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A sense of Exposure
Their reactions where quite different, while Hermione for some reason seemed extremely relieved, Draco was still slightly shocked and a little disgruntled, giving him a slightly constipated look.
"You mean to tell me...that the golden boy is your mate?..You one and only soul mate?" Draco fiddled with the neck of his shirt.
"Yes." Katrina looked between the two. "You can see why this might become complicated."
"Yes, its complicated in the fact that I'm practically going to be brother in-law to bloody Harry Potter!"
"Shh! Draco, keep your voice down, they'll be back any minute to go down for dinner." Hermione looked to Katrina, "What did you need our help with?" Katrina had forgot about that and the thought that she would have to expose this bit of information was distinctly uncomfortable.
"Well, you see the full moon is only days away and while I can control myself the days leading up to and the days after, for the days of the full moon, my Veela is practically in control then when night time comes fully." She ran a hand through her long hair, noting she needed to get it trimmed. "and....well..." The silver haired went completely red in the face at this stage.
"What is it Nina?"Hermione's hand on her own gave her the needed strength to continue.
"I'll need you two to keep me away from Harry, other wise my Veela will try to ...well you know...mate with him, while the full moons are in play it will be damn near impossible to ignore my instincts and I want to make sure I don't do anything that will jeopardize the chance of him accepting me." Looking into both their eyes, they saw the understanding there and felt a huge relief, it was nice to be able to talk to someone about things, before it was just her and her sister, but she stopped that train of thought before old memories swam to the surface.
"How bad will it be?" Draco grabbed her other hand and placed it in both of his.
"Bad." She looked back down to the patterned quilt. "It was a struggle to move myself away from him just then, and its not even full moon yet." Looking up and suddenly smiling she startled them. "But I found him....i found my mate!" Suddenly she felt a burst of happiness and launched herself at the two of them, both suddenly laughing and hugging her back.
"I hope you two will be very happy." Draco smiled back at her, although it may have appeared slightly strained, Hermione looked pleasantly surprised at his comment.
"well, clearly I'm over moon for you!" Giving Karina another hug, the three of them jumped at the sudden knock at the door.
"Guys its food time!" Ron's voice came from the other side.
"Its always food time to you Ron."Hermione shook her head but still smiled.
"Hey theres nothing wrong with a healthy appetite." Ron opened the door a jar and popped his head through, "What are you guys doing anyway?" He spotted Draco and immediately glared. Karina looked at their position and understood immediately why the animosity. Katrina was sprawled slightly over both Draco and Hermione who forced by this to be squashed together. The Veela smiled, would that red head ever get his act together?
"I was just introducing Draco and Hermione to the Aussie group hug." Karina stood up from the bed and rushed non existent fluff from her t-shirt and jeans.
"We have them here too you know." Ron didn't look convinced in the slightest.
"Yes, but its different because I'm the first Aussie they have had one with." She smiled up at him and he had no choice but to back out when she opened the door the rest of the way, her eyes immediately noticing green, he was leaning up against the doorway, a nonchalance aurora around him, his hair was wet showing his recent shower. But Katrina didn't even need her eyes to tell, she could smell the soap and the small amount of deodorant he had used. Calming her nerves she gave him a smile, automatically he mimicked the gesture and the sight of his upturned mouth made her heart squeeze.
"Hey guys! Food time, now!" Ron didn't bother waiting and turned to walk quickly out of the room.
Draco subtly but effectively stood in-between Karina and the dark haired Griffindore, grabbing her elbow and leading her out.
"Doesn't he realise that gluttony is a sin?" Draco's clipped tones brought Karina down from the clouds she had been drifting in. Hermione's laughter was a little strained as she took up her other side.
"I don't think he would care even if he did to be honest." Draco shared a look with her and smirked.
"He is a little thick isn't he?...not quite able to pick up on hints hmm?" He laughed at her blush. Karina could feel Harry behind them the whole time as they made their way to the great hall and was relieved when she sat down, Draco on her left and Hermione on her right. But of coarse Harry choose to sit across from her, it was going to be hard to keep from looking at someone who was straight across from you, she settled for staring at the table, taking a sudden fascination with the grains in the wood. She looked up when she saw others entering, Dumbledore, Severus, Hagrid and Minerva all sat down at the other end of their table. She smiled in response to the head masters twinkle in greeting. She noted with fondness the big smile Hagrid gave her and how much the others seemed dwarfed by his larger body.
"So what have you guys been up to today?" Her eyes closed on their own accord at Harry's words, they were smooth and deep, soothing to the frizzled thoughts racing in her mind. Draco obviously sensed Karina's disorientation, and seemed to be struggling with either amusement or worry, and answered for her.
"Well Nina and I had lunch and had a walk around the grounds."
"Ah, see anything interesting? I know Hagrid was telling me that the numbers of Dusk Wolves have been strangely increasing, their not normally found around this area, but he was saying apparently a small pack has taken up residence in the forbidden forest." Harry was rambling, Karina found it quite endearing, but then she realised what he was saying and her eyes snapped to his.
