King of Swords [ Regulus Black ]

Chapter 4

As midnight falls over East London, I double-bolt the locks on my front door and immediately cast my cloak aside. My legs ache, and I can't shake the feeling that my heart will soon pound out of my chest.

Upon leaving the alley, I walked about in a daze for a number of hours. Passing bustling pubs and vacant office buildings, I tried to remind myself I was a muggle. I told myself that fucking around in alleyways and posing political conspiracies would one day get me killed.

It didn't work. The adrenaline rush seeps into my skin and makes my hair stand on edge. This is my vice, my dopamine hit that keeps the horses running. I am a junkie through and through.

Occasionally, I will return from these runs and stare at myself in the mirror. My hollow cheekbones and spattered freckles tell me who I am. It is only when my heart ceases to race, and the blood tints my flesh pink that I start to look like Ana again.

Haro Fawley, or as he prefers me to refer to him, father, is already sitting on my sofa. He developed this idea in the earlier years that we should form a paternal relationship. It makes me easier to control if I look at him like he is my family rather than an employer. I don't tell him that it doesn't really work. I didn't particularly care for my original dad, so a proxy is not going to make me more devoted.

It is a ridiculous sight to see him cross-legged in my living room, surrounded by the belongings of a nineteen year old girl. His presence makes me hyper-aware of the empty wine bottle I left on the coffee table. The Fawleys have threatened to send me a house elf on multiple occasions, but I still have some morals left to cling to.

"Oh shit," Maslin says as he sits on the edge of an open window, "thought you finally died."

Maslin looks a lot like his father, which is to say, smug. They have the same wavy dark hair and big brown eyes that always make them look as if they've been caught doing something they shouldn't. It's the brows that get them in trouble, eternally cocked and sizing you up.

I am not in the mood to deal with Maslin. In fact, I would love to step across the couch and push him out of that window. We are the same age. However, he tends to take the dichromatic roles of either being my over-protective elder brother or the insufferable younger sibling to the max.

"Demetrius Connoway is dead," I say because it's best to just get that out of the way, "killed by deatheaters."

"Deatheaters don't operate in London," Maslin says with a sigh. He takes a long drag of his cigarette and blows it into my flat. Typically, that would annoy me, but I am under some high stress, so it smells welcoming.

Haro raises his hand to quiet the junior, "Deatheaters? Are you certain?" He asks.

"They descended in clouds of black smoke and wore gold masks, so yes, I am left to assume."
My thighs meet the sofa, and I pull them up to massage the knots, which does little to stop the aches.
Haro nods, clearly shaken by this information but refusing to show it.