Leaving by 
ficexchange
Merry Christmas, Salome (vituperat)!
Leaving
It's nightfall and Regulus stands in the middle of his room, watching as the shadows swallow his childhood memories. In the twilight, the green and silver looks sombre, and it calms him.
He knows he won't return to see the dawn. The thought does not scare him. He never expected to survive. With that strange passion that only teenagers can truly feel, he has stuck newspaper cuttings to his walls and dreamed of dying for the cause. And he will. It still fills him with the mad pride it did four years ago. It is the cause that changed, not him.
Carefully he runs his finger over the image of a green skull on yellowed paper and feels a soft twinge somewhere on his left forearm.
For days he has been pondering about his past and planning others' future. His first thoughts when he held the sobbing elf in his arms were regrets for his foolishness. He is past that stage. The darker his room gets, the lighter he feels. All his actions make perfect sense to him at this moment, and he no longer regrets what he has done – or will do. Of course his reasoning has been wrong, misguided and plainly stupid at times. But in the end, if he hadn’t joined and cursed himself into the Inner Circle, he could never do what he will do now. He will contribute more to the Dark Lord’s fall than Sirius can ever dream of. When he looks at the coat of arms over the bed, there's still a gleam of pride in his grey eyes. Even in betrayal he remains the better Black.
Kreacher has helped him paint the picture. The elf has always liked him, and he has always been fond of Kreacher, in the same way that he was fond of the broom he holds in his hands on the picture of the Slytherin Quidditch team. The truth is that he probably would not have cared much if anything had happened to Kreacher if he had not become a Death Eater. Strange, that.
It was no secret that he joined, but nevertheless, his secrets multiplied tenfold. He couldn’t tell his parents that there was little glory involved in torturing small children. He couldn’t tell Bella that he threw up at night. He couldn’t reveal his weakness to his roommates at Hogwarts. He suddenly found it hard to look Lucius into the eyes and stared at his shiny boots instead, boots that he knew had waded through blood just hours previously. The thought of telling Cissy about the things her husband and sister and cousin did in their spare time over a cup of tea sent him into fits of choked laughter. Over the course of two years, his faith in the Dark Lord did not waiver, but he found that he was less strong than he had expected. He told himself that the killings were necessary, that the humiliation was indispensable if those Muggles and Mudbloods were to learn their lesson, but he wished there was a less messy road to their noble end.
And so Kreacher became the one who held his hair back when he was retching over the toilet and listened when he tried to explain. And when the nightmares started, the elf moved a blanket from the kitchen cupboard to the foot of Regulus’ bed without an order and without a comment.
Now he takes up the blanket and folds it. Carefully, he places it on the green and silver plaid and runs his hands over it, recognizing the familiar texture. Suddenly the shabby piece of cloth seems the only meaningful item in a strange room, and he realises that he has changed, after all. He still remembers holding the shaking elf so tightly that he could feel Kreacher’s heart hammering madly against his ribcage, here in this very room, on this very bed. It was a bright day, and he and Kreacher sat in a pool of sunshine as his mind cleared. That day, he made a judgement, and a choice.
Outside, the last feeble specks of light have died. The room is dark, but he finds his way to the door with ease. He has often had to creep out in the middle of the night in the past years.
He closes the door gently when he leaves and enters the torch-lit corridor. There’s the little self-important sign - Do Not Enter Without the Express Permission of Regulus Arcturus Black - and Regulus can’t help to feel reminded of the little self-important good-bye message to the Dark Lord he carries in his pocket. I want you to know that it was I who discovered your secret.
Kreacher will be miserable when dawn comes, but Regulus sees no way to prevent that. Somebody has to make a sacrifice, and he will not use a puppet, as the Dark Lord did. He will take his chance to make a grand gesture, no matter that in all likelihood nobody will ever know. Kreacher will be miserable, but at least he’ll be safe.
He knows the elf will not fail. He is a Black house-elf from the tips of his pointed ears to his gnarled toes, and the Blacks have always made a point of being purer, better, more thorough. No, Regulus knows that Kreacher will see the locket destroyed if it’s the last thing he does.
No need to worry, then. He casts a last look at the closed door before he goes down to Kreacher and asks him to take him into the Dark Lord's secret shrine. Kreacher’s hand trembles when he takes it, and Regulus squeezes it gently before they disappear with a crack.