Regulus felt his limbs returning, and he could move. The charm had worn off after a few minutes.
He turned quickly and noticed his friend, Allan lying on the ground as if his arms and legs were bound by invisible ropes. Nearby was he. A person he had watched a lot since arriving at Hogwarts.
Regulus for a moment forgot about Allan's betrayal and stared at the jet-haired boy, who was still wearing a blank expression.
'James Potter... My brother's best friend,' Regulus thought with a slight frown.
His older brother was always telling him about the Potter boy, and he had quite the reputation at school. Especially after humiliating a Lestrange in front of everyone and then being the seeker of the Gryffindor quidditch team.
When Regulus noticed James' gaze on him, he gripped his wand tighter. He noticed that James' aura was very different. Whenever he watched him with Sirius and his other friends, he always had a relaxed aura and a friendly smile.
Now his gaze was stoic and icy, 'He looks more like a Slytherin...' Regulus thought swallowing saliva.
"You're Sirius' brother, right?" asked James, though he already knew the answer.
"Yes," replied Regulus, surprising himself at how easily he answered. He didn't like James Potter. He thought he was partly to blame for why everyone considered his older brother a disgrace.
"Wingardium Leviosa," James said, pointing it at Allan, who began to float, though what floated was his robes. He threw it without much consideration near Regulus, who looked on blankly.
"Ask your friend why he betrayed you after he made you work like a laborer to decipher the enigma," James said and stood quietly waiting.
'Does he know about the enigma? How? Besides, he seems to know that I was the one who solved it,' Regulus thought in alarm.
How long had they been watched by James? At first, she thought James just happened to see them and followed them, not that he had started watching them for days from the shadows. The thought of it was kind of scary.
"Regulus isn't what it seems..." said Allan with a chagrined expression.
"Not what it seems?" repeated Regulus as his anger grew. Although he was curious as to how James had followed them for so long, he had saved him, and thanks to that his memories were unchanged.
"Why were you in such a hurry to get back when we finally found the entrance? We've been looking for it for a long time," Regulus asked.
"I doubt you wanted to go back by yourself later to keep the treasures. You don't have the ability," he added tactlessly.
"It's not that..." muttered Allan, not daring to look up and make eye contact with Regulus.
"Come on, talk," Regulus said impatiently after a few seconds of silence. Allan, however, remained silent.
"Go on, tell him," said James, fiddling with his wand nonchalantly.
"Tell what?" asked Allan, looking up and looking at James. Making eye contact, he thought James knew everything. It was ridiculous, wasn't it? But it gave him that feeling.
"Your relationship with Eustace Burke. The DADA professor. He gave you the two old scrolls and gave you a one-week time limit. That's why you were so anxious these last few days," said James.
"What!? How do you know so much?" asked Allan fearfully. James didn't answer. He won't tell him that he overheard them while returning from completing his daily routine late at night.
He'd better think he had all the information in the palm of his hand.
"The bald guy who crapped himself? You told me the scrolls were an old family heirloom," Regulus said, looking at Allan with narrowed eyes.
"I lied... I'm sorry," Allan said, embarrassed.
"So, you used me while you were following the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor's orders. Why?"
"I can't tell you," said Allan stubbornly.
"Are you sure about that? I can erase your memories, and you won't know how to get to the vault entrance. Tomorrow, when you join Eustace, you won't have accomplished his task. What will you do now?" said James with a faint smile.
Allan opened his mouth to say something, but no words came out. They had him trapped. If James did this he wouldn't be able to complete the assignment the professor gave him.
"Well... What do you want to know?" asked Allan in surrender.
"What information did Professor Eustace give you about the vault? Besides giving you the two scrolls," asked James beginning his interrogation. He didn't care about the personal problems between Regulus and Allan.
He was to find out Eustace's objective and more detailed information about the vault.
"Not much. He only told me that there was a riddle in the scrolls that I had to uncover to get to a vault that held ancient treasures," Allan replied.
"You don't know anything else?" said James, a little disappointed.
"No, just that."
"Your task was just to solve the riddle and find the entrance to the vault, right?" asked James, and Allan nodded.
'After he knows the location, Eustace will come and take care of entering the vault to take all the treasures. Just that? Maybe inside the vault, there is something useful,' James thought.
"Why doesn't he look for the entrance on his own?" asked James.
"I don't know. He didn't tell me. He just gave me the order."
'What a pointless interrogation,' thought James, clicking his tongue slightly.
"Why did you follow his orders? What did he threaten you with?" asked James.
"He..." said Allan with his eyes glistening. It looked like a tear would escape him at any moment.
"Come on, don't be so dramatic. Just spit it out," James said impatiently. He had an ice knight to defeat.
"He threatened to poison my grandmother, who is in St Mungo's Hospital," replied Allan.
"Your grandmother Isabel?" asked Regulus with surprise, and Allan nodded. His anger subsided as he learned this.
"A deadly poison?" asked James.
"Yes..." replied Allan.
It was important to James to emphasize that it is deadly, "You believed him that easily?" he asked again.
"He told me he has a colleague at the hospital. I couldn't risk it. Please let me go! I just have to tell the professor the location, and my grandmother will be safe," implored Allan.
