A/N: Hello and apologies for not updating sooner. Several things have changed in my life, I had to get another tooth operation, (yuck), I got a job which required me to move to NYC! And I had no internet connection whilst setting up my flat. Now that I'm back to work updates will be once a week, twice if I'm lucky but I am determined to finish what I started slowly but surely. I missed you lot. Please review!

"You love me?" Rowan repeated.

"Yes, very much. I've never been in love before, but if what I feel about you is what I feel then yes, I consider myself to be terribly, terribly in love with you, unfortunately," he added trying to make this light.

"Oh," she said faintly. "Unfortunately?" She wrinkled her nose at that last word. Regulus had to laugh faintly. "You know why I say that, I don't want to come between my brother and you,"

"There is nothing between your brother and I remember?" She said through gritted teeth. "I gave myself time for a reason and that's because I'm not ready or the person I want to be who could be with Sirius. Right now, Sirius is the furthest thing away on mind, stupid git," she chuntered.

"Anyway, I….I just had to tell you. This is the first time I've ever told a woman I'm in love with her so I'm no sure how it's supposed to go or anything…" Regulus was babbling.

Rowan silenced him with a slim finger on his lips. Then she enveloped him in a close embrace and kissed the temple of his forehead, and then his forehead and stepped back from him to survey him. "When did you know?" She asked in a strange voice.

"Know what?"

"That you were in love with me?"

"Well…if I'm being the honest, and I am being honest because I am truly a dead man walking…I've wanted to kiss you ever since we got dressed up and I played the piano for you in the Room of Requirement. You looked so beautiful and at peace and we were in the perfect place and you were sitting so close and I really wanted to but I was afraid to break the spell or accidentally make you angry. But most of all I didn't want to come between you and my brother,"

"Sirius and I weren't even aware of each other's existence in that context, believe me," Rowan corrected.

"But I knew I was really and unfortunately in love with you when the Dark Lord sent me after you to hunt you down and either recruit you, or kill you. That's when I knew I was in love with you. I could not bear the idea of you getting hurt or killed by him or through him. It was the fact that I could not ignore that I would do everything, anything, to protect you from harm, the fact that, I would well, die for you."

"And here you are, dying for me and all of greater humanity!" Rowan grandly swept her arms about.

"I didn't plan on it! It just kind of happened that way anyway, I just had to tell you, that I love you, very, very much, unfortunately," he added giving her a beseechingly look.

"I love you too Regulus, as a mate, as a human, and as something more than as a mate. But not in the same way as I feel about Sirius. If anything I've realized in this fucked up way , is that good and bad are relative concepts and that it's possible to be in love with more than one person at once, you can most definitely be in love with two people at the same time. Which is the predicament that I find myself in."

"You can love two people at the same time?" Regulus was utterly confused.

"Yes, you most certainly can." Rowan solemnly nodded her head. "There's a reason why I never read any of his letters or anything, or gave myself this time and that's because I knew, I knew I was caught in between the both of you and it would not be fair to either one of you if I played pretend so right now, I'd rather be alone and just make the most of my moments with you."

"So what now?"

"I have to let you go now," Rowan said hugging him again.

"That you do…I don't want you to feel like you have to end up alone for the rest of your life….if you want to be Sirius, you should try to fix things up with him, if you want to,"

"Yes that's exactly right, if I want to, and right now, I do not want to," Rowan said mulishly.

"Anyway…I love you and I'm going to miss you and all that blahblahblah," Regulus tried to make light of the serious situation but he was silenced when Rowan suddenly stepped closer and kissed him quietly on the lips.

"Oh," he said faintly.

"A kiss to say good bye," she smiled sadly.

A little silence fell over between them and then Regulus made his bold move and kissed her again, cupping her face in his hand and felt her kissing him back. He kissed her hard and then stepped back and ultimately, let her go.

"What was that for?" She asked still surprised.

"A kiss to say thank you, for everything you've done for me and my life,"

Rowan nodded and then saluted him. "Good bye Regulus,"

"Good bye Rowan…thank you, for everything," and with that Regulus clamored outside the window and with one last look at her, he saluted back at her and she nodded once again.

Rowan waited, one, two, full, minutes before carefully closing the window and standing what seemed suddenly enormous, room of what was soon to be the former of Regulus Black. She felt this overwhelming feeling of apprehension and fear wash over her and she went and curled up on his bed, waiting for inevitable to happen since she had connected their ethos together. With a flick of her finger, she locked the room to the door and then waved an arm around the room to cast a silencing charm around it in case things went to hell and she started screaming her lungs out.

