The Art of Dying - R. Black

five

When I reached our meeting spot outside of the Great Hall, Regulus was there, looking more irritable than usual.

"Hey, Black-"

He pushed himself off of the pillar he had been leaning on. "I can't figure out why Slughorn invited you into the club," Regulus spoke.

"Oh, we're doing this again?" I asked, falling into step with him.

Regulus shook his head, a stray curl falling against his brow bone. His eyes were dark, accompanied by dark circles underneath his grey eyes.

"Yes, because I can't figure out why he'd invite blood traitors."

I bit my cheek, wanting to argue with him tonight. "Maybe he invited us 'blood traitors' so that Dumbledore doesn't think that his little club is a Death Eaters meeting."

Regulus jerked his head to the side to look at me. The look in his eyes told me that I already struck a nerve.

"Oh, sensitive subject?" I questioned, maintaining eye contact with Regulus.

He shook his head, "Don't joke about stuff like that, Meredith."

That's the first time he's called me by my first name.

"Who says that I was joking?"

Regulus stopped in his tracks, and I pushed my shoulder against his arm as I kept walking. He quickly caught up to me, looking at me in disbelief.

I didn't want to provoke him, so I changed the subject before things could escalate.

"I, for one, am the utmost excited to spend even more time with you," I joked, rounding the corner of a side corridor.

Regulus smirked, "Yeah, I bet you are. Don't lie, you've been dying to get me alone."

"Oh yes, I look forward to our patrols," I replied sarcastically.

The castle was silent except for the rain pattering against the roof. It has been raining all day and has been showing no signs of letting up anytime soon.

"I must admit, I'm quite excited to see you lot lose to Hufflepuff in a few weeks," Regulus stated.

I raised an eyebrow at him, "Oh yeah? Well that's not going to happen, so sorry to let you down."

Regulus scoffed, "Even if you beat Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw, we're gonna kick your arses in May."

"I bet you are," I teased, smirking at Regulus.

He looked away and fiddled with the ring on his right ring finger. I snuck a look at the ring, realizing how familiar it looked. It's a Black family crest signet ring. Sirius wore the exact same one up until fifth year, when he ditched the family ring for several different rings that he wore scattered across his hands.

I fiddled with my own ring as we walked in silence. I've always worn the McKinnon family crest proudly on my hand, but I realized that maybe Regulus wasn't proud to be wearing the Black family crest. Sirius never was, but he was very adamant to everyone he met that he hated his family and their ideals of pureblood supremacy and preserving the bloodline.

I shook my head. I need to stop analyzing someone that I barely even know, let alone get along with.

"Stop staring, McKinnon," Regulus said, a slight smirk dancing across his face.

I fluttered my eyes at him. "I wasn't staring."

"Sure, you weren't."

I grinned, "I think you're confusing your dreams with reality."

"Definitely," He replied, "Because we both know that you're in my dreams all the time."

I bumped his arm with my shoulder, "Don't be a prick."

- - - - -

October 10th, 1978

I was right about the rain not letting up anytime soon. It's been raining on and off for almost three weeks. The sky seems like it's permanently cloudy and grey at this point.

The quidditch pitch is squishy underneath my shoes as I step onto the pitch, carrying my broom. My hair is already soaking wet and plastered against my neck, and my clothes won't stay dry for much longer.

Emmeline shields her eyes and peers up at the sky. "Merlin, please stop raining."

Jack and Thomas are already standing in the middle of the pitch, completely unbothered by the pouring rain. Emmeline and I joined them in the middle of the pitch, waiting for the rest of the team.

Soon enough, Richard, Stephen, and Natalie joined us on the pitch. They're all from younger years, and it's Richard and Stephen's first year on the team, but they've got up to speed quite quickly. We have a good chance of taking the Quidditch Cup for a third year in a row.

Jack is the Captain and Keeper, doing his best to fill James' shoes as a good captain, Thomas, Emmeline, and Carter are our Chasers, Natalie is our new Seeker, going from a Chaser to a Seeker since James left, and then there's Stephen and me as the Beaters. It's weird working with someone who isn't Marlene. I forgot that he wouldn't know what I was thinking, what my next move would be. It's weird without Marlene, but Stephen is quite a good Beater.

Jack cleared his throat, yelling over the rain. "We've got our first match in a few weeks, so we're going to do drills today to perfect everything we can."

We all lined up, beginning the drills that we would be doing for the next hour.

The rain pattered roughly against my clothes as I took to the sky on my broom. My braided hair was soaking wet, dripping even more water onto my back.

Stephen and I hit bludgers back and forth for a bit, and I showed him a new trick, and helped him work on his form.

"Hey, start aiming the bludgers at us!" Thomas yelled.

I furrowed my brows at him. "Are you sure? We don't want anyone to get hurt before the watch."

"Don't aim them directly at us," Emmeline added, "Just close enough so we can work on how to dodge them."

Stephen had a shocked look on his face. I shrugged, raising my bat and smacking the upcoming bludger towards the Chasers."

Emmeline passed the quaffle to Richard, and the boy spun out of the way of the bludger, passing the quaffle onto Thomas.

Once the hour was concluded, the seven of us landed back onto the quidditch pitch, which was practically on the verge of flooding from the rain.

I quickly ran into the quidditch changing room to throw my stuff into my bag before running back towards the castle, just wanting to get out of this damned rain.