"An interesting challenge," Ollivander murmured, leaning forwards across his shop counter.
Regulus smiled. He would rather be seen in the light of an interesting challenge than pitied for the years and life he had missed. "But one that you think you can meet?" he asked.
"Yes, of course," Ollivander replied, confidence apparently not dented by the fact that every wand he'd tried out of over a hundred had rejected Regulus. "I may have to craft you a custom wand, but this will work, never fear!" He turned around and bent down behind the counter, standing up with a large device in his arms that Regulus blinked at.
It was a crystalline wheel, with bright silver spokes and small boxes fastened to the ends of the spokes. The boxes appeared to be made of different kinds of wood. Regulus watched as Ollivander touched his own wand to the center of the wheel and it began to spark and spin.
"Look into the wheel, and you should experience your magic pulling you towards one particular kind of wood," Ollivander said in a slow, sonorous voice. "From that, I will make your wand."
"Is this a form of Divination?" Regulus obediently looked into the center of the wheel instead of rolling his eyes the way he wanted to.
"Of a sort. My own invention."
From the sound of it, Regulus wouldn't get more than that. And he could feel Narcissa already radiating disapproval—something she was very good at—from behind him. He leaned a little closer, staring at the wheel, and fell into silence.
It didn't take long before he realized that one of the spokes was dancing with bright sparks, pointing straight at a wooden box revolving too quickly for him to catch more than a glimpse of it. Regulus reached slowly out, only then discovering that Ollivander hadn't told him what to do when he felt the pull.
It seemed it didn't matter. The spoke he'd been looking at came detached from the wheel and extended towards him. Regulus found himself holding a small box of a wood he didn't recognize.
"Holly," Ollivander declared. The wheel had already stopped spinning, and he was storing it behind the counter again. "An inspired choice, if I may say so. One of your cousins wields a wand made of holly."
Regulus blinked. "I would have thought the associations too positive for me."
"Every association with a wand is positive," Ollivander told him firmly. "You need not fear, Mr. Black."
"I wasn't afraid," Regulus began, but stopped when Narcissa put her hand on his arm.
"I will craft a wand of this holly wood with a phoenix feather core, in a likeness of the one that your cousin has." Ollivander held out his hand with the box of holly wood and stared at it with glowing, almost fanatical eyes. "I promise you, it will be such a wand as you have never had."
Regulus shoved aside the temptation to say that he'd only had one wand before, and asked, "You don't need me to choose a phoenix feather the way I chose the wood?"
"No. I know how to craft this wand."
Regulus hesitated, then shrugged. Ollivander was the expert. And it was true that he needed a wand that worked true to his hand to confront Sirius.
His brother was older and might have all sorts of magic learned from the Aurors that Regulus didn't know about. On the other hand, he'd also spent more than a decade in Azkaban and didn't seem to have recovered from that, and now a Horcrux was possessing his mind.
And Regulus had taken to the Dark Arts lessons that their parents had offered them in a way that Sirius never had.
It would be a hard fight. But with a new wand in hand—the kind that Ollivander's eyes seemed to hint at as he stared at the holly wood box—and some rest and recovery and training, Regulus thought he could win.
Draco walked at Henry's side as they made their way towards Transfiguration. McGonagall had said that she wanted Henry to come early so that he could practice the spell they were doing today and not burn desks or smash them to splinters, and Draco was coming along to make sure that he reached his destination in one piece.
Abruptly he stopped and turned his head back and forth. Henry stopped with him, one hand clutching his wand.
"Draco?" he breathed. He knew that since the ritual, Draco's protectiveness made him more alert for threats.
Mother and Father had said that the effect would fade in time. Frankly, Draco hoped it didn't. It had already helped him win a few impromptu duels that had started because people seemed to think Henry was public property.
Just because most of the protectiveness was focused on Henry didn't mean all of it was.
"There's something nearby," Draco said, and shook his wand into his hand. He didn't say that he couldn't tell the direction or nature of the threat. That hadn't happened since the ritual, and it made him more than uneasy.
Henry backed up a step. Draco mimicked him, and their backs ended up pressing against each other's.
Henry glanced over his shoulder and caught Draco's eye. Draco nodded. Right now, it felt as if they had that kind of silent communication the Weasley twins always seemed to exhibit.
"Ready," Henry said softly.
....
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