RAB . . . a mystery that has plagued us since Half Blood Prince is now resolved with finality! Reguls Arcturus Black. What do you think of him now that we know his tale? Do we loathe him? Do we love him? Do we feel he deserved what he got? Talk about your thoughts on Regulus, his relationships, his possible motivations, and his final acts in this thread!

I thought that it was going to be a part of the story that would wait until the end to come to fruition. It seemed to come so sudden and abrupt, in my opinion, and then left as soon as it had arrived in the story. I also thought if Harry had told Voldemort, that it would have enraged him even more. I would like to know if his story was told by Harry so others would know.

I was glad that it was Regulus, as I didn't want to see some completely new character come into that noone could have figured out. However I expected a little more on him, since he's been one of the biggest debates since HBP ended.

I would have liked to have seen a little more of his history. Why he became a death eater, his relationship with Sirius, why he decided to betray Voldemort, why he was the one who volunteered his elf in the first place. There were loads of pure-blood wizarding families who supported Voldemort- why not Lucius volunteer Dobby?

Also people knew that Regulus decided to betray Voldemort and leave the DE. How did they know? In DH, it just had him deciding to go off one day and find the Horcrux- did he know what it was? But why did people think that he'd deserted LV? Was it just because he'd disappeared and people assumed him dead?

I think it's really hard to judge him on so little to go by. Initially in OOTP I thought him a prat, because I loved Sirius. And then when I suspected him to be RAB, I wondered what had happened for him to betray the DEs. I liked the relationship between him and Kreacher, but I don't feel that it explained his character and reasons enough to understand him.

I never gave a hoot about who RAB was. But I suppose I agreed with everyone else, that it was Regulus because no-one could come up with anything more concrete. It sucked the way he died though, kinda lame. But I'm glad he was brave enough to drink the potion himself and not be horrid like LV and make a House Elf drink it.

I'm in agreement PIxy, I'd like to know more about him and his motives, and everything she said in her post. I can't help but wonder why he flopped. We know he wasn't exactly happy with what he was being told to do but I want to know what the turning point was. Perhpas he was told to kill his own brother, that'd be enough for anyone to turn on their leader.

It was good that he came and went so early in the book. I didn't even think of him til he popped up. Then I didn't think of him again until this topic was made. Like I said before, he wasn't that big of a deal for me.

Although I was pretty sure knew RAB was Regulus, deep down I wanted it to be someone else. Still, that's by the by.

I liked Regulus, I liked that he wasn't very old when he changed his mind about what side he was batting for. I think his respect for his house elves was admirable, that he trusted Kreacher the way you may do a friend.

It's very scary that he died the way he did being dragged under by the inferi.



Yes me too!!! Maybe JKR can take this route in her next wizarding book...where's my quill, I need to write a letter!

Hey,

I always thought it was Regulus, ever since i re-read OotP and read about that "heavy locket that nobody could open". What else could it have been? Something so strongly enchanted? And in a house as we know, ruled by the dark arts!

But then, i thought Jo would have made it harder for us to figure out, and would've put it at the end of the book, as a deep mystery...not something Harry could've figured out and found out so much about in such little time.

I hated Regulus, for being a Death Eater...for being against his brother, for being the one that was liked most in the family. But i must admittedly say, what he done was something i would have thought only a true gryffindor could have done, only a true brave person...who loathed voldemort, who wanted revenge. Also, the way he treated Kreacher, compared to Sirius and his Master...was very kind...very very kind for a DE, and beautiful.

I like Regulus now, for what he done, for the way he was killed, because he realised the truth, because he found out about Voldemorts secret, and in the end...it all paid off.

That was really a shock to me. I thought JKR had a better person to come up with, as Regulus seamed to obvious. I thought all the way that it was too ridiculous, but JKR made it seam so right, and I wasn’t disappointed as I was so sure I’d be if it was Regulus. I just still wonder how he could have brain to figure it all out. How did he do? And why, why should Kreacher drink the potion in the cave, when the locked had not yet been placed there? It seams very odd to me.

That is very odd. I always thought LV put the basin there when he put the locket in. Hmmm...perhaps Regulus was taken along when he first visited the cave, otherwise how would he know it was there? He was never painted as a super smart guy.

