(01 : THEN BE EMPTIED TO . . .
REDEEM A TRAITOR HOME?)

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8TH AUGUST 1993

     BY THE TIME JULIET RETURNED from Little Whinging and settled Harry into one of the spare rooms with the promise of telling him more about his parents at breakfast, it was a couple of minutes past midnight. In spite of the late hour, she couldn't seem to shut her suspicions down as she padded towards her bedroom. A rather small voice in the back of her mind assured her that she wouldn't be sleeping anytime soon — at least not until she figured out why Harry Potter's name hadn't appeared on their list of magical children to help sooner.

In her rush to check the list, she barely noticed the other presence in the room. Regulus Black was perched on the edge of her neatly made bed, staring out of the window. He was illuminated beautifully under the silvery glow of the moonlight, his dark hair tousled and his torso bare. Although Juliet wasn't wholly surprised to find her friend idly staring at the stars instead of lying in bed, she still stiffened and rushed to slam the dresser drawer — in which the list safely resided — shut.

"What are you doing here, Reg?" probed Juliet, feigning boredom as she pretended to rearrange the perfume bottles on her vanity table. "If you want to talk, now really isn't a good time."

"I woke up and you weren't there." He absentmindedly began to trace Canis Major with his pointer finger. "I — I was worried. I thought I would wait for you to come back. I fell asleep for a little while and then heard the door. I, uh, hope you don't mind."

Although Regulus had inherited Grimmauld Place after Walburga died, he much preferred staying at the reformed Fawley home and the site of their shared business, Mantua. Whilst Juliet typically appreciated his company, their friendship had been tense ever since a drunken night ended in their bodies being twisted in silk bed sheets. Or maybe that was simply the breaking point for the pair — frequent arguments over appealing Sirius' imprisonment and her unexpected friendship with Remus had caused equal strain.

Juliet shrugged. "I was out."

"You went, didn't you?" Regulus surmised, a note of underlying bitterness nestling itself into his voice. "You went to find Harry after I told you not to."

     "And I told you that you're not my keeper." Juliet bristled at his accusation. "But, now that I think about it, why didn't you want me to find Harry? We are not in the business of playing God, Regulus. We don't pick and choose who is most deserving of our help."

His eyes finally snapped towards hers — twin blue flames in a deadlock. "You think I don't know that? I care about this place as much as you do. But I care about you more, and Harry Potter coming here would only cause you more harm than good."

With a flick of her wand, she cast a silencing charm and thought better of mentioning that Harry Potter was already sleeping two doors down. "I don't think you do know that because the kids are meant to be our first priority!" exclaimed Juliet. "I'm an adult — one that is more well-adjusted that you seem to want to give me credit for. I'm not going to fall apart the second I see him."

"Then what do you call this?" Regulus challenged, pointedly gesturing to the redhead's frenzied state.

"I call this losing trust in the one person I have depended on for over a decade." Her hissed words were filled with such venom that even Voldemort would've been impressed. "His home life has been terrible. He's been verbally abused and lived in a cupboard under the stairs for eleven years. He was walking the street with his suitcase when I found him. He should've been on that list from the second he showed signs of magic. I want to know why he wasn't."

     "Maybe the list made a mistake," he replied quietly.

      Scoffing, she tilted her head to meet her friend's cool, unflinching gaze. "Remus charmed it himself and I would trust him with my life. The list doesn't make mistakes. Not unless someone tampered with it." Lowering her voice, she daringly continued, "I want to know why. I want to know why you hid his name from me."

     Juliet remembered when Harry's name first appeared on the list in shimmering red ink. It seemed to taunt her, revealing itself after she subconsciously tapped her wand against the parchment in the same pattern she had once used to decode Regulus' messages when she was on the run from Voldemort and the Ministry in '79. Never had it crossed her mind that Regulus — of all people — would hide something from her. For all that Regulus Black had changed from the teenage Death Eater he once was, it appeared his Slytherin cunning was still a treasured relic from the war years.

     "I did it to protect you," insisted Regulus. "Everything I do is for you, Julie."

     For a moment, her harsh exterior wavered and she recoiled. "Don't call me that."

     "It's been twelve years," Regulus reminded her of this fact, like she didn't still mark her life by all the milestones James Potter had missed. Birthdays, reunions, anniversaries — none of those things mattered to a dead boy. "You need to get over him and that is never going to happen if we have his son living around the corner every Christmas and Easter! Anything to do with Potter makes you impulsive and you proved as much tonight. I thought you were making progress after we . . ."

     "We fucked, Reg," she picked up coldly. "It didn't change anything for me. I don't want a relationship right now."

      If she hadn't known him since they were children, she might not have noticed the brief flash of hurt in his eyes. "There is more to this world than him! There is more to you than James Potter."

