Archive of Our Own ^beta

The room smelled sterile, and James hated it.

He hated the fluorescent lighting overhead, the polite hum of cooling charms in the corners, the faint notes of antiseptic and ink and something vaguely citrus trying to cover the real scent of heartbreak hanging in the air.

Regulus sat beside him on the padded exam table, one hand resting lightly on James’ thigh. He was dressed too nicely for something like this — deep navy robes pressed flat and elegant, silver clasps at the cuffs, hair tucked back behind his ears in the way he only did when he needed to feel in control.

James could smell the effort it took to keep himself composed. Not stress. Not even fear. Just… effort. Like Regulus had drawn his entire being into a single tight knot of control and handed it to James to hold, as though his own body might betray him if he let go.

The Healer cleared her throat softly. "I'm very sorry," she said again, gentler this time. "There’s scarring in the uterus, some of it quite old. Possibly from a poorly treated illness in childhood. The damage appears irreversible."

James didn’t mean to dig his fingers into Regulus’ hand, but he did. And Regulus didn’t flinch. He just… nodded.

“I understand,” Regulus said, with a coolness James recognized like muscle memory — the way Regulus had always sounded around people he didn’t trust, people who had power over him.

There was a pause. The Healer, a warm-eyed woman who looked like she’d rather be anywhere else than breaking this news, offered carefully, “There are still options, of course. Carriers. Surrogacy, if you choose. Adoption—”

“We weren’t sure we wanted children anyway,” Regulus said, smoothly. “It’s hardly an issue.”

James felt the words like a slap. Not because they were untrue — they’d only just started talking about it seriously — but because he knew Regulus. Knew that voice. Knew how easy it was for him to say something convincing while crumbling inside.

He looked down at Regulus, but Regulus wouldn’t meet his gaze. His eyes were fixed on a framed botanical print on the wall across from them. Neatly painted hellebore, labeled in gold ink.

They walked out of the clinic in silence. James’ hand rested at the small of Regulus’ back, his touch light, instinctive. He could feel the tension humming through him. Not like a snapped string — no, this was worse. This was quiet. Tight. Contained.

When they Apparated home, Regulus didn’t cry. He didn’t break. He simply set the kettle on the stove with a casual flick of his wand and asked James how he wanted his tea.

Like nothing had happened at all.

---

James knew something was wrong the moment Regulus stopped scenting his pillow.

The first night back from the clinic, James had crawled into bed after brushing his teeth to find the sheets cold and untouched. Regulus had already climbed in — reading something slim and sharp-edged, a volume with silver runes etched into the spine — but the pillows were pristine. Not a trace of his scent layered over James’.

It hit him like a body blow.

He didn't say anything, though. Just kissed Regulus on the temple and murmured something like you alright, love?, and Regulus — without looking up from his book — said, “Of course.”

Of course.

And maybe that would've been believable if Regulus hadn’t then fallen asleep facing the far wall, back curled just enough to keep James from slipping an arm around him.

---

The next morning, James woke to an empty bed again. No note on the pillow, no smell of breakfast in the air — just silence, thick and heavy and wrong. He found Regulus in the sunroom, curled into the corner of the loveseat with a blanket tucked around his legs and a steaming cup of something herbal resting beside him. The scent of it curled sharp through the air — ginger and fennel, something to soothe the stomach.

“I didn’t want to wake you,” Regulus said, without looking up.

“You didn’t.”

A beat.

“I’m fine, Jamie,” Regulus added, too quickly. “Just thinking.”

James sat beside him anyway, close enough that their thighs touched. Regulus didn’t lean into it. Didn’t tilt his head the way he always did when he wanted James to kiss his crown. His scent, normally so rich with warmth and citrus and soft nesting things, was thinned out to something faint and brittle.

Like burnt sugar.

Like grief.

---

By the third day, James knew he wasn’t imagining it.

Regulus didn’t hum anymore. He didn’t run his fingers absently through James’ curls when they sat on the sofa. He didn’t nuzzle into James’ chest at night or press a kiss to the inside of his wrist just to feel his heartbeat.

He made tea. He folded laundry. He answered questions with perfect composure. And he was wrong.

James tried, gently at first.

“You’re quiet,” he said one afternoon, reaching out to touch Regulus’ hand where it rested on the arm of the chair. “You sure you’re okay?”

Regulus smiled — that soft, distant kind of smile that never reached his eyes. “I’m just tired. There’s nothing wrong.”

But James could smell it. The sorrow had a weight to it now, clinging to the walls like damp. Sometimes, he’d catch Regulus staring out the window for minutes at a time, unmoving, as though waiting for something to appear that never would.

And when James tried to scent him — just a quiet brush of nose to neck, a comforting pass of pheromones — Regulus flinched. Not visibly. Not in any way most people would’ve noticed. But James felt the way his mate’s muscles locked for the barest second.