I didn't want him to die that way though, I felt she should have made him destroy the Horcrux before dying, that would have meant more then him getting the locket then dying. I'm glad he didn't use Kreacher though. Shows he had some love in his heart for the little guy.

Did anyone else tear up as Kreacher explained his story regarding the Locket. It was horrible, horrible what they did to him! I first started to pity him, and then the tears welled up again... perhaps I have a soft spot for the sad sub-servient house-elves. I really cant stand to see him forced to do the Dark Lord's bidding because his Master told him to.



Perhaps it the third person way of speaking, perhaps its the injustice of it all, I do not know. But I do know that it tears at my heart to think that poor Kreacher endured that.

I am glad, and touched, that when Kreacher was to bring Regulus back to the Cave, that Regulus took his own life for the Locket, and spared Kreacher.

I was hoping, however, that RAB would be someone a bit more surprising.

Okay, so here's another theory that I was right about (maybe I should go visit that thread?), but it was a bit anticlimactic as some of you have been noting.

Also what threw me was that nowhere in OOTP the Movie was there any mention of the locket (a big hint in book 5 foreshadowing book 6), or note of Regulus on the Black family tapestry. Because those two things were left COMPLETELY out of movie 5, I was all in a tizzy. What's that about. It did seem to come rather quickly in the book, but that was the first real lead Harry had with the horcruxes.

I like him. I had secretly hoped that he wasn't dead, just under the Draught of Living Death and would return to help Harry destroy the horcruxes and be a stand-in for Sirius. Once Kreacher told his tale I knew that was false hope, but I still like the character.

Voldemort took Kreacher to place the horcrux. He made Kreacher drink the poison. Regulus took Kreacher to replace it, but drank the poison himself. He died rather than torture the elf.

Regulus was Sirius' brother after all. He wasn't just a good "Black" child, doing whatever he could to ensure pureblood superiority; he was brave, he was strong, and he wasn't an evil torturemaster. In some ways he was even better than his brother; Regulus chose to die rather than cause the house-elf some pain (seeing him as human) but Sirius couldn't do that. To Sirius, Kreacher was just an elf.

I was also hoping that he wouldn't be dead. When Kreacher said that he had been pulled under by the Inferi I thought that maybe we'd be lucky and he would come back during some part of the book.
I was sort of surprised to see that Regulus as really a good person and would have rather drank the potion himself that torture someone else. Sort of like what Dumbledore did.
I always thought that he was RAB...but as we got closer to the release I was sort of afraid that it was all a large and elaborate red herring.
But I did like the story when Kreacher told it. It was like we got an insight into Regulus' life, and what kind of person he was.
Overall, I was pleased with the result to the question we had been wondering all this time.

I feel that Regulus and his finding of the horcrux was slightly short lived in the plot of the final book, the fact that voldemort actualy never found out that one of his Deatheaters had helped in the destruction of one of his horcrux's kind of underminds of how important we once thought R.A.B. to be.
Don't get me wrong it was because of Regulus's discovery and his action against it that Harry managed to gain the friendship of Kreacher which played its part in different ways; and eventualy the destrution of the horcrux.
I suppose it did play a big part but not in the explosive twisting plot i once thought it to be...I think maybe because the initials R.A.B. were related closely to Dumbledore's death (Harry finding the letter inside the locket for the first time on Dumbledore's limp body) I thought it would have immense importance but I guess not...not that it wasn't important I just found it something of a false lead, not that i was unhappy, I was extreamly happy with how the final book panned out no matter what happened.

Personally I thought RAB was far too short lived. The note inside the locket left for LV stated he was going to find the others and destroy them, (from what I can remember) yet he must have known that he would have died revealing that one, making it an empty threat?
His death was noble yes, but more than slightly infuriating.

As for some more discussion on the locket, was I the only one who thought the speaking Parslemouth (sp? My apologies if so) to open it was far too easy and convenient.

One should judge a man not based upon how he treats his equals, but rather how he treats his inferiors.

