The silver-white radiance contracted sharply into a blurred sphere of light, then gradually elongated, unfolded, took shape.
Wings spread from either side — every feather wrought of silver light, their edges dusted with starlike motes.
The body condensed into a streamlined form brimming with latent power. The head rose; the beak was keen. Two brighter points of silver burned where eyes should be.
Last, the tail-feathers fanned out — trailing like a cot.
A silver-white bird hovered before Regulus.
Its fra fell between a hawk and a kite. Plumage composed of countless fine slivers of silver that flickered and pulsed like stars with each subtle beat of its wings.
The feather-tips were purest silver-white, refracting the dying sunlight into rainbow haloes.
Its eyes were a luminous silver-grey — uncannily close to Regulus's own — sharp and profoundly deep.
It spread its wings. Without a single flap, it hung motionless in the air, as though gravity had simply let go.
Stardust sifted from its wing-edges. Where the motes landed, shadows lightened for several ters around, as if darkness itself had been swept aside.
Regulus stared at it, an uncanny feeling rising — like looking into a mirror.
A thought surfaced, sudden and certain: this was not sothing he had manufactured. Not a product of incantation and magic.
This had grown from within him. It was the embodint of his innermost desires — a projection of sothing in his very soul.
The Patronus answered the truest longing of one's heart.
'What do I long for?'
Regulus searched himself.
He longed for genuine freedom — but unlike the narrow-minded, he did not crave anarchic license.
He longed for the freedom to choose his own path, unbound by any chain.
He longed for the boundless sky of stars. Longed to break the borders of the physical world. Longed to explore the places others declared unreachable.
He longed for power — so he could protect what he chose to protect, realize what he wished to realize, beco what he aspired to beco.
Every one of those desires was now concentrated in this silver bird.
In the sweep of its wings lay the resolve to shatter every obstacle. In its effortless hover, the unshackled freedom. In the starlight of its eyes, the yearning for a vaster world.
It was Regulus — or rather, the truest, purest part of him.
Regulus didn't know what kind of Patronus this was. He had never seen a bird like it, nor found one in any book.
But he could feel the perfect alignnt between it and himself.
Orion stood three paces back, frozen solid.
He was staring at the silver bird, eyes wide, lips parted, wand nearly slipping from his fingers.
This man — habitually composed, unfailingly cool — had shock and disbelief written across his face.
Several seconds passed before he recovered his voice, and it trembled: "A Starry Sky Kite..."
Regulus turned. "A what?"
"A Starry Sky Kite." Orion repeated, eyes still locked on the bird. "A legendary magical creature. I thought they were long extinct — or purely fictional..."
He took two steps closer, wanting a better look, then hesitated, afraid of startling it.
The Starry Sky Kite turned its head. Silver-grey eyes regarded Orion — calm, without hostility, yet offering no warmth either.
"Only the most fragntary records exist." Orion's voice was steadying, though he spoke faster than usual.
"The Starry Sky Kite appears solely where magic is utterly pure. They feed on starlight. They can pierce through space. In flight, they need not beat their wings — they let space itself carry them.
Their feathers can dispel Dark Magic. Their eyes can see through illusions..."
With every sentence, the resonance in Regulus's chest deepened.
Fed on starlight — just as he practiced star-orbit ditation, guided by the heavens, aspiring to the stars.
Piercing space — and he was studying spatial magic, striving to understand folding and warping.
Flight without wingbeats — his own pursuit was to understand rules, flow with rules, exploit rules.
Dispelling Dark Magic — as he believed: power itself knew no good or evil; what mattered was how and why it was used.
Seeing through illusions — he had always looked past the surface for the substance, refusing to be deceived by false glory or idle threats.
This creature was simply the animal form of himself — or rather, the magical projection of his inner self.
Regulus listened to his father's explanation, and sothing clicked.
He tried an experint — a thought flashing through his mind: 'Go over there and look.'
The Starry Sky Kite understood.
Its form flickered, and it vanished from the spot.
Regulus couldn't even sense where it had gone. The spatial ripple was too faint, too natural — leaving no trace at all.
