"He'd dead, Lily. Sirius went and saw the body!"

"I didn't feel him dying, Remus, he can't be. I know I would have felt it!"

"You said yourself just now, just a moment ago, that you felt something and then it just -- went away. That going away? That going away was him dying, Lily. You must have stopped feeling him because he stopped feeling what you were feeling from him."

"No, that's not -"

"LILY! He is already in denial. He doesn't need you making it worse. You have no idea how long we've struggled through Sirius's depression with this blasted Achyls. You have no idea. It goes back to fourth year --"

"I have no idea? Remus! Who do you think held him crying when you broke him in fifth! Me and James are the ones that took care of him all that term!"

"When I broke him?! Lily - he told Snape about me! About my furry little condition! He betrayed me!"

"He didn't intend to!"

"Oh so now you're on his side?"

"I'm not taking sides, Remus! That's not even what this is about, alright? It's about Regulus."

"It's about the fact that Sirius is in denial! He went and saw the body - hesaw the body, Lily. He saw it and he still denies that it's Regulus!"

"If Sirius says that wasn't his brother's body then I bloody believe him, and the fact that the magique amore corroborates the theory --"

"Which it doesn't as you said you cannot feel him now!"

"-- then yes, in this instance, I am taking Sirius's side."

Silence fell over the living room. Lily and Remus stood facing one another, each standing on either end of the coffee table, their hands on their hips. Peter sat awkwardly in the center of the couch, swallowing back anxiety and looking from one to the other and back again, his face pale and wide-eyed. When the silence fell, he continued looking between them, waiting for one of them to continue on. When neither did for several beats, he said, "Well, are you lot quite finished now?"

Remus sighed and Lily crossed her arms.

"Because it's really foolish, your fight is. And it isn't fair to Sirius! Only James has this right, going in there and just comforting him. You - you claim to be working love magic and yet you're out here fighting. And you - you're his bleedin' husband! But who is in there and being what Sirius needs? James is!" Peter was red in the face with anxiousness for speaking up, but he couldn't help himself. "Regulus was all our friend and maybe some of us are better able to process stuff that's happened than others of us, sure, but denial is a regular part of grief - if you all recall - and it's not fair to expect Sirius to process it all in just a few hours! Really, you lot, just - just - just shut up!!!"

Lily and Remus both looked abashed. Lily looked down at her feet and her arms fell from her chest to her sides, while Remus closed his eyes, frustrated with himself.

"Peter's right," Remus said.

Lily nodded, too choked up to speak.

"Thank you Peter," Remus added.

Peter nodded. "I'm sorry I got cross with you. I just - I think it was rather inappropriate."

"It was," Lily agreed. "I'm sorry, Remus. I'm sorry, Peter."

"I'm sorry, too, Peter," Remus paused, "And sorry to you, too, Mrs. Potter."

Lily smiled sadly and walked 'round the coffee table, wrapping her arms around Remus. "I don't think I've ever truly fought with you before."

"I don't reckon so," Remus answered.

"I didn't like it."

"Nor did I."

"Nor I!" Peter chimed in.

"Get over here, Wormtail," Remus said, and he held up his arm, giving Peter space to join in the hug and he ran over and flung himself in among them.

Regulus stood looking into the mirror of the upstairs bathroom.

He had spent a better than an hour resetting the protective charms on the house so that it was protected against intruders. There was no coming or going through floo or disapparation whatsoever. He blasted the base of the floo and bricked it over so there was no where to even arrive to. The front door opened only by the touch of his own hand on the knob, and the house remained invisible to anyone who had not been told of where to find it by Kreacher, who had been commanded not to tell anyone of the secret, except for Sirius, if the time should ever come that Sirius Black asked to be brought to Number 12 Grimmauld Place. 

"Then and only then are you to break this command, Kreacher. Do you understand? Only to Sirius."

"Yes Master Regulus, Kreacher understands."

Kreacher had served Regulus dinner then, and even surprised him with a small lemon cake for dessert on which Kreacher had carefully written out a Happy Birthday Master with red smarties. "Is Master surprised?" Kreacher asked hopefully after he'd brought the cake out to give to Regulus.

