. James ducked.
Lily, who had been watching this exchange with barely contained amusement, finally spoke. “You didn’t think to ask me first?” she said, folding her arms. “I’m top of the class in Arithmancy.”
James winced. “You were already helping. I thought of you first. Reg’s…a bonus.”
Regulus scoffed. “Flattery doesn’t suit you, Potter.”
“Not flattery. Facts.” James leaned forward, lowering his voice just enough to add weight. “You want to be useful, don’t you? Not just sit in the dungeons reciting your family’s mottos while the rest of us actually do something.”
The jab landed. Regulus bristled, eyes flashing. But instead of retreating, he lowered himself onto the floor across from Lily. His spine was stiff, expression cool. “Fine,” he said, plucking the quill out of James’s hand. “But if this explodes, it’s your fault.”
Sirius groaned, dragging a hand down his face. “This is a nightmare. First you,”—he jabbed a finger at James—“now him?”
Regulus smirked. “You sound jealous.”
“Jealous?” Sirius sputtered. “Of you? You’re insufferable so don’t make me laugh.”
“But,” Regulus said smoothly, dipping the quill into ink, “you’re the one watching me work. What? Too clueless to even help?”
Peter’s laugh cracked the tension, high-pitched and nervous. “This is going to end terribly, isn’t it?”
“Almost definitely,” Remus said, but he was smiling faintly as his eyes tracked the movements of Regulus’s quill across the parchment.
James leaned back on his hands, utterly pleased with himself. “That’s the spirit. Now let’s make some magic.”
Regulus tapped the quill against the parchment, brows drawn tight as he studied the blank surface. “You lot really think you can invent new magic just by…doodling on paper together?”
James looked positively delighted at the challenge in his voice. “Not think, little Black. Know. We’ve done it before. Lost it though. A shame. But the next generation must have a copy. Our genius is too vast to be contained and forgotten.”
That earned him a sharp glance. “You’ve done it before?” Regulus repeated, tone pitched between disbelief and suspicion. “As in, successfully? You four?”
James puffed up proudly. “Well, us three and Peter—”
“Don’t drag me into this,” Peter mumbled, tugging his knees closer to his chest.
Regulus ignored him, eyes narrowing. “What exactly do you mean, you’ve done this before? Like exactly, in your own words. What did you lot do?”
Remus set his quill down, rubbing his ink-stained fingers together like he could smooth the truth into something neater. “We, er…layered a series of charms together. None of which should have functioned in tandem. But they did.”
Regulus blinked at him. “That’s not how spellwork works.”
“Usually,” Remus agreed mildly. He leaned back against the side of Sirius’s bed and shrugged one shoulder. “It didn’t at first. We tried everything—alignment runes, stabilization circles, counterbalancing incantations—and nothing held. Then one night, when it completely collapsed again, I…well…” His lips quirked into a self-deprecating smile. “I slammed my hands down on it in frustration. And suddenly it held.”
Sirius, who had been lounging with arms folded, sat up straight. “You what? You never told me that.”
Remus tilted his head, entirely unapologetic. “Didn’t seem relevant.”
“Didn’t seem…” Sirius’s voice cracked with indignation. “You’re telling me the foundation of our best invention happened because you had a tantrum…and you just forgot to mention that to me?”
“It worked, didn’t it?” Remus said calmly.
Sirius looked about ready to combust.
Before he could, Lily piped up, brow furrowed in bemused amusement. “So it’s like when you smack the telly to get it to work?”
A hush fell over the room.
Four wizard-raised faces blinked at her in complete bafflement. Even Regulus froze, quill hovering midair.
“The…what?” Peter asked cautiously.
“The telly,” Lily repeated, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Television? You hit it when the screen goes fuzzy, and sometimes it fixes itself. My mum does it all the time.”
Silence.
James leaned back on his elbows, mouth twitching like he wasn’t sure if he should be laughing or asking for clarification. Sirius looked vaguely horrified. Like Lily had just confessed to practicing necromancy. Peter mouthed telly? under his breath, lost entirely.
Regulus, however, found himself unexpectedly intrigued. “So Muggles use physical force to correct malfunctions in their…devices?”
“Yes,” Lily said, eyes brightening a little at having an audience. Even if it was a reluctant one. “It doesn’t always work, but sometimes it realigns the…well, never mind. Point is, sometimes you just need a good thump.”
James finally burst into laughter, flopping backwards onto the floor. “Oh, that’s brilliant. Remus Lupin the telly-whisperer. Who knew?”
Remus groaned into his hands.
Regulus’s lips twitched before he could stop them, though he covered the near-smile with a sharp shake of his head. “You’re all completely mad.”
