Perfect Mate - Chapter 2
Chapter 2.
29th July
Draco Malfoy was not having a good holiday. No, that wasn’t exactly true; Draco Malfoy was not having a good summer. His problems had started on the second of June, two weeks before the leaving feast at Hogwarts. Yes, the second of June which just so happened to be his sixteenth birthday, the day he came into his inheritance.
“And what a stupid inheritance it is,” Draco grumbled, lying flat on his back throwing a snitch sized ball up in the air and then catching it again. “I couldn’t be Vampyre like Uncle Sev or a Fae like my mother. No I had to be a. Bloody. Stupid. Veela.” With each word he threw the ball harder, until it was bouncing off the ceiling. “Only beings in the world that have a soul mate and die without them or their acceptance. Oh, sure Vampyres don’t like being without their mate, look at Sev, but hell, it’s better than dying. And Fae, Fae don’t even have mates, they steal others’ and…” ‘No! Stop thinking about mates,’ he mentally shouted at himself, but it was too late. He curled into a ball on his side as he tried to stop the tears that started to flow as he felt the full force of the yawing pit of emptiness in his heart that he was trying so hard to ignore. It had gotten worse as the summer continued.
“Oh Draco,” his father said from the doorway. He sat on the bed, back against the headboard and gathered his son into his arms. “How does it feel?” Now the majority of the wizarding world would have been shocked to see a Malfoy acknowledging emotion, let alone acting on it, but the fact remained that Lucius - like Draco - was a Veela, and an emotional creature. It was, however, never displayed in public. After all, the Malfoy image must be upheld.
“Empty, so bloody empty,” Draco whispered into his father’s shoulder.
“Your mate’s not yet sixteen. Don’t worry, they will be soon; a Veela is never more than two months older or younger than their mate. No more than four days until you feel them, Draco, and then it’s just a month ‘til you see them,” Lucius said as he began rocking Draco back and forth. They knew Draco’s mate attended Hogwarts. Draco had complained that all he could smell in the castle was chocolate, a sure sign the Veela was close to his underage mate. Come the first day of school they would find his mate.
Yes, they. After returning from a three week business trip, securing a steady stream of potion ingredients from South America to his businesses in England, Lucius had discovered his name being dragged through mud (among other unsavoury substances) by the Daily Prophet, Malfoy assets seized and his own son believing him to be in Azkaban. It had taken nearly a week to sort out, with Avery’s (who through the use of the polyjuice potion had pretended to be Lucius) name being added to the court documents, his assets released with interest and a front page apology from the Daily Prophet. Pressing his advantage (and when wouldn’t he), Lucius had demanded that the minister show the public that he still trusted him. With very little effort on his part Lucius was granted the DADA position at Hogwarts, all the better to help his son and the new mate.
As a teacher, he was given a suite of rooms and it was a simple enough matter to convince Dumbledore to add extra rooms for Draco and his mate. This would mean Draco would have time to convince his mate to bond in private, not in the hustle of the school like he had been forced to do.
While Lucius had been musing, Draco had fallen into a restless sleep, so he kissed him lightly and slipped out of the room. Pausing at the door Lucius prayed to whoever was listening that his son’s mate would turn sixteen soon. He couldn’t stand seeing him like this for much longer.
***
31st July (2:14am)
{Draco’s bedroom}
Draco awoke suddenly to a feeling of intense joy. The hole in his heart was filled, his mate was alive, they were of age, they were…hurt?
“Father!” Draco cried in distress, as he threw off his bedcovers. His father had taken to sleeping next door and was in the room in seconds.
“Draco? What is it? What’s wrong?”
“My mate’s hurt. I can feel it. They’re in pain. We need to get them. NOW!” Lucius’ eyebrow lost itself in his hairline; at this stage of the bond, when they’d not even touched physically as mates; it was practically unheard of for an empathic connection to form. Draco’s mate was extremely magically powerful.
“Slow down, concentrate for me. How does it feel now?” He asked a hand on each of Draco’s shoulders.
“It’s gone now, it was just a flash.” Draco lay down on the bed and sorted through his feelings. “All I know is that I need to find them,” he pondered for a second, “but it’s not as bad as it was just a few seconds ago.” He looked at his father to find him nodding in agreement.
“A natural reaction for a dominant, whose submissive is in pain, is to get to them as quickly as possible. You can no longer feel them so you don’t know if they’re still hurting, therefore it’s just your Veela instincts talking now.”