It made his throat close.

---

By the fifth day, James couldn’t take it anymore.

They were in the kitchen — Regulus rinsing out a tea strainer, sleeves pushed to his elbows, hair messily braided back — when James came up behind him and wrapped both arms around his waist, pulling him close.

Regulus froze.

Just for a second.

Then he melted into the hold, but it was deliberate. Performed. Like he was giving James something out of politeness.

“Reggie,” James murmured, burying his face in the crook of his neck. “Talk to me.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

“There is,” James insisted softly. “I can smell it on you. You’re not fine.”

Regulus went still again. Not tense — just empty.

“You said it yourself,” he said, voice too calm. “We weren’t even sure we wanted children.”

“That doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to grieve.”

“I’m not grieving.”

James pulled back, just enough to look him in the face. “You don’t have to lie to me.”

“I’m not,” Regulus said, and it wasn’t angry. It wasn’t anything. It was flat.

That scared James more than anything else.

---

That night, James lay awake long after Regulus had curled up beside him.

He watched the ceiling, listened to the soft breathing beside him, and kept his nose pressed to Regulus’ shoulder. The scent was still wrong. Still muted. There was no comfort in it, no warmth. Just the distant trace of salt — the kind of scent omegas gave off when they were grieving in silence.

He thought of something Regulus had said to him once, whispered into his hair in the safety of their nest after a long, vulnerable talk:

“She told me… my mother… that omegas who can’t bear children are dead weight. That an Alpha would never keep one. That there’s no point.”

James had kissed those words off his lips, told him fuck your mother and her beliefs, and Regulus had smiled. He’d smiled.

But now?

Now Regulus was silent, hurting, and hiding it all behind polished calm — and James didn’t know how to pull him back from that place.

He didn’t know how to reach him without breaking him.

---

James woke to cold sheets.

It was the kind of thing he might’ve missed on any other night—a subconscious shift in temperature, the faintest disturbance in scent. But tonight, it lodged in his chest like a shard of glass. He rolled toward Regulus’ side of the bed, reaching instinctively, only to find emptiness. No warmth. No weight.

James sat up, heart beginning to race. The bedroom was silent, still wrapped in the darkness before dawn. No creak of floorboards, no running water, no soft rustle of a blanket being pulled tighter. Regulus wasn’t in bed. That wasn’t unusual, not exactly. He sometimes wandered when his thoughts got too loud. But the bond between them ached with something unfamiliar.

It felt like a snapped thread.

James threw off the blankets and padded out of the room.

"Reggie?" he called softly, checking the kitchen. Empty.

The sunroom. The library. The laundry. The den.

Nothing.

Each room was colder than the last, quiet in the way only heartbreak could make a home feel. And James could smell it now, faint and sharp in the air—grief clinging to the corners like smoke. It grew stronger as he climbed the stairs again, heading toward the guest bathroom. Not their shared one. Not the one they used together every morning, with the too many toothbrushes and half-finished bottles of lavender shampoo.

The guest bath. The one Regulus only used when he wanted to disappear.

The door was ajar. The light was off. But he could hear it—the low, steady stream of water hitting porcelain. Too steady. Too long.

James pushed the door open fully.

What he saw turned his stomach.

Regulus was curled in the farthest corner of the shower, knees pulled tight to his chest, head buried in his arms. Water streamed over him from the still-running showerhead, icy and relentless. He was naked, pale skin blotched red from the cold. His braid had come undone, hair hanging limp and dark against his back.

He was shaking.

Not trembling—shaking, violently, his shoulders hitching with every breath. And the sounds…

Soft, muffled, shattered. He was sobbing into his knees, great heaving gasps that didn’t even sound human. Just raw grief. Pain.

James moved before he could think.

He crossed the room in three strides, yanked the curtain aside, and turned off the water. The silence that followed was deafening.

"Reggie," he breathed, falling to his knees just outside the tub. "Reggie, baby, what are you doing, what—"

Regulus looked up.

And James almost broke.

His mate’s face was blotchy, eyes red-rimmed and swollen. His lips were trembling. His scent hit James like a physical blow—salt and despair and fear.

Not of James. But of loss.

"Please… don’… don’ go," Regulus choked out, voice so small and broken it was barely more than breath. He crawled toward James on shaking hands and knees, still drenched, still sobbing. "Didn’ mean to—I just—’m sorry, I… I couldn’t—I can’t…"

James was already reaching for him, already pulling him into his arms, grabbing the towel and wrapping it around him with trembling hands.

"Shhh, love, no, no… You don’t have to be sorry, baby, it’s okay, I’ve got you…"

Regulus collapsed against him, body limp and soaked, curling into James’ lap like a child. He clung to James’ shirt with wet, trembling fingers and sobbed into the crook of his neck, desperate and breathless. The towel clung to his damp skin, barely containing the shivers.