Based upon this, Regulus should be heralded as a great and noble soul. Despite his Slytherin background and his initial Death Eater leanings, he drank the potion and perished rather than force it upon his loyal elf.

His part in the Deathly Hallows was perhaps one of the saddest in the entire book--perhaps the entire series.

Se gap lai nhe.

I have to agree with most on here that Regulus' part was way to short lived. I was a strong supporter that RAB was Regulus, but I was wrong in his role. I thought he would have taken the DoLD and be back among the living to help Harry discover the truth of the locket. I didn't think he would help with the other horcruxes or anything, just the locket.

I was also surprised to find out that he drank the potion instead of Kreacher. My theory was that he made Kreacher drink it. I was touched and teary when I read that scene. I was moved and wished that Kreacher could have apparated him out of there before being taken by the inferi. But unfortunantely it wasn't meant to be.

After all the build-up and theorizing I did up to this point about RAB and DH, I almost feel foolish for thinking too deeply into it. Oh well, I'm glad that Harry was able to win Kreacher over with the fake locket and that they were able to join forces. Regulus would have been proud.

I was really glad that RAB was Regulus because if it wasnt every fan would be very put off. I really liked the role he played because it was every so pertinent to the turn around of Kreacher which was so important in the plot. I don't fully understand why one day he decided to retrieve the horcrux but I am already re-reading so maybe I will see it this time.

I suspected he was RAB all along. I think he turned out to be a good guy who got in to far (jumped before looking type of thing). He fixed it in the end.

RAB being Regulus I thought it was him but sort of didn't at the same time. It was the only option to me but it seemed too obvious. He was on the wrong side in the beginning but much like Albus Dumbledore to me. He was wrong in the first part, but he did the right thing in the end. He gave his life to help take down Tom/LV just like Albus, Severus, Lupin Harry was about to do and many others.

Since HBP and the locket with RAB I thought, just like most people, that it was young Regulus and I really was kinda hoping that he would be alive. Alas he is not but I a really big fan of his none the less. I was so please that he ended up being a hero and doing something so noble.

I would really like to know how he found out about the horcrux to beginning with though

Well i think the thing that made Regulus turn his back on Voldemort was what voldermort did to kreacher, because i think that Regulus actually considered kreacher a friend. Thats also why i think that regulus didnt make kreacher drink the potion. In all i liked his way of thinking.

I can't say that I didn't predict it. I as good as knew that it was Regulus Arcturus Black. I think it was very cruel that Voldemort used Kreacher to drink the liquid in the cave so that Voldemort could put his locket in there.

I got at least something right. RAB being Regulus. I was surpirsed to find out he did not make it out of the cave. That was a very unexpected twist to the story. I wonder when Harry tried the summoning charm for the locket, was it Regulus he came out of the lake?
I still leaves a question how did he know about the horocrux.

Another thing that I do not understand, Kreacher went with LV and was left for dead. Why is it in OotP, when Kreacher is used to get Harry to the MoM that, that LV does not connect the dots to him still being alive. And we have this read harring that he was killed by the DEs? Makes one wonder what/who might have been working against LV that long ago.

Also DD probed Kreachers mind, did he see what happened back in OotP. Did DD already now that the locket was a fake before embarking on the trip with Harry to the cave. Alas maybe that is best left for another thread.

Voldemort left Kreacher for dead on the island, without bothering about him any further. Kreacher was expected to die there and take Voldemort's secret with him. But he hadn't counted on elf magic (he was probably too contemptuous of it) and it was elf magic that allowed Kreacher to Apparate back to the Black house when he was called by his masters. Regulus was probably the only one of them who cared enough for him to ask why he was so ill. Maybe it was even Voldemort's abuse of Kreacher that made Regulus decide to leave the Death Eaters.


The only explanation I have of that is that Voldemort thought house-elves so far beneath him that he wouldn't recognize any individual ones. He might have thought the Blacks got another one to replace Kreacher.


I'm not sure where it says that exactly. Sirius said "you just don't leave the Death Eaters", and that Regulus probably wasn't important enough to be killed by Voldemort personally.


