OOC: misc background information
*The wand, for starters: alder, eight and a half inches, phoenix feather core. Wood choice based on information here.
*Regulus is left-handed, despite his mother's best efforts to the contrary. And while being able to write with his right hand is very useful in a world that relies so heavily on wet ink, wands aren't fooled so easily by schooling someone out of instinct.
This has caused him no end of frustration in the wand-based end of things; he mostly held his own the first year or two of school because it wouldn't have been proper for his parents not to bring in tutors earlier, thus giving him more time to reconfigure the gestures in his head and get them workable. Charms is somewhat better, as Flitwick knows well enough to demonstrate both angles. Other than that... Regulus will stick to things less rooted in wand work, thanks.
*Speaking of that, his electives are arithmancy and divination. (Muggle Studies was... the opposite of an option, Sirius had leapt at the other two, and Regulus was more genuinely interested in what he picked anyway.) Divination, at least at the moment, is not the easy pass the Trio knows and... knows. Professor Device puts far more emphasis on interpreting prophecies, since that part's much easier for most people to get the hang of than actually making predictions. at the same time, though, if you don't present at least two interpretations of something - or three to five, if it's really obtuse - you're marked down.
He's going for NEWTs in both, though he has yet to work out what to do with what he knows in order to pass the time until he pulls in that looming inheritance.
*And about that... even though Sirius has been disowned, Regulus still wouldn't put it past his mother to kill him if he goes beyond her view of acceptable behavior. (Well, if she finds out about said, anyway.) After all, he's got cousins who are just as zealous as his parents. Due to recent changes in his thought process, as well as those that are likely to come, toeing the line will involve a lot of agreeing to their faces and then getting the hell out of the room.