Sirius/Regulus has become alarmingly popular in the last few years, so I'm going to take that as a sign that stories like this are a little more welcome on this site now?

This is just a quick, little story I wrote for a prompt challenge on my LiveJournal account. I wouldn't say it's too great or anything, but I moved it over here just for the hell of it ;)

Main Characters: Sirius and Regulus Black

Pairings: Sirius/Regulus

Warnings: Violence, slash, incest, language, unspecified religious content.

Chapter titles credit to: George Gordon (Lord Byron)

Also I feel the need to mention that this was written for a timed prompt challenge, meaning it was all done in less than two hours. Just...keep that in mind.

Big brother? Are you awake?

Yes, did you need something?

I had a dream…

Was it a nightmare?

Parts of it were, I guess. Some parts were nice though.

What's with the blush? Come here and sit with me. Look how pretty the full moon is through the window; can you see the stars?

Everything's so pretty outside!

Mhmm, and peaceful.

Will it always be like this?

Yes.

Was it always like this?

I don't know.

Well I do.

Did you dream about the past?

Yeah, how did you know?

Big brothers are smart like that. Come back here from the window, you'll get cold. Why don't you talk to me about it?

Are you sure you want to know? It's kind of long…no changing your mind halfway through!

I promise—

Hey, don't laugh at me!

—I'm sorry. I promise I'll let you tell your whole story.

Even if it gets weird in places?

Yes, even if it gets weird.

I mean like…really strange? You have to promise you won't be mad.

I won't be angry at you because of a dream, silly.

Yeah, well…

I promise.

Okay.

…

Our house is built where the castle used to stand. We're probably right over top of the old dungeons right now!

Spooky.

You're making fun of me.

Hey, stop—come back here. I'm sorry, I was kidding. Finish telling me all about how things were in your dream. You know you won't be able to sleep if you don't. Here, come sit with me in the chair by the window, grab that blanket.

I'm too old to sit on your lap.

Ridiculous.

Mum says that I need to grow up and be a different person from you—

Nonsense, and I'll hear none of it; come here.

All right.

There, comfy? Now talk away, we have all night.

Don't do that with my hair, it tickles!

As you wish.

Don't do that either!

My, are you pushy. Well go on then, tell me your dream story—

—it was real.

If you say so. Let's just think of this as payback for all the nights I had to stay up with you, reading you book after book until you'd finally fall asleep.

Okay.

…

D—do you like how the moon hangs low, just…just kind of skimming the tops of the orchard trees?

Yeah, I guess.

Well, it did that before, too.

Did it now?

Yes! Really it did! Only these apple trees weren't always here.

Of course not, Father planted them.

There were trees though! The orchard, it was woods! Dark woods that surrounded the castle on ALL sides.

Dark woods, you say?

Yes, and the full moons that shined over these woods were dangerous because they gave confidence to the hideous wolf creatures that lurked in their depths. They were enticed to come out from their Shadowed Places and wreak havoc!

That's an awful lot of big words from you.

They're not mine. Other people said them to me before.

When?

Just now! Before I came in here!

Oh, okay, right…right, right…what are Shadowed Places?

The spots in The Darkwoods where no light could ever reach, even on the brightest days in the middle of winter when all the trees' leaves were gone!

Of course, how could I be so foolish?

Try to keep up with me, okay?

Okay, I'll try harder. Was there a queen or a king inside the castle?

Yes, a whole Royal Family. Their name and insignia were everywhere.

Who were they?

The Blacks!

…

…Were they a good Royal Family?

Sometimes…

Sometimes they weren't?

They were really young, I think.

I see. Well go on, then, sweetheart, tell me about them…

† † †

In the second year of his marriage, Orion Black was given two sons. One from his wife, Walburga, the proud queen of their region, and another from his mistress, Libra, who was a close adviser to the throne. Under normal circumstance, Orion thought his lover to be an ambitious and powerfully magical person, but it seemed she had finally been tricked.

Walburga's son was eight months older, with coal-black hair and light blue eyes that were already slowly darkening to a steely grey. She and Orion named him Sirius and announced his arrival to the whole land. At every available opportunity, they presented him with pride and he was gazed upon with reverence.