      "I know. There always has been." Even the rustling of leaves outside seemed to quiet at her deadly whisper. "If everything you do is for me, then everything I have done since that night is because of him. He  — he died and I swore a part of me died with him. I should've died that night, but I didn't and I've lived every day in spite of being permanently left with feeling like the world is about to end. I'm sorry he's dead, I wish he wasn't, and I know the grief will always be lurking in some shadowed part of my shrivelled up heart, but I healed a long time ago, Regulus." Her voice slowly creeped up in volume, the frustration building as she stood in the haven they had formed together. "I don't want to go on dates, I want to kill Voldemort. Completely. I want to find the rest of those blasted horcruxes and —"

     Warily, Regulus rubbed his left forearm. "You're obsessed. You've done enough for his memory and lost enough in this war. James wouldn't want —"

     "You don't know a single thing about James, so shut the hell up," she snapped, drawing her wand on him for the first time. It was this action that startled her enough to shake the red from her vision and caused her to jerk back. "I didn't mean to — I would never —"

     The sinking realisation of how fractured and frigid their relationship hit Regulus. He didn't like it, he decided. "It's fi — " At some point, Juliet had started to backtrack towards the door. "Where are you going? We're not done here."

     "I need some air." Swallowing the lump in her throat, her anger promptly fizzled into regret — regret for allowing her relationship with Regulus to deteriorate, regret for not checking on Harry sooner and regret for always falling short of balancing out everything James Potter had done for her. "I didn't want to argue with you tonight, but you've crossed a line this time. You're meant to be my partner, my friend. It's not even about James, or Harry being his son, it's about how you endangered a teenager because you thought you knew best."

Upon hearing how disappointed she was, Regulus held back a wince. "It's hard to remember sometimes that the odds aren't stacked against us anymore, that there's other people to factor in. I'm — I'm sorry."

At his confession, her hand hesitated over the doorknob. Juliet knew how hard it was to unlearn the cutthroat survival instincts that had made them view everyone as a possible enemy and she knew Regulus' intentions weren't malicious, but it was still not an easy thing to forgive. Mantua was everything to her and his selfishness had put it at risk. Taking a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and pulled open the door.

     "Juliet!" called Regulus. "Please, I — till death us part, right?"

      Without looking back, she left the room. After all, Juliet and Regulus were never the star-crossed lovers of the tale.

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Once she reached the outskirts of Mantua's wards, Juliet found herself apparating to the one place she had always felt welcome — Potter Manor. Considering nobody had lived there for over a decade, it was well-maintained. Acting like a permanent snapshot of its prime time, the manor was relatively untouched by the tragedy that befell the rest of the family. For a while, Dippy —the family's ageing house elf — helped conserve the place, then Juliet took over as the creature became more sickly. Wherever she was, Juliet hoped her mother was happy all those cleaning charms she had been taught as a girl were finally being put to good use.

     When she reached the front door, Juliet immediately smiled. Her skin tingled as she nudged the door open — residue magic seemingly lingering in every crook and corner of the family home. It felt familiar and warm, much like the Potters. Juliet loved it. And yet, something felt off this time. Buzzing like a live wire, the magic seemed louder all of a sudden.

"Homenum revelio," Juliet muttered.

Within seconds, a swooping sensation passed over her and her heart began to beat like a hummingbird's. Someone else was in the house. Juliet debated what to do for a moment — fight or flight was never her strong suit. Then, a shadow darted out of the kitchen, barrelling towards her, so she acted on instinct, wordlessly taking down the intruder with a body-bind curse.

The audible thump of a body was followed by Juliet switching on the lights. "Sirius?"

Through squinted eyes, Juliet gasped at the pitiful sight of her old friend. With sunken eyes and skin like wax, the bedraggled runaway was a far cry from the well-groomed aristocrat she knew as a teenager. There was no question it was him though — not if he passed through Euphemia Potter's wards. Knowing that, she didn't hesitate to remove the curse from him.

"Juliet?" Sirius echoed, tears rimming his eyes. "You're real?"

"I'm real," she confirmed. "And I am furious with you."

If possible, his face became more ashen. "Please. You have to believe me, I didn't —"

"Copying me still, Black?" Juliet teasingly interrupted his pleas. "Come on, the fugitive thing is so 1979. Been there, done that. You're a Marauder, have some originality!"

A doubtful expression remained on the man's face. "You don't think I did it?"

"Oh, no, I do. It's a hobby of mine to stand around in abandoned houses with people I think are murderers, actually." When her musings didn't earn a smirk from him, she sighed, "Don't tell me the dementors sucked out your sense of humour by mistake. I know you didn't do it. Even — even if Regulus didn't tell me, I would have known. I've fought every day for a retrial, Sirius. And whilst I would like to know all about how you escaped the most fortified wizarding prison in existence, I'm just . . . happy you're here."

"Merlin," Sirius breathed out, "I've missed you."

All the uncertainty between the two instantly melted away. Sirius wrapped his arms around Juliet and buried his face into the crook of her neck. The enthusiastic act of affection initially caught Juliet off guard, but she soon melted into his embrace. Both of them remained like that until sunrise, vibrant hues of amber and gold filtering through the windows alongside the promise of better days for two disenchanted purebloods.

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A.N: I am very tired and didn't proofread this because I just wanted to get it up, but I hope you all enjoyed it! Hopefully I'll be updating more regularly because I missed Juliet. There's lots more still to be revealed about everything we've missed in the gap since James' death and now, so I can't wait. For clarity's sake, this chapter takes place directly after the epilogue (CH 61) of 'Check Yes,' but it will continue following the HP timeline from here on.

Question, what is your favourite book trope?