I am sure that Dumbledore would not have gone to the cave if he had known the Horcrux had gone! He did mention that it was a distasteful experience to delve in Kreacher's mind. Perhaps he didn't care to probe it further than he had to in order to get what he wanted to know.

I have been wondering about Regulus for quit a while. Well ever since HBP. When Slughorn told Harry that he wanted Regulus in his Slug-club (or whatever the name was) I wanted to know more about him. Until then we only knew what sirius said about his brother. I was pleased to read his story- it made me cry.
As for how Regulus found out about the horcruxes I'm not sure what to say. But didn't Sirius say he got to deep into LV and what he found then scared him? (that's somewhere in book 5) Maybe Regulus did find out that LV made horcruxes and that's what scared him. Who knows (well JKR does ).

Regulas Black seems like a very human character that many people could relate to.he gave in to the pressures of his family and became a death eater, even though he probably did many awful things he did the brave thing and turned against voldemort even though it cost him his life.And about where he found out about horcruxes he was a Black.A family whose decendents have been in slytherin for generations.I think it's very possible for him to have learned about it at home(maybe even sirius knew about them)

Yes, we love him - he went the Slytherin, pure-blood way to protect his family from dark wizards, and turned against Voldemort, attacking his Horcruxes. Bravery that matches what Snape did, I say.

it was far too short lived and gave the impression that Harry was just stupid.

I mean, if the reader can work it out the instant they saw the initials in HBP, then why on earth couldn't Harry ...

Maybe it was because I read the book so fast, but everything seemed rushed in the book ... in an attempt to get it all finished. Too much was missing ...

Well, we just looked for anybody who could possibly be R.A.B., so we thought of Regulas Black - we just assumed it may be someone we already know [about].


Look at it from Harry's perspective, though - who knows how many millions of wizards lived since the Horcrux was taken by R.A.B. - it could have been anybody from Harry's perspective. While the reader expected it to be somebody we'd already met, to Harry it could have been anybody.

Regulus was really nice. He was trying to protect his family. I felt bad for him because Sirius didn't know why he really died. He called him an "idiot" for joining the DE.I don't get why he didn't make kreacher drink the potion. He drank it before and he's still alive. Couldn't Regulus just cure him by bringing him to snape?HE didn't have to die..

I wouldhave thought that RAB would have been some new charatcter instead of Regulus, since it wa so obvious that it would be him, but oh well.

I think that Regulus was very brave in doing what he did. Not very many people - or Deatheaters - would do something like that to LV. He could make a good Gryffindor if he wasn't all Slytherin-ny and pureblood-ish.

From the first prediction I read that Regulus (somthing at the time) Black was RAB I belived that it was true, who else would it have been, some unknown character JK just intorduced ? Nah, that didn't seem likely.

Now that we know Regulus Arcturus Black's story I think that him and Sirius we're alike in many ways that they just didn't relize at the time ; they both had pride in what they each belived in, they both ended up having a loving vitality and both we're wrongly judged and accusted because of their blood-status and untrue facts.

I thought that the way after Voldemort treated Kreacher, how Regulus's opion changed, was very good.. though how he could have ever wanted to join Voldemort in the first place is beyond me, I guess he heard about all the crimes but when it was actually commited on someone, or somthing in that matter that he cared about he realized that it was wrong.

I was really disappointed with RAB being really rushed...there was all this speculation and argument about who it was and it had a smaller part than i wanted. I knew it would be Regulus, but i really wished it could have been someone else. I thought he was really brave though and a great character in the way that he drank the potion the second time and didnt make Kreacher do it.

Well, so Regulus turned out to be better than Sirius thought. Still, at first he with his parents and with all the pure-blood mania and he was a fan of Voldemort! He didn't really think for himself, like Sirius said. Though I guess it would've been hard -with that mother!
He loved his family and what he did for Kreacher was really ...unusual, I'd say. He certainly was brave. He was only 17 and that change -well, I'd have loved to get to know the 'new Regulus'.
I thought that Kreacher could have grapped Regulus and apparated out of the cave, but I guess Regulus was aware in what a delicate situation he was. He had discovered his master's greatest and best kept secret! He had decided to work against him. He hoped that someone would eventually conquer the Dark Lord. I don't think he was very accomplished at Occlumency -Voldemort would have known everything in an instant! Regulus didn't want to work for LV any more. That fact alone would have cost him his life. As soon as he would have backed out he would have been dead...
He was really brave, it's a pity he didn't realise those things earlier -would have been a good Griffindor! His poor parents! lol