"You’re not going anywhere," James whispered fiercely, wrapping both arms around him and rocking him gently. "I’m here. I’m right here."

"Can’t—can’t give you—" Regulus gasped between sobs, the words broken, barely formed. "Can’t give y’… pack… kids… I—‘m not—‘m not right, Jamie—can’t…"

James squeezed his eyes shut, throat burning.

"You are *not* broken."

"’S all I was s’posed to… all I was meant for… They said, always said… and now…"

"Stop," James said, firm but gentle, threading his fingers through Regulus’ soaked hair. "Stop. I want *you*. I chose *you*. Do you hear me? No child, no expectation, no outdated pureblood bullshit changes that."

Regulus was still sobbing, face pressed to James’ neck, soaking his shirt through. "Hurts," he whispered. "Hurts so much."

"I know, baby. I know. I’m so sorry you’re hurting. But we’re going to get through this together. You don’t have to carry it alone."

He rocked them gently, whispering soft things into Regulus’ hair, words he couldn’t even remember a second later. Just sound and comfort and love.

Regulus clung tighter.

It felt like hours before his sobs quieted, before the shaking eased. His fingers never loosened their grip. James stayed on the bathroom floor, cradling his mate, heart shattered and whole all at once.

He would stay there all night if that’s what Regulus needed.

He would never leave.

---

James didn’t remember falling asleep.

One moment he’d been holding Regulus on the bathroom floor, wrapped tight in a towel and in his arms, and the next—light was slanting in through the window, soft and golden. It crept across the tiles and pooled around them like a blessing neither of them had asked for.

Regulus hadn’t moved.

He was still curled in James’ lap, head tucked beneath his chin, one hand clenched tightly in the fabric of James’ shirt. The towel had slipped a little, barely holding on around his waist, his skin cold but no longer trembling. His breathing had evened out sometime in the early hours, but his scent still clung to the room—salt-heavy and bruised.

James exhaled slowly.

The pain in his legs didn’t matter. The ache in his back, the stiffness in his arms—none of it mattered. Regulus had finally stopped crying.

But he hadn’t let go.

James didn’t want to move. He didn’t want to do anything that might disturb him. But he couldn’t let him sleep naked on the tile floor, not after the night he’d had.

So he moved carefully.

He eased Regulus back just enough to slip one arm under his knees and the other around his shoulders. He stood slowly, cradling him close, trying not to jostle him too much.

Regulus stirred.

“Jamie?” It was barely a whisper.

“I’m here, love. Just taking you to rinse off.”

Regulus didn’t respond. His face pressed closer to James’ neck.

James carried him down the hall, past the sun-soaked bedroom and into the bathroom they actually used, the one with all their things. He sat Regulus gently on the closed toilet seat and turned the water on warm.

“Just a quick rinse,” he murmured, crouching in front of him. “You’ll feel better.”

Regulus nodded numbly.

James helped him out of the towel, kissed his forehead, and guided him into the shower.

Then he stripped off his own clothes and stepped in behind him.

The water was warm, steam curling around them. James reached for the shampoo and poured a small amount into his palm.

“Close your eyes,” he said gently.

Regulus obeyed.

James worked his fingers through Regulus’ hair with slow, careful motions. He massaged the shampoo into his scalp, rinsed it out, and followed it with conditioner. Then he moved down, soaping a washcloth and running it gently over Regulus’ skin—his shoulders, his arms, down his back.

Regulus leaned into him, silent, letting himself be cared for.

When they were both rinsed and clean, James turned the water off and reached for a towel. He wrapped Regulus in it first, drying him gently, then stepped out and toweled off himself before scooping Regulus back into his arms.

He dressed Regulus in one of James’ oversized shirts—soft, worn-in cotton that hung past his thighs. Regulus didn’t protest. He just let James maneuver him like a doll, pliant and silent, his eyes glassy and distant.

It made James want to scream.

Back in bed, James pulled the blankets over them both and gathered Regulus close again. He tucked him into his chest like he could keep the grief out by sheer force of will.

“Do you want to talk?” he asked, hours later, when the sun was high and the silence had begun to ache.

Regulus didn’t answer.

He didn’t need to.

The scent of heartbreak still clung to him like second skin. But this time, it wasn’t sharp. It wasn’t fresh. It was duller now, aching instead of bleeding.

James pressed his lips to the top of Regulus’ head.

“You’r

e allowed to grieve,” he said softly. “But don’t think for a second that I’ve changed my mind about you.”

Regulus turned his face into James’ chest.

“I know,” he whispered.

James smiled, even if it hurt.

They had a long road ahead of them.

But at least they were walking it together.