“So you think I’m dominant?” inside he was crowing with delight, as a male Veela he had had a fifty-fifty chance of being the submissive in the relationship and the thought of being pregnant was not appealing to him.
“Judging by that reaction, I’d say definitely.”
“So, I’m looking for a girl as a mate?” Mentally Draco began to list and go through all the females at Hogwarts close to his age.
“Or one of the many, many male magical beings who can bear young. Don’t try to hard Draco. When you smell them you’ll know.”
“Follow the instincts. I know, father.”
“Get some rest; we’ll discus this in the morning.”
With a nod to his father he returned under the covers. Waiting until he’d left the room Draco placed a hand to his heart, where he could feel the difference. He slept, content in the knowledge that somewhere his mate was out there, waiting for him.
***
{Sun Room} (8am)
Draco entered the sun room where they took breakfast, not surprised to see his father calmly eating and his mother nursing a hangover. Summoning a house elf he ordered his breakfast and took his seat to the right of Lucius. They ate in silence. Only after he had finished his croissant and picked up his tea, did Draco turn to his father.
“Father, I believe my mate to be hurt.” Draco stated calmly. His father merely raised an eyebrow, his cold, indifferent mask in place…after all Narcissa had long ago gone from ‘family’ to ‘public’. “I do not think it would be wise for me to confront them on the train in that frame of mind.” He continued.
“And what would you suggest?” Lucius’ tone was as calm and indifferent as his mask.
“I propose, father, that you allow me to accompany you when you leave to take up the Defence post. Thus I will be at school prior to their arrival and will be able to determine who they are as they arrive at the welcoming feast. Then it just becomes a matter of informing the headmaster.”
“You think it wise to involve Albus?”
“Sadly, it will probably be necessary. If they are Slytherin then we will be able to go through Professor Snape, otherwise we will require the headmaster to explain it so the student in question will be able to trust that we are being honest with them.”
“Very well,” Lucius nodded, “You shall accompany me, and I will inform Albus of the arrangements this evening. We will depart in two weeks. Is their anything that you require?”
“Yes, father, I do believe so. I received my O.W.L results this morning and…” He stopped as his mother rose and made her way out of the room. As she shut the door behind her, Lucius’ eyes calmly darted around the room (quite a trick if you can manage it). After ascertaining that they were indeed alone, he turned to his son, who had a bright grin on his face.
“I take it you did well then?”
“Passed everything and got outstanding in both the theoretical and practical aspects of potions.”
“Well, Severus will be pleased. He won’t have to lower his standards and allow anyone in.” Lucius smiled.
“You say that like Uncle Sev would have let me in with anything less. You forget, his list goes Potions, Family, Everything else, Hair care.” Lucius laughed aloud at his son’s snide comment.
“I’ll give you that.” He paused. “What I can never get is why you insist on referring to the man as ‘Uncle’. He’s your godfather, not a blood relative. Why the only purebloods further away in blood terms than the Snapes are the Potters. Goodness knows that we’re closer to the Weasleys than Sev.”
“That’s hardly the point father and you know it.” Draco frowned in concentration.
“Don’t do that Draco, you’ll get lines, just ask the question.”
“You said the Potters are the furthest away…I’m just trying to figure out how Sev and Potter are related.”
“Merlin, no Draco. The Snapes and Potters are on opposite sides of the Malfoy family tree. You’d have to go back to the founders’ time for the last recorded union between the two families.”
“That’s a relief, could you imagine Sev and Potter related.”
“Well, they do have the same approach to personal grooming.” Lucius said, eyes twinkling. Draco thought for a second, comparing Sev’s greasy, never-heard-of-shampoo hair and black work robes which didn’t show the stains, to Potter’s never-be-tamed rats nest, worn school robes and overly large, mismatched casual clothes. He began to chuckle.
“Now, now, Draco, that’s enough. What subjects are you thinking for you N.E.W.Ts?”
They spent a pleasant morning in the sunroom going over Draco’s options and subject selection. Once an accord was reached, Draco began to write them down when Lucius’ hand stopped him. He looked up with a question in his eyes.
“Draco, these are the best choices for you at the moment, but you will want your sub in class with you. So you might, probably will, have to make changes to accommodate them and what they want to do after they graduate.”
“I know father.” Draco interrupted softly. “The mate comes first.” It was, after all the Veela code, just one line, and it surpassed even the Malfoy codes of conduct…all 241 of them. Draco locked eyes with his father. “My mate will want for nothing.”