"Dusk wolves you say?" She had a similar breed that had lived near her old home, beautiful creatures, very much like wolves only they were three times the normal size and their coat takes after their name, their fur shimmers in the colours of the setting sun. And the fact that they are extremely intelligent, the ones back in Australia had even been able to communicate telepathically, she wondered if the same applied to these wolves.
"Yes, thats right. I myself don't know much about them but Hagrid would use any excuse to talk about them."
It was then that she had noticed Draco began pilling food onto her plate, and the others doing the same.
"Yes I know about them, I had some that lived near me back home." Harry's eyes looked up sharply at her. "I'd be curious to see if they were the same." She tried to stop the blush from reaching her cheeks but to no avail. Her only relief was that he appeared to be ignoring it.
"We'll have to see if we can organise something with Hagrid, I'm quite curious myself." He gave her that smile again, it was one she had only seen him give her, crooked and slightly dopey. She unconsciously leaned forward more, eyes fixated on his mouth, thoughts of closing that gap running ramped through her mind. Luckily Draco had been paying attention and tugged playfully on her hair immediately distracting her.
"Now Nina," He started with a disapproving tone. "All this talk of wolves and you haven't even attempted to eat anything, come on, Dumbledore said you'd need your strength remember?" He gave her a pointed look. Nodding she pointedly avoided Harry's searching gaze and began eating, not really paying attention to what she was putting into her mouth, only being able to tell that whatever it was it tasted delicious.
Her mind wondered to how she was going to talk about what had happened before she got to this castle. She would happily go with not ever talking about it, but she knew that these people deserved answers and especially if she was going to help them bring this psychopath down. He was killing her kind and theirs, at that thought her hand convulsed around her knife, making it bend, looking at it she quickly ducked her hand under the table and straightened it out. Looking around she saw everyone was too busy eating to have noticed. All too soon everyone had finished eating and She began to feel even more nervous, It felt as though thousands of butterflies were fluttering around in side her stomach. Subtly she saw Dumbledore and the others move down, the older wizard cleared his throat and immediately received everyones attention.
"Evening students," He smiled at them while stroking his beard. "Draco informed me today that Karina wanted to talk to us about her circumstances regarding of how she came here." She could feel everyones eyes on her and her first instinct was to duck her head down and avoid everyones stares.
"You must be strong! How do you expect our mate to respect us if your scared all the time?, think of everything he has done! You must become confident in your abilities and our enemies will not be afraid of you in this state." Her veela's bitting words struck her harshly, but she was right she needed to become herself once more, while her sister was always the confident and louder of the two, Katrina new that in order to survive she needed to toughen up no more hiding no more running away. Sitting up straighter she lifted her chin and stared at each of the face in turn, determination evident, she noticed they were surprised at the different demeanor.
"From what I've heard you have been at war with this Voldermort wizard and his men for some time now." There were only a couple of winces as the mention of his name followed by nods. "Well, I guess if I can help with my information then I will share my history with you." She looked in front of her and found strength in the jungle green eyes that bore into her own, there felt like there was a sudden connection between them, each having experienced first hand some of the horrors Voldermort was capable of.
"As you know I'm from Australia, I'm not sure what its like here, but even in the wizarding world us Veela's generally keep to ourselves. The fact that Voldermort's forces have reached as far as my homeland shows the direness of the situation, his numbers are obviously growing at an alarming rate for him to be able to effect a country that is literally on the other side of the world." She felt Draco grab her hand and squeezed his in return. "Light Veela's back home have different tribes so to speak, I'm obviously apart of the Stone tribe. But there are many others. My father was well connected within our community, and word had reached him that our people were going missing, at first it was just one or two, but steadily the numbers began to grow and grow, to the point that father feared for our safety and we moved out further into the country. Apparently not further enough..."
She let go of Draco's hand and clasped them together and placed them on the table in front of her. A look of concentration making her frown deeply. It was silent, everyone was hanging onto her every word, out of the corner of her eye she saw Ron's mouth open, but it quickly shut as the veela could only guess Hermione must have kicked him under the table, by the sudden painful grimace on his face. "Their numbers were large...and they were organised...too organized. Someone must have betrayed us and told them of where we were, but so few even knew that. Even though were not well known by other wizards, we are very close to other tribes, we hold a deep kinship with fellow veela's, especially due to our lack of numbers...but if we were betrayed I can only imagine it was against their will, I myself have felt first hand how persuasive Voldermort can be." At this she looked into Harry's eyes, she needed her mate with this, she began to notice her hands shaking slightly at the memory, he stomach ached with the memory of the pole that once lodged there, a shudder riped through her and she suddendly felt two large warm rough hands encase her own, and even with her eyes closed she knew they belonged to Harry, she could feel every callus, from his hours of riding his broom. She instantly calmed her heart slowed and her stomach settled. And when his thumbs gently ran across the tops of her own she wanted to shudder for an entire different reason.