"I am, Kreacher, thank you," Regulus had answered, and he'd petted the elf on the head and felt fit to cry as he blew out the candles that Kreacher had placed so carefully all around the edge of the cake. A perfect seventeen of them. 

When the dinner was done and the cake was eaten, Regulus had said that he was going to bed and he'd gone upstairs. He kept his bedroom door opened and listened for Kreacher to stop working at cleaning the kitchen and the dishes and when the clicking of plates and pans finally stopped, when the lights were out and Kreacher was curled up in his cupboard for the night, that was when Regulus had gotten up and walked to the bathroom on the third floor.

And here he was, standing in the bathroom, staring at his reflection.

He looked a real fright. Black eyes, split lip, broken tooth, broken nose...

Regulus lifted his wand and aimed it at his own face. "Episky." With a terrible crunch, his nose snapped back into place and he doubled over as his stomach turned from the feel of it. "Oh gods," he groaned. It took him a moment to stand back up again and he could still feel his stomach rolling in response to the sensation. He couldn't imagine how Remus must feel, turning into a werewolf every month only to turn back. How horrific the crunching and cracking of his bones must feel... He'd read once that the transformation process was much worse for a werewolf than for animagus. With animagus, the change was magical and painless. For a werewolf, it was biological and dreadful. 

"I'd bloody off myself and get it over with if I was a werewolf, I reckon," Regulus muttered, shaking his head.

He looked in the reflection again. He looked a wee bit more like himself now - with his nose back in the place it belonged, and he stared into his own blackened eyes. 

"Hullo Regulus," he said to himself. "You best take a good long look at yourself because it's the last time you'll be looking the part for a time, I reckon." 

He swallowed, mustering his bravery, and he reached up, taking hold of a great handful of his hair tight in his fist. He tugged it up and aimed his wand, closed his eyes, grit his teeth, and took a deep breath.

"Agrafo."

He steeled his muscles at the sound of the slicing charm and his fist came away clutching a huge clump of his hair, which he tossed into the sink. He didn't dare to look yet, so he grabbed the next handful blindly, wincing as he cast the spell again, "Agrafo!"... and a third time... fouth... fifth... until there was nothing left to grab onto.

He lowered his hand for the last time, tossing the last bit of his wild mane into the sink. 

Finally, he opened his eyes.

It was a terrible mess, what was left, all different lengths and angles and it was choppy and there were spots where the hair had been cut so close that his scalp showed through in bright gashes between the thick black that covered his head.

He stared at himself again for a long moment, then looked down at the sink where all his hair lay. His hands shook as he gathered it all up and put it into the bin numbly, trying not to think about the fact that there was no going back.

Regulus went down to the library then, carefully stepping over the spot where Maryrose had laid, and went to the bookshelf. He looked over the titles, running his fingers along the spines, trying to select one that might be a good place to start.

Moste Terrible Incantations from the Newe Worlde Order by Astrange Victore.

He carrie it to the chair where Mother usually sat to take her tea, and he opened the book and started to read.

James Potter came out of the bedroom when Sirius had finally fallen asleep. He sighed heavily as he fell into a chair in the kitchen, where Remus, Lily, and Peter were now sitting. The curry shop was opened, despite it being Christmas, and he'd gotten a good deal of food and brought it back upstairs and they now had loads of take-out containers sprawled all over the table. 

"How is he?" Remus asked, and his eyes were nervous.

"Asleep," James answered. 

"Here, eat, love." Lily started piling masala and rice onto a plate and gave it round to James.

He hadn't realized how famished he was until he had it before him and he started to shovel it into his mouth eagerly. 

"But mentally?"

"He's upset, of course," James replied. "He said that it wasn't Regulus, that he saw?"

"The mortician took the pendant Maryrose gave Regulus off, and also the watch Sirius gave him just this morning, and Sirius thinks it means that it was a fake body," Remus said.

"Please don't start fighting again," Peter begged.

"Fighting?" James asked, "Fighting over what?"