TBC...
29th July
Draco Malfoy was not having a good holiday. No, that wasn’t exactly true; Draco Malfoy was not having a good summer. His problems had started on the second of June, two weeks before the leaving feast at Hogwarts. Yes, the second of June which just so happened to be his sixteenth birthday, the day he came into his inheritance.
“And what a stupid inheritance it is,” Draco grumbled, lying flat on his back throwing a snitch sized ball up in the air and then catching it again. “I couldn’t be Vampyre like Uncle Sev or a Fae like my mother. No I had to be a. Bloody. Stupid. Veela.” With each word he threw the ball harder, until it was bouncing off the ceiling. “Only beings in the world that have a soul mate and die without them or their acceptance. Oh, sure Vampyres don’t like being without their mate, look at Sev, but hell, it’s better than dying. And Fae, Fae don’t even have mates, they steal others’ and…” ‘No! Stop thinking about mates,’ he mentally shouted at himself, but it was too late. He curled into a ball on his side as he tried to stop the tears that started to flow as he felt the full force of the yawing pit of emptiness in his heart that he was trying so hard to ignore. It had gotten worse as the summer continued.
“Oh Draco,” his father said from the doorway. He sat on the bed, back against the headboard and gathered his son into his arms. “How does it feel?” Now the majority of the wizarding world would have been shocked to see a Malfoy acknowledging emotion, let alone acting on it, but the fact remained that Lucius - like Draco - was a Veela, and an emotional creature. It was, however, never displayed in public. After all, the Malfoy image must be upheld.
“Empty, so bloody empty,” Draco whispered into his father’s shoulder.
“Your mate’s not yet sixteen. Don’t worry, they will be soon; a Veela is never more than two months older or younger than their mate. No more than four days until you feel them, Draco, and then it’s just a month ‘til you see them,” Lucius said as he began rocking Draco back and forth. They knew Draco’s mate attended Hogwarts. Draco had complained that all he could smell in the castle was chocolate, a sure sign the Veela was close to his underage mate. Come the first day of school they would find his mate.
Yes, they. After returning from a three week business trip, securing a steady stream of potion ingredients from South America to his businesses in England, Lucius had discovered his name being dragged through mud (among other unsavoury substances) by the Daily Prophet, Malfoy assets seized and his own son believing him to be in Azkaban. It had taken nearly a week to sort out, with Avery’s (who through the use of the polyjuice potion had pretended to be Lucius) name being added to the court documents, his assets released with interest and a front page apology from the Daily Prophet. Pressing his advantage (and when wouldn’t he), Lucius had demanded that the minister show the public that he still trusted him. With very little effort on his part Lucius was granted the DADA position at Hogwarts, all the better to help his son and the new mate.
As a teacher, he was given a suite of rooms and it was a simple enough matter to convince Dumbledore to add extra rooms for Draco and his mate. This would mean Draco would have time to convince his mate to bond in private, not in the hustle of the school like he had been forced to do.
While Lucius had been musing, Draco had fallen into a restless sleep, so he kissed him lightly and slipped out of the room. Pausing at the door Lucius prayed to whoever was listening that his son’s mate would turn sixteen soon. He couldn’t stand seeing him like this for much longer.
***
31st July (2:14am)
{Draco’s bedroom}
Draco awoke suddenly to a feeling of intense joy. The hole in his heart was filled, his mate was alive, they were of age, they were…hurt?
“Father!” Draco cried in distress, as he threw off his bedcovers. His father had taken to sleeping next door and was in the room in seconds.
“Draco? What is it? What’s wrong?”
“My mate’s hurt. I can feel it. They’re in pain. We need to get them. NOW!” Lucius’ eyebrow lost itself in his hairline; at this stage of the bond, when they’d not even touched physically as mates; it was practically unheard of for an empathic connection to form. Draco’s mate was extremely magically powerful.
“Slow down, concentrate for me. How does it feel now?” He asked a hand on each of Draco’s shoulders.
“It’s gone now, it was just a flash.” Draco lay down on the bed and sorted through his feelings. “All I know is that I need to find them,” he pondered for a second, “but it’s not as bad as it was just a few seconds ago.” He looked at his father to find him nodding in agreement.
“A natural reaction for a dominant, whose submissive is in pain, is to get to them as quickly as possible. You can no longer feel them so you don’t know if they’re still hurting, therefore it’s just your Veela instincts talking now.”