Sirius jabbed a finger at him. “You’re one to talk. You’re the one sitting in a Gryffindor dorm helping us with our mad scheme instead of running back to your snake pit.”
“Because I’d rather supervise than let you burn a hole through the castle walls,” Regulus shot back crisply. He dipped the quill again and drew a careful rune at the parchment’s corner. “Now, explain exactly what this so-called invention is meant to accomplish.”
James propped himself up on his elbows again, grin back in place. “Simple, really. A map. But not just any map. A living one. One that sees everything the castle sees. Entirely for prank purposes, of course.”
“Yes, of course,” Regulus says dryly, vaguely remembering James holding such a thing once. He said it was important to keep ahold of while they—
Now Regulus knows why.
Regulus’s stomach dropped, though he kept his face carefully blank. A map like that…well, it could be quite dangerous. Brilliant, yes…but dangerous.
He found himself leaning closer.
“Show me,” Regulus said, voice cool. But the way he set the quill down with deliberate care betrayed his interest.
James’s grin softened into something smaller. Private. Almost secret. “Knew you wouldn’t be able to resist.”
Regulus shot him a warning glare, but his ears warmed. “Don’t flatter yourself. I only want to prevent your inevitable disaster from becoming my disaster.”
“Mm.” James leaned forward, close enough that Regulus felt the brush of his sleeve. “Whatever helps you sleep at night, little Black.”
The words were casual, but the look that flickered between them wasn’t. It lingered for half a beat too long, enough that Sirius’s suspicious gaze narrowed and Remus’s brow furrowed faintly. Lily, bless her, seemed more focused on corralling the ink bottle away from James’s careless elbows than noticing the undercurrent at all. Peter glanced between them with a vague, puzzled frown. As though something didn’t quite add up.
Regulus cleared his throat and shifted back just slightly, quill in hand once more. “Explain the framework.”
Remus adjusted the parchment, pointing to faint ink-scrawls already etched along the border. “Base layer is a Reveal-All Charm, but twisted through a localization runic array. We tether it to the wards, but the wards resist anything invasive. That’s where it usually collapses.”
“And you tried a stabilization sequence?” Regulus asked.
“Six of them,” Remus said. “No cohesion.”
Regulus’s mouth pulled taut in thought. He bent over the parchment, eyes scanning. His fingers were twitching as though he wanted to correct their messy rune-work.
James leaned in again, chin almost brushing Regulus’s shoulder as he peered down at the parchment. “Go on, then. Show us how it’s done, little Black.”
Regulus stiffened at the proximity, but didn’t move away. Instead, he tilted his head just enough to meet James’s eyes, dark with annoyance but laced with something unspoken. An old argument. A dare. A reminder of whispered nights where this exact posture wasn’t foreign at all.
“Don’t call me little Black,” he said under his breath.
James’s grin crooked wider, quiet enough only for Regulus. Dangerous. “What should I call you, then?”
The faintest flush rose in Regulus’s cheeks, and he bent quickly over the parchment. He drew a sharp rune to disguise his distraction. “Focus, Potter. Or do you want me to fix all of your mistakes for you? Do I have to clean up your messes that you seem so eager to make worse?”
“I’d let you,” James murmured.
“Unbelievable,” Regulus muttered, quill digging so hard the parchment squeaked.
Sirius’s eyes darted between them, suspicious. “What’s going on with you two?”
“Nothing,” Regulus said sharply. Too quickly. “I hate him.”
“Absolutely nothing,” James echoed, tone a bit too breezy. “The loathing is mutual I’m afraid.”
Lily looked up, one brow arched. But she said nothing. She only tapped her quill against her knee and returned to the parchment. Peter shifted uneasily, like he half-sensed the weight of something unsaid but couldn’t quite name it.
Remus, ever the diplomat, cleared his throat. “If you’re finished…posturing, perhaps we could actually attempt a layering sequence?”
Regulus inhaled, steadying himself, then nodded curtly. “Yes. Fine. Hand me the ink.”
James passed it to him with a flourish and a wink. Small enough to go unnoticed by most. But not by Regulus, whose lips pressed into a hard line as though holding back either a sigh or a smile.
He dipped the quill and began to write. The room was hushed except for the soft scratch of nib on parchment. The air felt heavier now. Charged. Not only with magic, but with something else simmering beneath the surface.
Regulus’s hand moved with sharp precision, carving runes into the parchment with strokes that made everyone else’s (excluding Lily’s) messier script look like chicken scratches. Each sigil flowed neatly into the next, crisp and balanced. His concentration was almost palpable.