In the next instant, the Kite appeared a hundred ters away, above the open sea.
There it hovered, the sinking sun behind it, its silver-white figure crisply outlined against the gold.
Then it vanished again. When it reappeared, it was perched on a jutting rock at the far end of the cliff, gazing down at the waves battering the stone.
Another thought: 'Co back.'
The Starry Sky Kite materialized before him — as though it had never left.
It lifted its head. Silver-grey eyes t Regulus's own.
In those eyes lay a depth bordering on sentience — as if it truly understood him, truly shared his mind.
Orion watched, breathing quickening.
He fought to maintain his outward composure, but his fingers were trembling and his cheeks flushed with excitent.
This patriarch — the man who never flinched under the heaviest pressure at the Wizengamot — looked, in this mont, like a child seeing magic for the first ti.
"Dumbledore..." he murmured. "Dumbledore's Patronus is a phoenix..."
Regulus glanced at his father.
"The phoenix is a legendary-tier magical creature." Orion continued, excitent barely suppressed.
"Reborn through fire. Tears that heal. A song that grants courage... Dumbledore's Patronus is a phoenix — everyone said it was a sign he would beco a great wizard."
He looked at Regulus, eyes ablaze with a brilliance his son had never witnessed.
"The Starry Sky Kite... in lore, it stands on the sa tier as the phoenix — perhaps rarer still.
At least people have seen a phoenix. The Starry Sky Kite exists only in the most ancient texts... Regulus, you..."
He was too overco to finish, but the aning was unmistakable.
Regulus, too, would beco a great wizard — great in the truest sense, the kind whose na endures in the annals of magical history.
Orion was already thinking further ahead.
When the day ca for Regulus to step onto the public stage and display his power, should the Black family crest be redesigned?
The twin-stars-and-Sirius emblem had a long history, but it was rather ordinary.
The Starry Sky Kite would suit perfectly — carrying the weight of ancient legend and matching Regulus's essence.
The thought was fleeting — far too early for that. Even so, he desperately wanted to see that day arrive.
Regulus listened, pondering.
The Starry Sky Kite could traverse space the way a phoenix could — and might be even more adept at spatial magic.
But for now he had only managed an initial corporeal Patronus: sustain its form, basic communication. That was all.
Advanced applications of a Patronus were many.
ssage relay. Dentor dispersal. Reconnaissance. Combat support. Each required systematic practice.
And since the Starry Sky Kite possessed spatial abilities, perhaps even more specialized uses could be developed.
Using it to train spatial magic. Sending it through otherwise impassable barriers for intelligence gathering. Having it appear behind an enemy mid-battle.
Perhaps he should find an opportunity to speak with Dumbledore?
When it ca to the Patronus Charm, Dumbledore ranked among the wizarding world's very best — he had surely developed extraordinary applications grounded in the phoenix's nature.
But the chance had to co naturally. Regulus was not Harry Potter; he would not be welcod so readily.
This was different from consulting a professor on a point of knowledge. He couldn't simply knock on the door uninvited.
Still — opportunities would co.
Orion took several deep breaths, forcing himself to cool down.
Excitent was one thing; reality demanded consideration.
He moved to Regulus's side, eyes on the still-hovering Kite, and lowered his voice: "This Patronus... it would be best to keep it hidden for a couple of years."
Regulus looked at his father, waiting for the reasoning — though he already had a fair idea.
"The Patronus Charm is genuinely advanced, genuinely positive white magic." Orion explained. "If you reveal it now, it may clash with the image Voldemort's side expects.
They won't say it outright, but they'll think it: a Black who excels at the Patronus Charm is not one of us."
Regulus nodded. Indeed — everything beautiful was fundantally at odds with Voldemort.
The Death Eaters and Voldemort exalted power, dominion, and fear.
The Patronus Charm stood for guardianship, hope, and positive emotion.
The two were ideologically irreconcilable. He still needed to maneuver within Voldemort's sphere. Exposing this incompatibility too soon would be unwise.
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