"We were packed to leave that night, I don't know where we would have gone, maybe to join another tribe, maybe another country. But we never got the chance, they swarmed our house, wands blazing. My parents fought and they fought well, I myself was responsible for the deaths of quite a few robed men." At that Harry's hands stilled for a few heart beats but when she looked to him with what must have been sadness he presumed the soothing movement. "My sister, brother and myself attempted to escape, we nearly succeeded as well....but Alex.." She faulted and felt her throat close , pain must have been clearly shown on her face because Hermione wrapped an arm around her and whispered in her language.
"Nina, you don't have to do this now, you can wait." To hear her language albeit a bit clumsy on Hermione's tongue was still nice to hear. She replied in kind,
"No I need to do this." Clearing her throat she looked to Dumbledore, "At the loss of my little brother and I can only assume that my sister is dead also, either she died defending herself or she died from refusing to give them certain information." The teachers became tense, Draco had told her they had had no luck in finding out information, mostly because he had told her bluntly, no one had survived escaping except for Harry, "I was...interrogated, they had wanted information about where the other tribes where but specifically they wanted to know our magic source, and were we kept it. As you must know, Veela's are very different to wizards, while we are both magical, Veela's do not use magic, we are apart of magic. Magic is what makes us who we are, and while you could argue that you are apart of it as well the fact remains that you can survive without magic, your muggles prove this, as well as wizards who may never realise what they are or those who choose to live like muggles." She stared at each individual in turn, making sure they fully comprehended the importance of this. "Veela's, cannot survive without magic, if the magic within us dies...we will die."
The hands clasping her own tightened compulsively. And she smiled a little sadly at the dark haired wizard. "My people have accepted this for it is the natural way of life and we know no different. But as Voldermort was soon to discover we are not ones to be toyed with, he may have us beaten and broken but nothing, and I mean nothing...would make us reveal the source of our magics. Not to him or anyone else for that matter." She looked sharply at Dumbledore and Severus, her eyes glowing faintly. The head master nodded resolutely understanding her meaning. "From what I could gather, for I wasn't always entirely aware of my surroundings, they had me captive for three months." There was a couple of gasps and a empathetic whimper from Hermione, "I know I was inside a castle of sorts, obviously in England. They had cast a spell on me and transported me there I can only gather, they continuously injected a serum into me that stopped my magics. It appeared they had been doing this for sometime, so I can only gather they had been kidnapping veela's and doing the same thing. The day before I escaped a man brought me to Voldermort, a man that had a unique hair coloring, I only remembered it because I have only ever seen it once after."
"what was it?" Hermione's voice was hushed as though afraid to break the steady silence. Katrina turned slightly and looked to the handsome blond beside her, one hand reluctantly leaving the warmth of Harry's and almost regretfully picked up a loose strand of Draco's tresses that had fallen onto his forehead and delicately smoothed it back. Draco slowly looked to her, haunted and enraged as he realised what she was saying, his body began to shake, she could feel almost first hand the hatred he felt towards the man and her suspicions were confirmed.
"Dragon, be still," She cupped his face. "Do you know a man with the same colouring as yourself working for Voldermort?" There was angry curses said about the room, mostly from Harry and Ron.
Draco looked at her, torn and a sense of guilt peering through his eyes.
"I only know of one man with hair the same colour as my own..." He grabbed her hand and placed it back onto the table. "...My fathers."
"Do not think for one moment that I blame you in anyway Dragon, you have told me about your relationship with him." He nodded but she knew she would have to talk with him later, he felt responsible for what had happened to her.
Almost without thought her hand returned back into the warmth of between Harry's own. "That man was in charge of the questioning the majority of the time. Then as I said I met Voldermort, he had many, many followers with him. He sat upon a throne of sorts, he was....not what I expected, quite strange looking indeed. I don't remember much after that as I was too weak, but I know they were moving me, Voldermort questioned me and when I refused to tell him I soon blacked out. I next woke up in a carriage, must have been not that far outside of the town you found me in, they had forgotten to give me another dose of that serum and I managed to escape. If not for their foolishness I fear....i might have never made it."
"And for their stupidity we are resoundingly grateful, and for our impeccable timing also," Dumbledore smiled kindly at her, "Thank you for telling us, I imagine given your circumstances it must have been quite difficult." She nodded not trusting her voice. She looked at the potions master who appeared to be deep in thought, he was staring intensely at her.
"Lucius." Startled she could only manage an , "excuse me?". "That is the man who interrogated you, Draco's father."
"I shall remember it." Looking at the ceiling she noted how late it had gotten, a rush of fatigue made her slump.
"I think we shall call it a night, we have much to think on." With that Dumbledore swept from the table and the other teachers followed quickly after.
"Karina I think you should get to bed, your still not quite yourself yet." Hermione's arm was wrapped securely around her and she welcomed the warmth. Instinctively wrapping her own arm around the bushy haired witches waist it reminded her of her sister. Resting her head on her shoulder she mumbled something that wasn't intelligible. "Come on." With help from Draco they made they way back to the rooms, Karina didn't really remember getting back through the portrait or when Hermione and Draco gently tucked her into bed.
"If theres one thing I'm grateful for,.." Karina yawned and looked up into the faces of the four new friends she had, "....It's that I got to meet you guys." And without another thought she drifted into the land of slumber.