James watched him, chin propped on his hand. His eyes were not on the parchment but on the boy hunched over it.
“Stop staring at me,” Regulus muttered, not glancing up.
“Just admiring your…penmanship,” James said lightly.
Regulus’s quill paused mid-stroke. His lips twitched. It was the faintest tug upward before he forced them flat again. “You’re insufferable.”
“You’ve said that before,” James replied, tone far too casual for the way his eyes softened. “Didn’t stop you from—”
A pointed cough from Remus cut through. “James.”
James cleared his throat and leaned back, throwing his arms behind his head as though he hadn’t just nearly betrayed something best left unsaid.
Sirius narrowed his eyes. “What exactly was he about to say?”
“Nothing,” Regulus said quickly, resuming his rune with meticulous care. “Absolutely nothing.”
“Mm,” Sirius said skeptically. “I’ll bet.”
Lily broke the tension with a sigh. “Honestly, you lot are worse than toddlers. Focus. Regulus. What’s the next step?”
Regulus finished the curve of a rune, then handed the quill back to her with clipped efficiency. “Overlay a tethering glyph here. It’ll stabilize the ward interaction.”
Lily bent forward to do so, her hair falling into her face. “Like this?”
“Yes, though…” Regulus leaned across her shoulder, adjusting the curve with the tip of his finger. His sleeve brushed hers, and he murmured more softly, “tighter. The wards will slip through if you leave it open.”
Lily’s brow furrowed. “Right. Got it.”
James was watching with an expression halfway between pride and irritation. He piped up, “see? Knew he’d be useful.”
Regulus shot him a glare. “Don’t get smug. You’re lucky you didn’t blow the parchment apart trying this yourselves.”
“That only happened once,” Peter said nervously.
“Twice,” Remus corrected.
“Three times,” Lily added dryly.
Regulus pinched the bridge of his nose. “Merlin preserve me.”
James leaned close again, his voice pitched low. “Merlin doesn’t preserve you. I do.”
For the barest moment, Regulus froze. His quill tip bled a dark blot of ink onto the parchment. A stark slip in his otherwise perfect work. His eyes flicked up, meeting James’s. The weight of it was almost enough to unravel his composure entirely.
“James,” he hissed, too quiet for the others. “Not here. I swear to fucking Salazar if you...”
James tilted his head, grin edging toward wicked. “Then where?”
Sirius’s eyes flicked between them again, suspicion sharpening like a blade. Remus sensed the brewing storm. He set his hands flat on the parchment. “All right. Enough bickering. If we’re doing this, let’s do it properly.”
Lily straightened, nodding. “Agreed.”
Peter looked relieved to have someone else taking charge. “So…what do we do?”
Regulus exhaled, pulling his focus back to the work. “We layer the charms simultaneously. If we’re not in sync, the wards will reject it outright.”
James grinned. “Sync. Easy.”
Regulus’s eyes cut to him, sharp as glass. “Not as easy as you think.”
Their gazes held. A spark of challenge and something warmer. It passed silently between them before they both looked back down. The parchment seemed to hum faintly beneath their hands. Magic gathering, coiling, and waiting. The parchment thrummed beneath their fingers, a low vibration like the pulse of the castle itself. Ink shimmered faintly, runes glowing along the border as if lit from within.
Regulus adjusted his hand over one of the glyphs, steady and precise. “When, exactly, did you lot make this first so-called map?” he asked, voice calm but edged with suspicion.
James grinned, the golden glow reflecting in his eyes. “Last year. Years of almost getting caught, cramped dorm, and a lot of sleepless nights.”
Regulus’s head snapped up. “Last year? You lot never said shite! And fifteen for this is…insane.”
“Sixteen by the end of it,” Sirius corrected automatically.
Regulus’s brows drew down, horrified. “You stitched together illegal charms at fifteen and it worked? That’s—”
“Brilliant,” James supplied cheerfully.
“Reckless,” Remus muttered.
“Illegal,” Lily said at the same time, though her quill didn’t leave the page.
“Stupid,” Regulus snapped, trying to force his focus back on the runes. His hand trembled, the glyph he was tracing flickering at the edges. “You—”
“Relax, Reg,” James cut in smoothly, grin turning maddeningly smug. “Worked out fine last time. Besides—” he leaned in again, voice low and far too familiar—“you trust me.”
Regulus’s whole body went rigid. His quill jerked across the parchment, spilling a jagged line through the glowing array. The hum beneath their hands spiked into a crackle, light flaring brighter.
“Can you cut it out Potter!” he hissed, fury lacing every syllable.