"Whether Sirius is in denial or not," Remus replied. 

"Obviously he's in denial," clucked James, shaking his head, "I mean..."

"I know -- exactly! Of course he is," Remus said.

Lily spoke up, "He's not dead! It isn't denial... I didn't feel Regulus die, James. I didn't. And I know I would have."

"You said it just stopped before, though, when we were in the field playing quidditch," James said. "What if..."

"No. No. Remus and I already talked about this. That wasn't him dying. It wasn't." Lily shook her head. "I dunno what it was, but it wasn't him dying."

James glanced at Remus, then back at Lily. "Evans..."

"James Charlus Fleamont Potter, I'm not wrong." Lily said.

James looked at Remus again and shrugged. "If they both say it wasn't him mate, I dunno. I reckon there may be some plausibility to it."

Remus looked shocked and betrayed, "James, letting him believe -- when it's not possible -- it's not --" He shook his head, unable to finish any of the sentences he started. Finally, he sighed and got up, "Alright, fine. Let's say it wasn't his body. Let's say that. Well whose body is it, then, first of all. Next, why did they bother dropping him off at the ministry? What are they trying to accomplish by giving him up to aurors when they could set Greyback to do the clean up, like they usually do?"

"I don't know," Lily answered. 

"Sirius says it's to draw their mum out of hiding."

Remus got up and went to the living room and returned, tossing the evening news paper from the Daily Prophet before them. "Well. They didn't need to do it to get her. Walburga's in Azkaban as of yesterday afternoon." 

Lily gasped.

James picked up the paper. "Blimey."

"What happened?" Peter asked eyes wide.

"She turned herself in," Remus said. "She went to the Ministry saying You Know Who kidnapped her son and she turned herself over to them in exchange for them going to find Regulus. But they didn't get to go far because he turned up this morning."

"But they didn't kidnap him. He was here with us," Peter said.

"I know that, Peter. You know that. But nobody else knew that," Remus said, shrugging. 

James couldn't believe what he was seeing, looking at Walburga Black calmly staring out from the photograph, clutching the placard that denoted her prisoner number as though she had barely a care in the world.

"They put Underhill on the job," James said, reading from the article. "And Mad-Eye, too. Regulus was actually originally reported kidnapped by --" he paused and looked up at Lily. "Horace Slughorn."

"Slughorn?" Lily said in surprise.

"Yeah, that's what it says. He reported it directly to Moody and Underhill and they've been searching since, according to this."

Remus said, "I just don't think that it's healthy or safe for Sirius to be denying what's clearly been building for some time. He has a million reasons to fall into a really unealthy state of mind right now. Dead Regulus, imprisoned Walburga..."

"He was arguing with Achlys when I went in the room," murmured James.

"See? Precisely the problem with it. I mean, I'm all for hoping that I'm wrong and that it'll turn out the body was a fake, too, but --" he shook his head. "I would rather it be an unexpected celebration when he does than to see him struggle through all this rubbish only to come out the other side more battered up than ever mentally... and if it isn't a fake, what would all that hoping and believing do for him but destroy him even more thoroughly?"

"I see you're all talking about me."

Sirius's voice cut through the silence that had followed Remus's statement like a knife cutting through butter and all four of them looked up in surprise. 

"Do you all think I'm mad then?" he asked, looking from one to the next of them. "Peter? James? Evans? All in agreement I've lost my mind?" he twiddled his fingers against his temple as he said the words. "Like I'm twiddled about in the head? Nothing but scrambled eggs in his brain, of course he's addled --"

"None of us said that!" Peter said desperately.

"-- just look at what he's come from." He waved his hand at the calm, stoic face of Walburga that graced the front page of the Daily Prophet. "How could he be anything but mad, given who his family is -- isn't that right? Isn't that what everybody here was thinking?"

Remus had stepped forward, "Sirius..." 

Sirius shook his head, "It's fine! I don't give a damn if you lot don't believe me. I believe me and that's enough. But when Regulus and I come strolling back in here together, you will all be quite welcomed to fuck right the fuck off..." and he disapparated.