Disclaimer: I am in no way profiting from writing this. Harry Potter and all of Potterverse belong to J. K. Rowling, Scholastic, Warner Bros., etc., and this piece of fiction is purely for entertainment purposes. This will be the only disclaimer.
Author's Note: So, I published this story originally in 2014, and it's currently 2018. I apparently promised to upload the first chapter "shortly" in my original author's note…that was clearly a lie since I did not have chapter one written at the time, and I still do not have it written. Instead, I present to you an edited version of the prologue. The story remains canon up until the summer between HBP and DH. I've made some edits in regard to the timeline of this story since it didn't match up to this point in the canon timeline. Let's see if I can actually do this and commit. This will still be a Veela fic even though it feels like Dramione is completely saturated with that trope now. YOLO, PPL.
There is not a single word
in the whole world
that could describe the hurt.
The dullest knife just sawing and forth
and ripping through the softest skin there ever was.
How were you to know?
Oh, how were you to know?
-Paramore / Hate To See Your Heart Break
PROLOGUE: SINGULARITY
The first thing he notices is the talons.
Initially, he does a double take because it seems impossible—he squeezes his eyes shut with the hope that when he opens them his hands will be normal again. But it doesn't work.
He has fucking talons.
It's only been a few weeks since his seventeenth birthday, so he supposes that this is the universe's gift to him. It wasn't enough that he tasked with murdering Dumbledore at the age of sixteen (in reality: a suicide mission that was set up for his failure), but now he has to endure an unbearable shift in his body because he is some sort of humanoid. How lucky.
The rest of the changes don't make themselves apparent until a little later: an uncanny sense of smell, his body becomes tauter, a sharper face (almost bird-like), a sharper field of vision, and his voice deepens in timbre. For the first time in his life, he wishes he wasn't a Malfoy. He's in so much pain the first week that he tells his mother he's happy his father is still locked up in Azkaban—partially because he's so angry that he can't control any of his new powers, and partially because he can't attack Lucius when the transformation is complete (but he doesn't tell her this). As he learns how to control the Veela inside him, he has discovered that it's fueled by his emotions. What's worse is that if his ire becomes truly uncontrollable, tiny balls of fire blast from the palms of hands like small, rogue snitches—albeit, flaming snitches. His only reprieve is that The Dark Lord has showed little to no interest in him since he failed to kill the headmaster.
Draco assumed he'd spend his life inheriting the sins of his father; he never thought he'd be betrayed by his mother.
His mother ignores him for the most part. He supposes that she's tired of the verbal abuse he gives her daily and too busy pining after her husband. The Dark Lord's occupation of the Manor is probably an additional constant on her mind, but he can't spare a moment of sympathy for her because of his wonderful transformation. A part of him feels cruel—he really does love his mother very much and can't effectively communicate that since he has giant wings beginning to sprout from his back—but a part of him also feels like she deserves it. How dare she hide this part of his parentage from him? Never mind that it should have been her duty to inform him considering this is happening only because she is a Black—she should have felt obligated to inform her only child about his unfortunate birthright.
He is a flurry of emotions: regret, anger, confusion. But above all things, he feels disgust. Shame. Repulsion. Malfoys are supposed to be pure. The Veela blood running inside of him is living proof that he is far from it.
All semblance of normality is gone—he's a ticking time bomb now.