“So you think I’m dominant?” inside he was crowing with delight, as a male Veela he had had a fifty-fifty chance of being the submissive in the relationship and the thought of being pregnant was not appealing to him.
“Judging by that reaction, I’d say definitely.”
“So, I’m looking for a girl as a mate?” Mentally Draco began to list and go through all the females at Hogwarts close to his age.
“Or one of the many, many male magical beings who can bear young. Don’t try to hard Draco. When you smell them you’ll know.”
“Follow the instincts. I know, father.”
“Get some rest; we’ll discus this in the morning.”
With a nod to his father he returned under the covers. Waiting until he’d left the room Draco placed a hand to his heart, where he could feel the difference. He slept, content in the knowledge that somewhere his mate was out there, waiting for him.
***
{Sun Room} (8am)
Draco entered the sun room where they took breakfast, not surprised to see his father calmly eating and his mother nursing a hangover. Summoning a house elf he ordered his breakfast and took his seat to the right of Lucius. They ate in silence. Only after he had finished his croissant and picked up his tea, did Draco turn to his father.
“Father, I believe my mate to be hurt.” Draco stated calmly. His father merely raised an eyebrow, his cold, indifferent mask in place…after all Narcissa had long ago gone from ‘family’ to ‘public’. “I do not think it would be wise for me to confront them on the train in that frame of mind.” He continued.
“And what would you suggest?” Lucius’ tone was as calm and indifferent as his mask.
“I propose, father, that you allow me to accompany you when you leave to take up the Defence post. Thus I will be at school prior to their arrival and will be able to determine who they are as they arrive at the welcoming feast. Then it just becomes a matter of informing the headmaster.”
“You think it wise to involve Albus?”
“Sadly, it will probably be necessary. If they are Slytherin then we will be able to go through Professor Snape, otherwise we will require the headmaster to explain it so the student in question will be able to trust that we are being honest with them.”
“Very well,” Lucius nodded, “You shall accompany me, and I will inform Albus of the arrangements this evening. We will depart in two weeks. Is their anything that you require?”
“Yes, father, I do believe so. I received my O.W.L results this morning and…” He stopped as his mother rose and made her way out of the room. As she shut the door behind her, Lucius’ eyes calmly darted around the room (quite a trick if you can manage it). After ascertaining that they were indeed alone, he turned to his son, who had a bright grin on his face.
“I take it you did well then?”
“Passed everything and got outstanding in both the theoretical and practical aspects of potions.”
“Well, Severus will be pleased. He won’t have to lower his standards and allow anyone in.” Lucius smiled.
“You say that like Uncle Sev would have let me in with anything less. You forget, his list goes Potions, Family, Everything else, Hair care.” Lucius laughed aloud at his son’s snide comment.
“I’ll give you that.” He paused. “What I can never get is why you insist on referring to the man as ‘Uncle’. He’s your godfather, not a blood relative. Why the only purebloods further away in blood terms than the Snapes are the Potters. Goodness knows that we’re closer to the Weasleys than Sev.”
“That’s hardly the point father and you know it.” Draco frowned in concentration.
“Don’t do that Draco, you’ll get lines, just ask the question.”
“You said the Potters are the furthest away…I’m just trying to figure out how Sev and Potter are related.”
“Merlin, no Draco. The Snapes and Potters are on opposite sides of the Malfoy family tree. You’d have to go back to the founders’ time for the last recorded union between the two families.”
“That’s a relief, could you imagine Sev and Potter related.”
“Well, they do have the same approach to personal grooming.” Lucius said, eyes twinkling. Draco thought for a second, comparing Sev’s greasy, never-heard-of-shampoo hair and black work robes which didn’t show the stains, to Potter’s never-be-tamed rats nest, worn school robes and overly large, mismatched casual clothes. He began to chuckle.
“Now, now, Draco, that’s enough. What subjects are you thinking for you N.E.W.Ts?”
They spent a pleasant morning in the sunroom going over Draco’s options and subject selection. Once an accord was reached, Draco began to write them down when Lucius’ hand stopped him. He looked up with a question in his eyes.
“Draco, these are the best choices for you at the moment, but you will want your sub in class with you. So you might, probably will, have to make changes to accommodate them and what they want to do after they graduate.”
“I know father.” Draco interrupted softly. “The mate comes first.” It was, after all the Veela code, just one line, and it surpassed even the Malfoy codes of conduct…all 241 of them. Draco locked eyes with his father. “My mate will want for nothing.”
TBC...