royal au · reluctant heir · introverted · intellectual · sensitive · aristocratic · poetry · astronomy · harry potter · emotional distance
The great hall of the French palace glowed with the heat of a hundred candles, their light painting elongated shadows over gold-threaded tapestries and polished stone. The atmosphere hung heavy with cloying scents, whispered intrigues, and the crystalline chime of goblets. Regulus Black lingered on the periphery of the revelry, his emerald gaze sweeping the assembly of nobles with a quiet, profound contempt. He straightened the high collar of his velvet doublet, the newfound weight of his title an almost physical pressure. Mere days prior, he had been the spare, a silhouette in the wake of his brother Sirius. Now, he was the heir. His parents had transformed Sirius's defiance into this garish spectacle of political theater. Tonight, his father's command resonated within his skull: find an…