I thought it was weird how Harry had spent so much time at Grimmauld Place in the summer before his 5th year at Hogwarts and he never noticed the sign on Regulus's door. Or even Hermione, it seems like she would remember that kind of stuff. I always thought that Regulus was RAB, it would have been too much trouble for JKR to make a whole new character. I think it was dumb of Regulus to believe the pure blood superiority thing and join the Death Eaters, but he redeemed himself by trying to destroy one of Voldemort's horcruxes. It turns out someone in Sirius's family turned out to be half-decent.

they did'nt noticed the name because they were so busy in cleaning up other rooms and as harry has said in kreacher's tale he had never entered sirius's room in his previous stay, and regulus's room was facing his brother's. so even with hermione's memory, they wouldn't remember the r.a.b., because she and harry had not come across that name, they didn't even reach the topmost area where the two rooms are located.

Yep, i was pretty surprised at how it was Sirius's brother...And how Harry had found the room was pretty straightforward!

But anyway, the tale of kreacher was especially sad to read after what Voldemort had put Regulus and Kreacher through. Would anyone reading this think that Regulus deserved to die? I definitely think that he shouldn't have! But if I had read about his history, I wouldn't have thought on what I think now, because what he did for Kreacher was very brave...

Lucky the Kreacher survived!!! x0x

Reply if you want!

hmm... I always like all Sirius's family, but when i read 7th book i changed my mind. So, I don't like Andromeda, but Regulus (after 7th book) is my favourite character! He's very good person. I think he has many good points and I very like him (hmmm... i think that he is my ideal). He love his family, he wasn't stupid (well sirius didn't speak truth in 5th book). I think that he is R.A.B. after i read "half-blood prince", but when i read his tale i cried, really. He was very good man and ... in my opinion he is a hero. I very like himself. OH! and he like elfs! this is good idea!!!

I definitely don't think that Regulus deserved to die! It was really dumb of him to get into all that pureblood-mania and join up with the Death Eaters, but he realized his mistake and did a good job of fixing it! He also must have been a good person because he could have easily made Kreacher drink the potion and not have died, but he did it instead. He definitely had the courage of a Gryffindor on that one!

well I have to say the moment I saw R.A.B in the book it made click...I contemplated bout the families in the plot whose name starts with B and the first thought was obviously Black...and coming to Regulus he was the only one I could remember of the Blacks with an R and the A I thought was maybe from his Uncle...(I forgot his name it was mentioned at the time Regulus' was ) so I thought he had his name as his second one...never doubted that and when other people started to say the same I kind of felt confirmed

and to Season :
dearest well that IS actually the point in Regulus..he didnt even want Kreacher to suffer as he was a family member for him and he rathed died than letting him suffer again

I have been thinking about this every since I read DH. The way Regulus was presented to us was of a young kid who got caught up with the Death Eaters. We know that he wasn't killed the way Sirius thought, but at the same time he was still a kid when he died.

It just seems kind of a stretch to believe that after he hears Kreacher's story of the locket that he knows what it is and figures out something that perhaps only DD could figure out (with Kreacher's help). With all the pains that JKR went through to show that almost no person or book discussed Horcruxes, all of a sudden Regulus knows exactly what is going on and he is some kid too far over his head.

I just felt that it was a bit choppy and not a lot of help for the reader to make that jump. It difficult to ascetain just really how mature this 17 year old was.

I completely agree with you ericcantona7.

The note from Regulus to Voldemort shown in the 6th book said, 'It was I who discovered your secret.'

After reading the 6th book, I thought that the events which led to Regulus 'discovering' Voldemort's secret would be given much more importance in the 7th book. Instead, Rowling wraps up the plot point in a pretty pathetic way, squashing it into tiny paragraph, saying that, after only a few months of Voldemort's visit to the cave with Kreacher to place his horcrux, Regulus comes home disturbed, takes Kreacher with him to the cave, gives Kreacher instructions to switch the lockets, drinks the potion, and sacrifices himself leaving poor Kreacher to finish the mission.