'Why didn't he send a letter to a family member...? Or put a trusted nurse to attend to his grandmother so he doesn't poison her... He doesn't have Ravenclaw qualities either,' thought James, looking at Allan like he was an idiot.
The Abbot's belonged to the Sacred Twenty-Eight and had power and money. Enough to take good care of an old woman and not have her food poisoned.
One thing that struck James as odd was that as he watched Allan these days, he could tell he wasn't a very bright kid by any stretch of the imagination. Professor Eustace should have noticed that too.
Why did he give him such a complicated assignment? When he wasn't smart. There's no way he could have figured out the riddle on his own.
'He most likely knows that Allan is friends with Regulus, and Regulus is smart,' James thought. Threatening Regulus wouldn't have been as easy as Allan.
He had already wasted too much time. He pointed his wand at Allan, and as he was about to cast an Obliviate Regulus stepped in the way and held out his arms.
"What are you doing? Move," said James.
"No! You won't hurt him!" said Regulus. He knew he didn't stand a chance against James in a magical duel.
James saved him because he was his best friend's younger brother. He won't hurt him, right? That was Regulus' thought.
"Depulso!" said James without hesitation.
A flash of light hit Regulus and sent him flying away from Allan. He rolled on the ground and ate a lot of snow.
Depulso was a spell that moved the target away from the caster. It could send a target to a specific location. Its only function was to push. Different from Flipendo besides sending you flying away you felt a strong hit in your chest.
"What are you going to do...?" asked Allan with fear, looking at James as if he was a serial killer.
'I'm not going to kill you,' thought James, rolling his eyes.
"Relax. I'll just erase some of your memories and create some new ones,' replied James with a smile that gave Allan chills.
First, he cast a Desmaius to knock Allan unconscious. Then, he went to work erasing memories and creating new ones.
He cast an Obliviate and erased all of his memories since James made an appearance. He also erased the memory of when Allan asked Regulus to come back to prepare better, and the Black boy refused.
It created a new memory for him. In which Regulus told him yes. It was better to go back and prepare better. This way, Allan didn't have to attack Regulus, and all went well or so he would think.
The spell to create false memories was different from Obliviate, but James had mastered it as well. You implanted a false memory into the victim's mind, without them realizing that the memory wasn't originally theirs.
"Job done," said James, satisfied with his work. Allan was still sleeping on the floor.
"Why are you erasing his memories?" asked Regulus, approaching James. His robes were all wrinkled, with dirt and a bit of snow on them. However, he didn't have the heart to complain. He didn't want his memories erased.
"This idiot if he goes back to Professor Eustace, it will be impossible for me to fool him. The bald man will find out that I was here, and I don't want that. As for you, he most likely already knows you solved the riddle. There's no way this guy could have solved it," James explained.
"Yes. Allan isn't very clever by any stretch of the imagination," Regulus said with a grimace. That's why he befriended Allan in the first place. He wasn't your typical arrogant, spoiled, pureblood boy who only knew how to talk about his family.
"Now, you will have to act. For Allan, you agreed to better prepare yourself to later enter the vault. With that, his mission will be completed to perfection, and he will be able to tell Eustace about it. And your granny will be safe," said James with a grimace.
"I see. What will you do?" asked Regulus warily.
"Go into the vault of course," replied James.
"But that way when Eustace sees the vault open and the treasures gone he'll blame Allan. And his grandmother may be in danger," said Regulus.
" He will have no reason to blame him. For Allan, they both decided to leave and not enter the vault. No matter how much you question him you won't be able to find anything, and it would be irrational for him to blame him," said James.
'And I doubt his grandmother is in danger...' thought James, though he didn't say so. The only evidence Eustace gave Allan was his word that a possible colleague was in the hospital and that this possible colleague might poison Isabel Abbot. A witch belonging to a powerful family.
The odds of this being true were low for James, though there was always the possibility that Eustace was telling the truth.
"I understand. After spying on us and taking advantage of our work you'll take all the treasures, right?"
James smiled slightly, "Not quite. You can come in with me. We'll split the treasures." he said without giving it much thought.
He didn't have high expectations on this. Mainly because of Eustace Burke's background having a connection to a store selling antiques and obscure objects.
If there are objects related to the dark arts in this vault, James is not interested in them. He could study them at best, but nothing more. He was more interested in fighting the ice knight and whatever was inside the vault.
At last, he would find a worthy opponent. If this knight was the only defense of the vault he would be very disappointed.
"Really?" asked Regulus in surprise.
"Yes. Now wake your friend and return to your common rooms. Then pick up the path and come back here. I'll wait for you," said James as with a disillusioning spell, he hid in the surroundings of the icy walls. Taking on the exact color and texture, as if he were a chameleon.
'That's the way it followed us?' thought Regulus.
With the counter spell of the stun charm, Regulus woke up Allan who was very confused. He gave him the excuse that he passed out and Allan thought it was because of all the anxiety and tiredness of the last few days that he slept little and badly.
Luckily his friend agreed to leave the entrance to the vault, and they didn't argue. Tomorrow, he could pass the information on to Professor Eustace.