The Chain|Regulus Black

Good old fashioned loving

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"I know you don't tell me everything," Delilah mumbles against his back, feeling him become rigid. The way she whispers has him wanting to release every secret etched in his skin. "I know you want to keep me safe, so thank you. But I need you to know you deserve more than what they make you think you do. I've seen the bruises my love-" Before she fell asleep, Regulus's soft snores making her smile, the sliver of his t-shirt rode up, trailing her finger over his stomach, she discovered the deep bruising. Blues and purples of forget me not.

It was gentle how her fingers brushed over them, but even then he tensed, pulling away, Delilah began pulling down his top, and that's when she felt the burn marks on his hips. No bigger than the tip of a wand, profound and raw, she tried her best to heal them, but magic as emotional as his made them embedded in his skin. So she numbs the pain like she always did for him. 

Regulus noticed the tug of his clothes didn't sting as much as he had wanted. Rolling down the waistband of his trousers he inflicted a few more, just to remind himself that he would become everything he feared and more.

"You're my best friend Regulus. Please, let me understand. Let me protect you. You don't have to be strong for the both of us." But her grief spreads as he scoffs, "You're stronger than the things that you think make you weak." And like a knife grazing over him, his left arm throbbed, retaliating against Delilah's words, daring him to believe them.

This was what he was destined for, it was his path, not chosen by his parents as Sirius might like to believe, but by him. He knows Sirius thinks he did his brother a favour when he left, but as the door slammed shut, the lock turning; the beatings, the torment, the disappointment fell onto his fragile shoulders.

So Regulus learnt to carry the weight. But how he wished he could be like Sirius. Bold in every decision, but he wasn't. He was the boy his parents made. Maybe that's why he decided he never wanted children, because if his parents moulded him, what would he do to his own child?

Turning around in Delilah's arms, he's facing her brutal emotion blazoned in her eyes. Regulus observes everything about her face and he curses himself for not savouring her sooner. Because when they left Hogwarts, there would be nothing left of them, they'd be on different sides of a battle line neither of them drew.

I love you.

The thought startles him, Delilah feels his tremble under her grip, because he'd never thought it, or said it. Because saying it out loud would make this real, would make it terrifying. It would give him something to lose. It made his throat tighten, yet, he wanted to tell her this a hundred times over. Just so that she knew, when they were trying to kill each other, they would always remember where it started, it started in the words of love.

Regulus wants to say I love you between kisses because he does, even when he'll betray her faith in him and it dawns on him

In order to betray someone, love has to take place first. And surely that must count for something?

"Let me see the world through your eyes." The Ravenclaw pleads, she wants to breathe him in, she looks at him and sees nothing but the truth. He'll come apart, turn black and fester, but she wants him.

Wanting to fade into the shadows with him, because holding his hand in the dark, it's more comforting than in the stark daylight. In the dark she blindly believes, in the light, she's forced to consider factors that retaliate against her affections.

Delilah's fingers thread through his hair and their lips meet, a sigh of relief escaping Regulus before he can stop it. Every gesture has been thought of a million times, the way her lips yield against his, her hands grasping his robes and moulding his body to hers.