The parchment shuddered violently. The runes writhed, overlapping in ways they shouldn’t. Lines were bending into new, unstable patterns. The glow surged, no longer soft gold but searing white. It swallowed the ink.
“Uh—” Peter yelped, scooting backward as the parchment lifted an inch off the floor.
“Not good,” Remus said tightly, already reaching for his wand.
“Bloody hell,” Sirius muttered, eyes wide.
Before anyone could react further, three sigils tore free from the page like molten brands. It floated in the air before James, Lily, and Regulus. The light engulfed them, wrapping around their figures in blinding arcs.
“Don’t move!” Lily shouted, even as her outline blurred in the glow.
Regulus tried to wrench himself free, but the magic caught him fast, pulling him upright. His glare shot toward James through the searing light. “This is your fault—”
And then the glow swallowed them whole.
The dormitory vanished.
The brightness faded as abruptly as it had erupted, leaving a ringing silence in its wake. Regulus blinked and coughed. He found himself sprawled atop James and Lily in a heap on the floor. The parchment lay somewhere beneath them, inert. The glowing threads were fading like dying embers.
The dormitory around them was eerily still. No quills scratching. No Peter’s nervous shifting. No faint smell of ink lingering in the air. It was as if the room had been abandoned for at least a month. Dust motes drifted in the dim light filtering through the high windows.
Regulus scrambled backward, brushing his robes off and glaring. “What…what did you do, Potter?”
James immediately fumbled to sit up, hands hovering over Regulus as if to check him for injuries. “You’re all right? Are you hurt? Did you—”
“I am fine,” Regulus snapped, swatting James’s hands away. “Stop hovering!”
James paused, blinking, utterly unconvinced. “Fine? You just got thrown around by your own runes. You could be anything from bruised to—”
Regulus cut him off with a sharp, exasperated hiss. “I am not fragile!”
“We’re fine,” James said more gently, softening. “It’s just Lily here. Nothing else. We’re fine. Don’t need to hide, yeah?”
Regulus froze, the indignation in his chest mingling with a prickling warmth in his ears. He gave James a flat look, trying to suppress it. “Only Lily? And what am I supposed to do with that information? We had a deal, Potter.”
James shrugged, leaning back on one elbow, eyes scanning Regulus carefully. Like he was both assessing damage and delighting in seeing him riled. “It’s fine. She’s not going to tell Sirius.”
Regulus let out a sharp exhale, folding his arms across his chest. “Being able to keep a secret or not, I do not appreciate being manhandled through a magical explosion just to prove you clever, Potter.”
“I wasn’t manhandling you,” James said, voice a touch defensively. “I was making sure you didn’t get hurt. You’re stubborn, but you’re still—you know—important.”
Regulus froze mid-protest, mind flipping through the phrasing. He leaned back, trying to disguise the faint flicker of panic mixed with something else. Something he couldn’t quite name. He hid it behind a scowl. “Important? Hmph. That’s rich.”
James smirked, unconcerned by the jab. “Yeah, well. You should hear the things I don’t say out loud.”
Lily, perched a short distance away, had been silently watching the exchange. Her eyes were wide but expression calm. “You two are ridiculous,” she said finally. “Can we maybe…figure out where we are first? Because…I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.”
Both boys give her a look.
“Oh come on! Do you lot just not have childhoods or—?”
Regulus huffed, sitting up straighter. He decided to ignore her for now, but press about the reference later. “Agreed. But Potter…next time, you keep your hands to yourself.”
James made a mock salute. “Yes, sir. But only if you promise not to glow like that next time.”
Regulus glared but said nothing, tugging his sleeves down and surveying the strange, quiet dormitory around them.
Lily tilted her head. “This…we did something bad, didn’t we?”
Regulus exchanged a look with James. The corner of James’s mouth twitched. “Probably,” he admitted. “But we’ll figure it out.”
Regulus gritted his teeth, muttering under his breath, “…Potter.”
James only grinned. “Yeah. That’s me.”
The three of them sat in silence for a heartbeat, the room around them still and strange. The parchment was forgotten at their feet. The weight of the unknown stretched before them.
Regulus adjusted the sleeves of his robes for the third time, muttering under his breath. James, as usual, was utterly unconcerned by the muttering and entirely preoccupied with making sure Regulus didn’t step on a loose floorboard—or do anything remotely reckless.
“Careful,” James said suddenly, catching Regulus’s elbow as he pivoted too sharply. Their hands brushed, and before either could think too hard about it, James’s fingers threaded around Regulus’s.
Regulus stiffened, eyes widening slightly, but he didn’t pull away. Not immediately. Instead, he cast James a sharp glare that somehow carried both irritation and (he refused to admit it) something warmer. Something that had nothing to do with the looming uncertainty of where they were.
