Chapter Text
Well, this was quite awkward, Regulus thought as he was standing in an almost empty corner of the library he had frequented in the past few days, flying in there and avoiding Riddle.
Almost empty because there was a girl, crying. Regulus was not good with comforting. He had never been comforted in a way that he would have preferred. It was usually a small flicker of a crucio that he got or jokes his friends made to lighten the mood. He however was quite sure that neither of those were viable options for the girl clad in blue robes.
Should he just turn around and go back to his dorm?
He would usually go to the room of requirements at night but Regulus might manage to sneak in that day. No one would question a crow flying around inside of the castle, right?
Just as he was about to turn around and walk off he heard another sob and suddenly the girl started talking.
“What are ya staring at? If you’re going to throw a book at me do it, you coward! Oohhhh or am I too weird for that too now? Waaa! Maybe Hornby set you up to this you meanieee waaa”, and she started crying again. Regulus was taken aback at those words and just tilted his head to the side, looked to his left, then to his right and back.
Was she talking to him? Why would he throw a book at her? He would never hurt a book like that. He also had no idea who she was. If she had been someone’s parent he knew, like Dorcas’ mum he might’ve considered a hex since she tried to marry Cass off to some rich guy she never liked right before Dorcas graduated, even though everyone with functioning eyes could see that the oldest of his friend group fancied girls. Regulus was happy that Dorcas could escape that through the order and disappointing her parents. Her mum was barely in his friends life and his friend managed to live quite happily so Regulus wouldn’t do anything too drastic if he ever got the chance to meet the younger version of Dorcas’ mum.
And who was Hornby? He couldn’t quite remember such a name ever being relevant in his timeline.
This girl however did not carry the same magical signature as anyone he’s ever met before, so he isn’t quite sure as to why she thought he would terrorize her.
Regulus took a seed out of his pocket and transfigured it into a napkin. He froze and after a minute of thinking it over he transfigured some more napkins before stretching his hand out with the napkins.
Maybe acting like Barty would help? He seemed to be popular enough through his personality?
“Girl, I don’t even know you, why would I bully you?” Maybe he should’ve said it with Barty’s usual dramatic and flare, because apparently Regulus’ usual way of speaking seemed to not make whatever has been saddening her any better, it actually got worse.
“I’m not even worth bullying anymore! You said it like you were disgusted with the thought of bullying ME. Waaaa waaa”, the girl continued to cry.
What was this kid’s problem? He was pretty sure she was younger than him at this point. Finally, she looked up so she could see the napkins he’s been holding out for her.
Wait a Circe be damned minute, that was moaning Myrtle! But she was alive?? She looked just like her ghost though, not a day older.
Regulus knew that the ghost died around the same time that his parents went to school, but he never expected to actually walk into her.
“Uh, are you alright?”, Regulus actually tried to sound more empathetic than before, he also cringed at the same time since he figured that saying something like that right after he saw her sob her soul out was probably not a smart idea. Oh well.
“Do I look alright?! Who even are you? I thought everyone from your house already-“, blows her one on a napkin, ”-went back to your family to celebrate with them? Well aside from that tall handsome fella”, she looked down to the side with a blush.
…Regulus was two seconds away from telling her to raise her standards but he bit his tongue.
He understood that Riddle could look like a handsome, charismatic lad more than anyone. He managed to convince most of the pure-blood families to join his cause by the time they exited Hogwarts. Of course some or even multiple people harbored crushes on him, especially since he does look human now, and less like a snake.
“I’m Zwezdochka, Blake Zwezdochka. I’ve arrived around a week ago? I honestly don’t know who you are or who that Hornby person you were talking about is, but if you wanna talk about it I would be doing some reading here so, I probably won’t recall most of it afterwards anyway”, Regulus shrugged, then he sat himself on the ground and bent over his notebook as he started to write.
“Well, you know, there’s this girl and she’s just so mean to me, like, why does she not like my glasses? It’s not like I can change my prescription! She’s such an arse. And I can’t even fight back because she would snitch and nobody likes me so if she would snitch then no one would believe me when I try to explain why I did it! She and the others already make fun of me enough but it got so much worse for a few weeks after the first time I told professor Binns, and now I’m too scared to tell any other teacher about it because I do NOT want to get my face dunked into the toilets again. I usually cry in the bathrooms, imagine if I had to go through multiple weeks where my face would get dunked there! I would never feel safe again to cry there! Ugh, and they usually go home during these holidays but apparently not this timeee, like why? The other girls bullying me aren’t that bad compared to Hornby but they are still so mean! I mean I’m pretty, right? Wait don’t answer that-“
Regulus just tuned out whatever she said afterwards.
Myrtle was going to die in a few months. She was going to die and Regulus knew where she would die, everyone who tried to find some peace in the girls bathroom -aka his whole friend group- knew where she died, because she wouldn’t stop talking about it.
Regulus needs to find out how, why he managed to go back in time just before she died and right on time to see a normal notebook that Riddle was probably going to write in, not have any writing and end up in the Malfoy manner in the future.
Regulus was sure that everything had to be connected.
Somehow…
Regulus gulped… It couldn’t be that Riddle had something to do with that child’s death?
Who was he kidding, he had most definitely some part in it. Regulus was just slightly anxious thinking about the implications of that.
At the age of sixteen? How did nobody even find a trace of Riddle on the case of Myrtle, to the point where not even the ghost herself knew what killed her, since she never mentioned it.
Regulus jotted the theory down. If he was correct that killing Myrtle would’ve been enough of a sacrifice for Riddle to create a horcrux, then he would need to speed up his process on the horcrux hunt and how to destroy the one hanging on his waist.