It just seemed so easy compared to what Dumbledore and Harry had to do. It took them both so much hard work to discover the secret of Voldemort's horcruxes in the 6th book, with an entire chapter devoted to the part when Harry has to worm out the 'missing link' from Slughorn, and Dumbledore travelling far and wide all over the British Isles (probably even abroad) searching for clues, including visits to Hokey, Morfin and Mrs. Cole, and arranging the various pieces of jigsaw together.

From all this, it seems that Regulus came to know about Voldemort's secret by purely blind luck. It could have happened probably because Voldemort was stupid enough to mutter about it in his sleep, and since Regulus didn't have a private connection to Voldemort's mind like Harry, there's no way he couldn't have seen a vision of it in his mind, like Harry did to determine the location of Ravenclaw's diadem.

This makes us assume what Regulus must have been EXTREMELY intelligent and cunning to uncover the secret. But he still didn't seem to have the brains to use fire as a weapon in the cave to save himself, like Dumbledore did, and worse, he didn't even try to put up a fight against the brainless zombies. Even though I agree that self sacrifice wouldn't have been a bad option in that situation, considering the fact that even if he escaped from the cave, he would have been killed later on by Voldemort anyway for ditching the Death Eaters. But still, it would have been loads better if he had tried to live longer in order to locate more horcruxes and destroy as many as he could. After all, his dying words were -

'I face death in the hope that when you meet your match, you will be mortal once more.'

P.S. - It would have been a piece of cake for Milla Jovovich to fetch the horcrux from the cave.

Just thought I'd throw this at you. It's from the transcript of JKR's web chat at the end of July.

Voldemort never told anyone about his horcruxes, so how on earth did regulus black discover his secret

J.K. Rowling: Horcrux magic was not Voldemort's own invention; as is established in the story, other wizards had done it, though never gone as far as to make six. Voldemort dropped oblique hints; in his arrogance, he did not believe anybody would be clever enough to understand them. (He does so in the graveyard of Little Hangleton, in front of Harry). He did this before Regulus and Regulus guessed, correctly, what it was that made Voldemort so convinced he could not die.

Thought that might help clear up any questions surrounding 'how did Regulus know'.

well it seems that regulus was an extremely clever and skilled wizard then..and after what kreacher had told him he defintely felt right then and therefore he acted...and you know he is also a black..a family which is as their name tells us...dark and secretetive and there a lot of them into the dark arts and well...regulus has definetly heard of somebody who did a hocrux then...(being in this family now wonder) and well he guessed right as he heard LV talk...and he probably thought that it was the only hocrux so he hoped that his death wasnt for free...and it was not actually
smart boy he was

HA! I KNEW IT!
Ok, now that that's out of my system, I just want to know why Regulus turned against Voldemort when he was so eager to join up with him?
Was it that he realized his wrong, or did he just have some sort of weird pschyco wake-up in his head?
-Just Another Muggle-

That mey be something to do with culture, he learned all his life to reverence pure blood more than anything else in life, he grew up with a family that was as we saw with Sirius's mother portrait, that hated the way wizzarding comunity was turning to not giving privileges to the pure blood families, not in law not in treatment, that was Regulus culture backgrownd, and he saw the way Sirius got into truble all the time with his family by not following that culture line. So I think that was his reason to get into the death eaters group, but when he saw what Voldemort was doing his bravery, and good heart to those he loved Kreacher for one, he could finally judge right and clearly, I don't think Regulus would ever thought about a broken sould as a good way to get power or inmortality.

This actually didnt suprise me
i knew it was going to be someone we already knew or was introduced to the story even if it was jus vaguely.
JK wouldnt have brought in a brand new character just for the sake of that locket.
She used the excellent technique of showing Regulus' character differently and that he was a power hungry boy who just wanted to be a death eater to please his family.
So the shock of what he was actually like when Kreacher spills all is what shocks the reader not the fact of who it is.
Thats just my opinion but im sure many of you have others