We do not look up at the stars to wish. We look up to recognize our reflection." — Ritual Book of House Black, Circa 1402
December 31, 1969, The Roof of Grimmauld Place
In the House of Black, the new year began with blood and starlight.
The roof of Number 12 had been stripped of its usual grime-repelling wards, exposing the slate tiles to the raw, freezing bite of the London wind. Above, the clouds had miraculously parted, or perhaps Arcturus had paid a weather-wizard a hefty sum, leaving the winter sky a canvas of polished obsidian scattered with diamonds.
Vega stood between his brothers. They were dressed in ceremonial robes of silver silk, thin enough that the cold bit through to the bone, reminding them that they were mortal.
"Stop shivering," Walburga hissed from the shadows near the chimney stack. She was wrapped in heavy furs, holding a silver chalice. Orion watched quietly.
"It's freezing, Mother," Sirius whispered out of the side of his mouth, his teeth chattering a rhythmic beat. "My toes are numb. I think they've fallen off."
"Then grow new ones," Vega murmured, keeping his eyes on the horizon. "Grandfather is starting."
Arcturus stood at the edge of the roof, facing north. He held a staff made of Oak, capped with a rough-cut star sapphire. Tonight, with the wind whipping his grey hair and the starlight catching the sharp angles of his face, he looked like a king of old.
"The year dies," Arcturus intoned, his voice deep and resonant, carrying over the wind without the aid of a wand. "The cycle turns. We, the Scions of the Stars, stand beneath our namesakes and ask for clarity."
He turned, raising the staff.
"Vega. Sirius. Regulus. Step forward."
The three brothers stepped onto the ritual circle etched into the lead roofing. The runes glowed faintly with a pale, ghostly light—Purity. Power. Blood.
"The Ritual of the Zenith," Arcturus announced. "We are washing the dust of the old year from your cores and inviting the light of your stars to fill the vessel."
He signaled Walburga.
She stepped forward and poured a liquid from the chalice onto their hands. It was star-water, collected from a high-altitude spring during a meteor shower. It was freezing cold, burning the skin like liquid nitrogen.
"Join hands," Arcturus commanded.
Vega reached out. He took Sirius's left hand and Regulus's right.
Sirius's grip was tight, vibrating with nervous energy. Regulus's hand was cold, his grip soft but steady.
"Close your eyes," Arcturus ordered. "Find the star that names you. Pull it down."
Vega closed his eyes.
He didn't need to search. The Hum in his blood surged upward. It recognized the ritual. It remembered Ming Yue's lesson about the breath and the anchor. He visualized the blue-white fire of Vega, the Harp Star, burning in the Lyra constellation.
Come down, he invited.
He felt the connection snap into place. A beam of cold, heavy magic hit the top of his head, flooding his system with light.
But then, something happened.
Usually, the ritual was solitary. Each wizard connected to their own star. But Vega was holding his brothers' hands. And Vega was a Metamorphmagus whose blood was currently charged with the concept of Change.
The Hum exploded outward. It rushed down his arms, bypassing the skin barrier, and slammed into Sirius and Regulus.
"Vega?" Sirius gasped, his voice tight.
"Don't let go," Vega gritted out, feeling the backlash.
It wasn't just his magic anymore. He felt Sirius, a roaring, crackling bonfire of wild, unrefined power. He felt Regulus, a deep, dark well of quiet, contemplative energy.
The three energies collided in the center of the circle.
A shockwave of pure, silver light erupted from the three brothers. It expanded outward, silent and blinding, washing over the roof, over Arcturus, over Orion and Walburga.
The sensation was indescribable. It felt like he being unmade and put back together with better materials. It was the taste of ozone, the sound of a choir holding a high note, and the feeling of falling upwards.
"Hold it!" Arcturus shouted, his voice sounding far away. "The Resonance! Hold the line!"
Vega squeezed his brothers' hands. He poured his own stability into them, acting as the Anchor Ming Yue had taught him to be.
We are one, Vega projected.
The light flared one last time, a brilliant, blinding flash that turned the London night above Grimmauld Place into high noon for a split second, and then vanished.
x0x0x0x0x0x0x0x00x0x0x0x0x0x0x0
Darkness rushed back in.
Vega gasped, dropping to his knees on the cold lead. His brothers fell with him, all three of them panting, steam rising from their skin in the freezing air.
"What..." Sirius wheezed, rubbing his chest. "What was that? It felt like... like being electrocuted."
"Resonance," Arcturus breathed.
The Patriarch was staring at them. His staff was lowered, and for the first time in Vega's memory, Arcturus Black looked genuinely stunned. Even Walburga was frozen, her hand covering her mouth.
"Look at them," Walburga whispered.
Vega looked at his brothers.
Sirius was blinking rapidly. He looked up at the sky, then at the roof, then at Vega.
"Everything is... stringy," Sirius muttered, squinting.
His eyes had changed. The grey irises were gone. In their place, his eyes glowed with a faint, internal luminescence, a swimming, liquid silver that swirled like mercury.
"I can see the wards," Sirius said, reaching out to touch the empty air. "There are lines. Red lines. And the wind... it looks like blue smoke."
"Mage Sight," Arcturus diagnosed, stepping closer, his face illuminated by the wand-light he hastily cast. "A sensory overflow. The ritual forced his optical nerves to process raw magic."
"And Regulus?" Vega asked, looking at his youngest brother.
Regulus was staring at his hands. He looked terrified.
"My hair," Regulus whispered. "Vega, my hair."
Vega looked.
Regulus's hair, usually the same dark black as the rest of the family, was rippling. It wasn't a trick of the light. From the roots to the tips, the color was shifting, fading into a deep, oceanic blue, then bleaching into white, then darkening back to black. It moved in waves, reacting to his rapid heartbeat.