Sirius was asleep in his room when Orion's second son was born at precisely twenty minutes to midnight. Carefully, he and his wife examined the child they had been handed, looking over every inch of him.

"He is much smaller," Walburga said critically.

"Yes, but he will grow. Look at his hair…"

She nodded. "As black as a raven's feathers."

"And his eyes…"

"Already grey like mounting storm clouds."

"Perfect."

Libra was executed at dawn.

Walburga and Orion ruled vicariously through an elaborate system of delegated officials, whose reports were frequent, but short. Several hundred aristocrats, high-ranking public officers, and distant, pureblooded relatives lived in and around their secluded castle, but no one else could be found for a hundred miles, perhaps several hundred. So far removed from the sufferings of their subjects, the King and Queen had little consideration for anything other than their power and their wealth.

Time and time again, their delegates brought news of a threatened revolt, yet none were ever successful. The Blacks were wizards, and the Royal Family the most powerful sorcerers at that. No one else could control the monsters in the forest but Orion, Walburga, or their second cousin Libra, whose body now lay in pieces in the stomachs of the very creatures she once ruled.

No weapon was enough to stave off the clever monsters, who upon the painful command of the King and Queen themselves, devoured every trespasser who dared to traverse the woods surrounding the castle. Some made it ten or twenty miles into the thicket of trees and rocks, others not ten or twenty feet. It all depended on how frisky the wolves were feeling; they had some power over themselves, after all.

With the Blacks safely secure behind their shield of dark magic and wolves, no attack could be made; and with the wolves at the ready to travel as far as the Western Sea to assassinate any deserters, there was little room for change.

Yet there was one threat, one rival, who could be kept in check not so easily by pet wolves, but who required a bit more political finesse.

There were others, far to the north, who possessed a magic of their own—an unknown magic. A year previous to Sirius's birth they had come down from the forest mountains of their own lands and began to sniff around Walburga and Orion's own kingdom. They alone had passed through the Darkwoods unharmed, and Orion had executed ten of his wolf pack's pups as punishment, snapped their necks against the ground in front of their mothers, but still they refused to attack.

Angered, he spoke to the leader of this rare troupe of men. He pretended to welcome them.

"Welcome, gentlemen, to the Torvavetus—" as he called his home "—I had heard stories of a race hidden away up in the forest mountains to the north, but forgive me, because I had no idea that you still lived."

"Well I assure you, we do," asserted the leader of the company. He was a tall, frightening man with oddly shaped irises and unusually pointed teeth. Orion felt especially young and small when confronted with these rugged men, but all the more superior for their clothes were dull and their skin dirty. Their hair was not soft or sleek like Orion's, it was ratty and faded.

"We've traveled a long way," added one of the feral looking soldiers. "Surely you have food and rooms for us?"

Orion reached out with his magic, feeling, examining. There was a conflicting presence there, a magic that belonged to these people, though he did not understand it; and while he openly displayed his powers (his robes shone unnaturally bright, the torches in the hallways hung suspended in midair, various objects floated obediently to his side when he had need of them) these men had made no advances. They would give nothing away. Orion needed to know how strong they were, just how powerful, before he could make any decisions on how to repress this rising threat.

Soon thereafter, the negotiations began, and with each visit from their northern neighbors, Walburga and Orion became more anxious, knowing something needed to be done. They could not allow the creatures (for they were more beast than man) to gain any leverage, or to secure the upper ground. An heir, Sirius, was deemed necessary.

And it was the potential unknown powers that coiled around these foreigners, the danger they could represent to such an important child, that led to Sirius and his brother growing up together. Every night, whether Sirius protested or not, his parents would carry him down to the hidden room in the dungeons where the youngest Black slept.

Every night Walburga placed him in his brother's bed and they would sleep together. Some nights, Sirius would even cuddle the little one close, kissing him on his forehead, his nose, his mouth, like he saw his father do to Mother some evenings.

Walburga made a disconcerted noise in the back of her throat.

"No," said Orion. "It's good. The closer they are…the more similar they'll grow up to be…

"…And we need them to be exactly the same."