“Potter,” Regulus muttered, voice low, “I do not need—”
James only smirked, squeezing his hand gently. “You’ve got me,” he said softly, letting the warmth of his palm linger against Regulus’s. “That’s all you need right now, yeah? You don’t have to keep acting around me, Reg.”
Regulus blinked, flustered. He drew a breath and started walking again. He forced his mind to focus on survival, not the absurd thrum of his pulse against James’s palm. Lily followed behind, stepping lightly. Her eyes scanned the hallways for any sign of danger. Or in this case, anyone who might notice their abrupt arrival.
The dormitory doors loomed ahead, silent and shadowed. With a glance at each other, and James giving Regulus the tiniest, reassuring nod, they crept out. They were careful not to jostle each other too much. Regulus gritted his teeth when James’s shoulder brushed his again, but he didn’t pull away. That subtle touch anchored him, a small shard of normalcy in the whirlwind of confusion.
The stairs spiraled downward, creaking faintly under their careful steps. The air grew cooler as they descended, faint traces of firelight drifting up from the common room below. Regulus kept his focus on his footing, but he could feel James’s hand lightly tugging his as they navigated the worn steps.
When the final stair loomed, they slipped out into the Gryffindor common room. The glow of the dying evening light caught the dust in motes. It made the entire room feel like it was suspended between moments.
And then the Fat Lady happened.
She was perched perfectly in her portrait frame, brush in hand. A look of utter disbelief etched across her painted features. Her eyes widened, her jaw dropped. She flailed both hands dramatically.
“Oh! Oh! My stars and garters! What are you—what are you doing here?! How is this—no, no, no! This isn’t meant to be…what are you three…I mourned…”
Regulus froze mid-step, squinting at her. “Excuse me?” he said, his voice clipped. “What exactly are you getting at?”
James stifled a laugh, tugging Regulus a little closer. “Ignore her theatrics,” he murmured, thumb brushing along the back of Regulus’s hand. “She’s dramatic. She’s always dramatic.”
“Oh, I’m dramatic!” the Fat Lady exclaimed, spinning in her frame. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve mourned you two? My Gryffindors! Gone! How many candles I’ve burned in your memory? And now…now you waltz back in like nothing happened!”
Regulus exhaled through his nose, irritation creeping through the fluster. “Well, that’s helpful,” he muttered, voice low enough that only James heard.
“You always know how to make friends,” James whispered back, thumb stroking the back of Regulus’s hand. Regulus’s chest heated, but he didn’t pull away this time. Not entirely.
Suddenly, a voice. Cold, measured, and entirely unbidden. It echoed through the corridor.
“Well, what a pleasant surprise.”
All three spun, eyes wide. The shadows in the corners of the room seemed to deepen. Regulus tightened his grip on James’s hand reflexively, drawing him slightly closer. Lily moved instinctively between them, protective but alert.
“Who—?” James started. He stepped forward, but the voice continued, clear and unwavering;
“You messed with time, didn’t you?”
The hair on Regulus’s arms prickled. “Time? What—” He stopped, realizing that nothing about this place. Nothing about this moment. None of it felt like the Hogwarts he remembered. It was older. Older and quieter.
And then he saw him.
Dumbledore.
The man appeared at the top of the stairs, robes flowing. His silver beard was longer than Regulus had ever seen it, eyes glinting beneath half-moon spectacles. He was impossibly tall, impossibly imposing, and carried with him the weight of years. Years James and Regulus hadn’t thought possible.
He stepped down slowly and deliberately. As if the very boards beneath him recognized him as something more than mortal. His gaze swept the three of them—Regulus, James, and Lily—with uncanny clarity.
“You’ve arrived,” he said, voice calm but cutting, a faint smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Though I’m not sure any of you should have.”
James stepped protectively in front of Regulus, still holding his hand, but the words that followed froze him in place:
“You three—” Dumbledore’s eyes rested on them, glinting in the flickering firelight. “—are supposed to be dead I’m afraid.”
The room fell into a charged silence. The weight of the declaration pressing down like a tangible thing. Regulus’s stomach sank. Even James’s usual confidence wavered under the sheer intensity of the statement.
Lily’s eyes widened, and for the first time, Regulus noticed how tightly she held her wand. She certainly was ready for anything.
Regulus swallowed, voice barely audible, “then… what does that mean?”
Dumbledore’s smile deepened, enigmatic and coldly amused. “It means…” He paused, letting the words hang like a knife poised to fall. “…that something has happened at Hogwarts. But then again, isn’t that always the case?”