"A partial metamorphosis," Walburga gasped, rushing forward. She touched Regulus's shifting hair, her face a mixture of horror and awe. "He has the Gift. But... unstable."
"It's not unstable," Vega realized, sensing the magic rolling off Regulus. "It's reactive. He's channelling his emotion through his appearance. He's a sympathetic Metamorphmagus."
Arcturus stood over them, looking from Sirius's glowing eyes to Regulus's changing hair, and finally to Vega, who sat in the center, unchanged but humming with a power that felt denser than lead.
"A Triad," Arcturus murmured. "Three stars in alignment. The Resonance hasn't been seen in this family since the 15th century."
He looked at the sky, where the constellations of Lyra, Canis Major, and Sirius burned bright.
"The magic didn't just purify you," Arcturus said, a fierce pride cutting through his shock. "It marked you. You fed each other."
Sirius blinked, the silver glow in his eyes fading slightly but not disappearing. He looked at the chimney stack.
"Wicked," Regulus whispered, his hair settling into a calm, dark blue as his panic subsided.
Vega stood up, pulling his brothers with him. He felt exhausted, drained, but also incredibly connected. He could still feel them, at the edge of his perception.
"Happy New Year," Vega grinned, wiping star-water from his chin.
"You turned my eyes into flashlights," Sirius complained, though he was grinning too, staring at his own hands with wonder.
"And you turned Regulus into a mood ring," he added.
Arcturus let out a long breath, planting his staff on the roof.
"Inside," he commanded, though his voice was warm. "Before the Ministry detects the magical surge and sends a squad to investigate why Grimmauld Place just turned into a lighthouse."
January 2, 1970
The morning sun struggled through the heavy velvet drapes of the breakfast room, casting long, dusty beams of light across the table. It was a quiet morning, or at least, it would have been if Regulus Black's head wasn't currently cycling through the visible spectrum.
"Pass the marmalade," Regulus asked, reaching for the silver pot.
As his fingers touched the jar, his hair, which had been a calm, midnight blue a moment ago, rippled into a bright, shocking tangerine.
"It matches the toast," Sirius observed, chewing loudly. "Very chic, Reg. Do you turn brown if you eat sausage?"
"Shut up," Regulus mumbled, ducking his head. His hair flushed a deep, embarrassed violet. "I can't control it. It reacts to everything. I sneezed earlier and it turned grey."
Vega sat at the head of the table (Arcturus was taking breakfast in his study, and Walburga was "indisposed" with a migraine brought on by the sheer magical radioactive decay of her children). He watched his youngest brother with amusement.
"It's sympathetic metamorphism, Reg," Vega explained, pouring tea. "You're projecting your sensory input onto your keratin. You taste orange, you become orange. It's actually quite honest. You'll make a terrible poker player."
"I hate it," Regulus groaned, his hair settling into a sullen, murky green.
"I think it's brilliant," Sirius said, leaning over the table. His eyes were still glowing with that faint, liquid silver light, a souvenir from the New Year's ritual. He squinted at the marmalade pot. "Did you know there's a stasis charm on the jam? It looks like a little blue net. And Kreacher put a mild anti-theft hex on the silverware. It's pulsing red."
"Don't look directly at the house wards, Sirius," Vega warned. "Grandfather said it gives you a headache."
"It gives me ideas," Sirius corrected. He looked at the wall behind Vega. "For instance, there's a gap in the wallpaper weaving right there. It's vibrating."
Breakfast was abandoned immediately.
The three brothers stood before the wall in the hallway. To the naked eye, it was just damask wallpaper, peeling slightly at the edges with age.
"It's right here," Sirius said, tracing a seam with his finger. "The magic is... thin. Like threadbare fabric."
"It's a concealment charm," Vega diagnosed, feeling the Hum in his blood prickle. "Old. Probably mid-19th century based on the decay."
"Open it," Regulus whispered, his hair turning a curious, pale blue.
Vega drew his wand. He didn't use a breaking spell. He used a needle-sharp stream of magic to pick the lock of the weave.
"Aperio."
The wallpaper unzipped. A section of the plaster dissolved, revealing a small, dust-choked cavity between the studs.
Inside sat a small wooden box, carved with laughing faces.
"What is it?" Sirius asked, reaching for it.
"Careful," Vega warned, catching his wrist. "Black family heirlooms usually bite."
He cast a detection charm. The box glowed pink—harmless, but mischievous.
"It's a Prank Box," Vega realized, grinning. "Great-Uncle Algernon was famous for them. He used to leave them for the house elves."
Sirius grabbed the box and flipped the latch.
POOF.
There was no explosion. Instead, a swarm of spectral moths erupted from the box. They weren't made of light; they were made of giggles.
As they fluttered around the hallway, landing on the portraits, the stern faces of their ancestors began to twitch.
Phineas Nigellus Black, usually the sourest portrait in the house, suddenly snorted. Then he chuckled. Then he roared with laughter, clutching his painted frame.
"Stop!" Phineas wheezed. "It tickles! Get them off!"
"Catch them!" Regulus shouted, laughing as a moth landed on his nose. His hair exploded into a brilliant, joyous yellow.
Sirius was chasing them, leaping over the antique furniture. "I can see their trails! They leave glitter!"
Vega leaned against the wall, watching the chaos. The gloomy, oppressive hallway of Grimmauld Place was filled with the sound of laughter and the bright, flashing colors of Regulus's hair.
This house, Vega thought, watching Sirius tackle a coat rack, doesn't know what to do with joy. We're going to have to teach it.
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Mwahahahahahahhahaha. Siri and Reggie get some powers!! In the next chapter we're back to Hogwarts!!
Hope you're enjoying!