Disclaimer: I, regrettably, did not write Harry Potter. It would have been difficult to publish books while I was under the age of twelve, after all.

Author's Note: Written for xThePaintedLady, courtesy of the Gift-Giving Extravaganza 2013. I really hope you enjoy it!

Marlene McKinnon wasn't used to keeping secrets.

She had always considered herself very honest and open. Too honest, according to Alice; Marlene never hesitated giving her opinion - no matter how controversial - or sharing extremely personal stories. She was a bold, brash young woman, and she was perfectly content with that.

She had started having to keep secrets when she joined the Order of the Phoenix, because everything Order-related was considered extremely classified, but for a while, she had still let herself be very open about her personal life.

And then she had met Regulus Black.

It had started at the Leaky Cauldron, when they both happened to be at the bar, having a couple of drinks. They had talked for a while, being the only two young-ish patrons without a companion, and it had only continued from there as she saw him around again and again.

Regulus was quite a few years younger, fresh out of Hogwarts. Marlene was pushing mid-twenties, and sometimes she felt old and crotchety next to him; he still lived with his parents, and he had his moments of acting like a teenage boy - of laughing at stupid inappropriate things and ogling girls who couldn't be more than fifteen or sixteen. On the whole, though, he was relatively mature - certainly more so than James and Sirius, at any rate, and they were a couple of years older than him.

She couldn't tell anybody about their relationship. How could she? Not only was he Sirius's brother - which would have been all levels of awkward - but he was a Death Eater. He was also the youngest ever Death Eater to be admitted into their ranks, which really wasn't a good thing. He knew that she was opposed to the Death Eaters, just as she knew he was one, but it never went beyond that. Neither one of them talked about their respective positions - and so Marlene felt as though she wasn't doing anything terribly wrong.

Wrong, yes, but it surely would have been far worse if she had been sharing important Order secrets.

They always met up at night. Less people were out at night these days, and in the dimness and shadows, it would have been more difficult to be recognized anyway. They often met at Diagon Alley somewhere, in the little dead-ends between two shops; sometimes they would go somewhere else, like Marlene's flat or the Leaky Cauldron, but on the nights with better weather, they sometimes just stayed there, talking and kissing. Regulus made her feel young again - like a carefree teenager, sneaking around behind everyone's backs, rebelling against everything. It was a freeing, blissful feeling.

Marlene leaned against the outside wall of the building. Regulus had asked her to meet him here at eleven o'clock; it was now getting close to eleven-thirty, which was odd. He was usually punctual - and when he was late, it was never more than five or ten minutes, which Marlene barely even considered to be 'late'. He couldn't be angry at her, either. They had ended on a good note last time they saw one another, and his owl message had been completely normal. There was absolutely no reason why he wouldn't show up.

Part of her hated that she was still there, anxiously waiting for him - like a lovesick little girl. She was a nearly twenty-five-year-old woman, a talented Order member, an adult. And yet here she was, waiting for an eighteen-year-old boy to show up, even though it was a half hour past the time they had agreed to meet.

Another part of her worried. Why wouldn't Regulus be there? If he wasn't angry - and she was almost entirely certain that he wasn't, since there was no current reason why he would be - then that meant something else had happened. Something had interfered with their date - and in this world, 'something' was almost always assumed to be bad.

It crept close to midnight, and Marlene finally Disapparated, going back to her flat. She let herself up and stepped inside, flopping down onto her sofa. She knew it would be smart to go to sleep - after a couple years in the Order, she had learned that it was a good idea to get some sleep whenever possible, because you never knew when your next chance to rest would be. Right now, though, she knew she would never be able to get to sleep - not with her mind wandering so much, wondering about Regulus.

After a couple of minutes, she heard a knock at the door.

For a moment, she just laid there on the couch, frozen. Someone at the door at midnight was definitely not a good thing - but then, on the other hand, if it really was a Death Eater, why would they knock?

She pulled out her wand and held it ready, standing as far away from the door as she could, opening it with just her fingertips. She had a quick moment of wondering if it was a Muggle - and how she would explain the ten-inch-long stick in her hand - but as soon as she opened the door, she knew that she didn't have to worry about explaining.

It was Regulus.

Marlene inhaled sharply. "You look like hell," she said bluntly, half-dragging him through the doorway and kicking the door shut behind them, locking it with a flick of her wand.

"Tha-" Regulus coughed. "That's 'cause I w-was put through hell," he mumbled, collapsing onto Marlene's couch. His eyes were half-closed, and he had a few shallow cuts in a few different places, all of them new and angry red. He had a bruise on his right cheek, fresh-looking and dark. From the looks of him, he had other injuries too - maybe ones that couldn't be seen.

"I'm going to get you some water and Pain-killing Potion," Marlene said. "I'll be right back."

She headed into the kitchen and filled a glass of water from the faucet, and then headed into the loo. She kept a good supply of potions on hand - another thing the Order had taught her. There had been too many times that she had come home after a mission, exhausted and injured. Much easier to have most anything on hand. She pulled a vial of Pain-killing Potion out of the cupboard and brought that out to Regulus as well. He drank down the potion, and then drained the glass of water. "What happened to you?" she asked.

"I screwed up on, er, a mission for the Death Eaters," he said. "Not badly enough to be killed, but badly enough to get punished for my mistake."

"You're one of them!" Marlene felt outraged on his behalf. She had known, in the back of her mind, that the Death Eaters weren't shy about punishing their own, but it was different to know such a fact and to see it firsthand. The very idea of punishing their own members was ridiculous to Marlene - a reprimand was understandable, and a lesson on what to do in whatever situation had been screwed up - that was almost absolutely necessary. But torturing? That was unthinkable.

"Doesn't matter." Regulus tried to adjust his position on the couch, but winced at the first movement.

"Damn them," Marlene hissed.

The corner of Regulus's mouth quirked up in a slight smile. "Look at you, getting all defensive over a Death Eater."

In any other instance, Marlene would have told him to shut up, but it felt wrong to say something like that to him when he was in this state. The Pain-killing Potion had only seemed to help slightly, which was odd - there were only a few instances when it didn't work. Marlene's brain connected the dots. "Have you - did they use the Cruciatus Curse on you?"

"It's their favorite."

Marlene swore again. "That's freaking ridiculous. They can't -" She cut herself off. They could - and they would. It wasn't as though a Death Eater would report another Death Eater to the Aurors for torturing them - the very idea was ridiculous. They could get away with it, because they knew that they would never turn each other in, no matter what was done to them. It was coldly clever. "I'm so sorry, Regulus," she said instead. "You can stay here as long as you need to. Here." She flicked her wand at him, and he rose into the air; she carefully brought him into her bedroom and laid him down on the large bed. He managed to get himself under the covers, and Marlene dressed herself into pajamas and joined him.

"It's okay that I'm here?" Regulus asked. "No Order members are going to burst in here at seven in the morning and find me?"

Marlene laughed. "Believe me, if anyone came barging it at seven in the morning, they probably wouldn't make it out of here alive. I promise, you'll be safe here with me."

She could see the pain in his eyes, but despite that, he smiled at her. "Thanks for everything."

They tried to stay up talking for a little while, but Marlene could see that Regulus was starting to drift off and doze; the potion did have a side effect of drowsiness, which would have only added to the exhaustion Regulus must have been feeling. She didn't want to keep him up any longer, not after what he'd been through, and she flicked out the lights, whispering, "Good night." Quietly, she added, "Love you," unsure if Regulus could even hear her.

It might have been just her brain letting her hear what she wanted, but as she, too, drifted off to sleep, she was sure she could hear Regulus's voice whispering, "Love you, too."