OUTCAST | SIRIUS BLACK

CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE

DYING PROBABLY
✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

"The Dark Lord. He - he asked us about you."

Seraphina first thought she had misheard him. Her mind processed Regulus's words one by one slowly. Over and over again they echoed inside her mind. Her throat felt too dry for words to get out.

"The Dark Lord?" Seraphina finally managed to ask.

"Yes."

"He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?"

"Yes."

"You-Know-Who?"

"Yes!"

"Voldemort?"

Regulus simply nodded that time, grey eyes filled with fear. Not for himself, but for her. "I – I don't know how he got your name. I've never mentioned you to anyone in my family, neither has Avery nor Pucey, I think. Maybe Mulciber or Rosier have said something. Or maybe Snape."

"What did he know about me?" Seraphina asked quietly. Dumbledore told her about how Voldemort wanted her mother to join him and when she refused, she was eventually killed. If Voldemort somehow found out Kenna Hayes had a daughter – that Merlin's descendant still roamed this earth – she was screwed.

"Not much," Regulus told her. "Or I don't know. He didn't speak directly to me – at least not after my – initiation. But my cousin, Bellatrix, clearly tried to get me to speak about you a few times. Her husband did too."

Seraphina sat down, trying to comprehend what she was hearing. The Death Eaters asking about her couldn't be good. Perhaps she needed to tell Dumbledore about that – but how could she do that without breaking her promise to Regulus?

It was wrong of her, she knew that. Despicable even because she knew the names of several of the Dark Lords followers. Names that the aurors were searching for. And she kept them to herself because she made a promise. To be fair though, many of the people she knew for a fact were Death Eaters had never made their allegiance to the Dark Lord a secret.

"So you have no idea what he wants with me?" Seraphina asked, looking at Regulus. The youngest Black looked almost afraid for her – something that both warmed her heart and made her anxiety grow.

"Sera," Regulus said, sitting down next to her, "you are pureblood and an extraordinary witch. Anyone would want you on their side."

"My family are blood-traitors," Seraphina said and it almost came out like a whine. The Weasleys were known for their dismissal of blood supremacy; her brother's greatest interest was Muggles and their weird inventions.

"The rest of your family have been sorted into Gryffindor, have they not?" Regulus pointed out.

"Being a Slytherin does not mean I agree with him!" Seraphina exclaimed angrily. She'd spent so many years defending her house from the remarks of her friends and family, the last thing she needed was for her own housemates to do the same.

"I know you don't," Regulus shrugged, his previous sympathy turning into his normal apathy. "I just thought that you might want to know."

"Thank you," Seraphina said with a mixture of gratitude and sarcasm. "Now I can start planning my own funeral in good time."

After a moment of silence, Regulus asked, "Do you know why the Dark Lord would ask for you?"

"Huh?" Seraphina asked, not hearing him properly, too busy staring out the window now that the train was moving.

"Do you know why the Dark Lord is asking about you?" Regulus clarified, speaking slowly to make sure she heard every word clearly.

"No, why would I?" Seraphina lied easily. "That's why I asked you." Letting out a humourless laugh, she added, "Unless he's gotten ahold of everyone's O.W.L:s scores and is now doing recruitments based on grades combined with bloodstatus." In afterthought she grumbled, "No, that can't be right, because then how would Mulciber be recruited?"

"Even now you make snarky remarks," Regulus scoffed in disbelief.

"It's how I deal with shit in my life," Seraphina said defensively. Everything was easier for her to handle by trying to make it into a joke. It was that or having a breakdown. Running a hand through her hair, she said, "Did you have a good Easter?"

"Are you serious?"

"No, that would be your brother," Seraphina muttered. "And yes, I am asking you about your Easter because there is nothing I can do about the other thing at the moment — well, there is. But fleeing the country, changing my name to spend the rest of my life in hiding is my plan-B."

"What's plan-A?"

"I have no idea," Seraphina said. "Dying probably."

"Why do you continue to speak like this is a death sentence for you?" Regulus asked her, annoyed by how she seemed to both have given up already while somehow at the same time not taking this seriously at all. "I should not have said anything."

"No, I am grateful that you told me," Seraphina said. "But how could I not see this as a threat to my life? I've read the Daily Prophet. People talk. Muggles and muggleborns are being murdered. And it's only getting worse. I'm not loving my own odds if Voldy comes knocking on my doorstep — because it doesn't if it's to recruit me or murder me - I will end up dead either way."

"It doesn't have to be that way-"

"Reggie, I love you, I truly do," Seraphina told him sincerely. "And it's because of that I am not questioning your decisions. It's because of that I'd never do anything that put you in harm's way. But I could never go against my own beliefs like that."

"If you are so against it, how come you didn't run to Dumbledore the second I told you what I was doing over Easter?" Regulus wondered.

Seraphina didn't really know the answer to that question either. Despite caring deeply for Regulus — who was like her baby brother — telling Dumbledore or any adult could have prevented him from even joining the Death Eaters in the first place.

Looking at the young man in front of her, she couldn't imagine him committing those atrocious crimes she read about every other week. Many things could be said about him: he could be arrogant, snobby and patronising. But never cruel.

She hadn't given up on him just yet...

"Call it self-preservation," Seraphina shrugged. "Revealing what I know will only send me to the grave quicker."