Regulus could smell the salt of the water and hear the sound of crashing waves. A cold breeze blew around him and he shivered. He found himself standing upon a high outcrop of dark rock, the dark water churning and foaming below him. Regulus took a survey of his surroundings and saw a towering cliff standing behind him, a sheer drop, black and faceless. There were a few chunks of rock like the one he and Kreacher were standing on, they looked as if they had broken away from the cliff face at some point. It was the most depressing, bleak, harsh view he had ever seen. The sea and rock were not softened by any tree or sweep of grass or sand.

"So where to now Kreacher?" He asked warily.

Kreacher pointed into the water and Regulus grimaced. Regulus took the plunge as did Kreacher and they swum towards the dark slit in the rock face, Regulus held his wand above his head as best as he could as he said "Lumos" in order to see. The water was frigid he thought he would die of hypothermia.

At least the long swim was over and they came into the fissure of the cave and Regulus sensed that this was the place. It had known magic all over the place.

"Now what?" He asked shivering.

"The entrance is through here," Kreacher said going over the same spot once or twice muttering incantations. Kreacher motioned for Regulus to point his wand at the spot. And somehow it opened.

Rowan felt an unbearable chill surround her in Regulus' room and she dove underneath the covers of his bed to try to ward off the draft. She imagined he must be going somewhere very cold because she was freezing her arse off right now.

She felt pit of anxiety grow bigger and hotter in her stomach as she tried to envision Regulus and Kreacher going on the godforsaken doomsday boat. For half an hour it remained chilly in the room and she felt a little less cold.

A strange sense of detachment overcame her next and she wondered what was going on? Had he reached the cave? Was he near the basin with that awful potion?

Her question was answered by the sudden burning of her mouth and throat and she screamed and screamed and screamed in silence as the pain was so great she crying.

Meanwhile while Rowan was writhing around in agony, Regulus was in his own pain as he dutifully drank the potion in the basin. It tasted terrible and it burned like a motherfucker but still he drank. He drank and saw terrible things in his head, voices in his head screaming, it was a horror film of his worst moments in his life flashing by in his head. He felt like he was going mad but still he drank, and drank until there was nothing but that goddamned gold locket lying innocently at the bottom of at the basin.

"Sonofabitch," he rasped reaching into his pocket to fetch the fake locket. He quickly switched the lockets and then for good measure, he spat on the fake locket. "Take that you dumb motherfucker," he swore. And before his eyes, the basin seemed to fill itself again and he closed his eyes wearily.

He was so thirsty. So, so thirsty. His throat burned and his head was pounding. He was so thirsty.

"Water," he croaked to Kreacher was hovering over him worriedly.

"Master you cannot drink this water, it will kill you!" He cried.

"Regulus is dying now," he rasped already bending down to the dark ominous water. He drank greedily and his head begun to spin even more.

"Master, master! Stop!" Kreacher cried.

"So…thirsty…" Regulus said faintly as he continued to drink from the water and then he saw a rotten, scrabbled terrible looking hand raise from the surface.

Then more of those dead rotten hands came above the surface. Regulus tried to scramble back but the rotten hands grabbed a hold of his left foot and yanked him to the water.

He fought, he thrashed against the inferi as best as he could but he was useless without being able to use his wand and magic, he was too weak, he was half mad, he felt the inferi dragging him deeper and deeper into the depths of the cold, cold, water and he could feel the weight of the water crushing him.

The weight of the water was too much, it was crushing him. He had to get back to the surface…

In vain he tried to swim back to the surface, but he was too submerged underwater and the inferi were all round him grabbing at his limbs, as if trying to tear him apart. He felt himself being dragged deeper and deeper in the to the recesses of the water.

He could not breathe, he could not see, but mostly, he could not breathe. He felt this heaviness in his chest and then, all of a sudden, everything went black as his lungs burst.

Rowan was screaming and howling in pain as she thrashed around the bed, fighting off invisible monsters that she could not see. If felt as if ghosts were trying to tear her limb from limb and it hurt so bad. She was so thirsty but she could not bring herself to reach the pitcher of water beside the bed as she had no energy. Her head ached from the madness she had experienced earlier before the thrashing with the invisible ghosts had begun. Her head ached from the horrors she saw flash before her eyes as she felt the connection when Regulus was drinking that god awful potion from the basin.

She felt something in her chest tighten and then she felt as if she was being suffocated. She tried her best magic to fight off the invisible demons but nothing was working. It was getting harder for her to breathe. She could not breathe. She was loosing sight of the room, everything was going fuzzy and blurred. She felt as if something was crushing her lungs.

"STOP!" she howled in agony as the weight on her chest became even heavier. Of course, no one could hear her screams.

She was struggling for air, struggling against invisible demons and she felt half mad. She felt this strange sensation in her lungs. It felt heavy, as if it was filling up with something.

And then all of a sudden, she collapsed and everything went black.

A/N: Any questions or comments don't hesitate to ask. Please review it would make my day thanks!