Dear Mother and Father,

I know I haven't written to you since I've gotten back, but, as you probably can only imagine, I've been busy. I shall properly inform you of the happenings when I return to Malfoy Manor for Christmas, but for now this letter will have to be short as I have many emotions running through me at the moment.

I have chosen now to write because I thought that you'd like to know how I'm coping with finding my Mate and whether I'm settling into the inheritance well. In some ways, you could say that I am doing fine, but in others, it's a little bit disappointing. It might interest you to know that I have found my Mate, though I will withhold her identity until Christmas as a surprise. Being here and around her, however, hasn't been particularly good for my health and I now only have 247 days left.

In addition, this might appeal to you more Father, but I am one of the few to shoot fireballs and I have mastered the ability to make my wings appear and disappear at will. Unfortunately, they are more trouble than their worth. I haven't had time to read the book that you've given me, but I have researched about Veela's in the Hogwarts library, which has proved, as I would imagine, just as useful. I will look through your book though, should there be any information that hasn't been said.

I eagerly await Christmas,
Draco Malfoy.

Draco signed off his letter with a flourish and began to tuck it into an envelope. He had only managed to start melting the green wax to seal it, when a hand clapped onto his shoulder making him jump and have some of the wax fall onto his skin.

"You've got some explaining to do."

When Draco heard Blaise's voice, he picked the wax off lazily and looked up to his friend with a bored expression after setting down his wand and the rest of the wax. Luckily his lips weren't swollen anymore (he'd hate to have to explain the reason to Blaise), although he kept his hair messy as, from all the looks he was getting from the girls that he passed, he looked sexy. He raised an eyebrow in a silent question as his friend walked round the table to sit opposite him.

"Granger?" Blaise prompted, the very last of his patience running out. Out of everywhere in the castle, never did Blaise think that Malfoy would be sitting in the library, especially since he obviously wanted to escape Granger and this was her favourite place. It hadn't been easy to find Draco.

A faint look of recognition of the situation passed across his face, but seconds later it was gone and he was once again wearing his blank mask. "Hmm...I don't know what you want me to say, Blaise. She fainted at my touch so she's definitely my Mate this time. What else is there?"

"What I want you to say, Malfoy," he said slowly through his gritted teeth, glaring at his idiotic best friend. "Is the reason why, after you clearly snogged the daylights out of her, I just found Granger by the common room confused out of her mind about what had happened."

A look of horror planted itself on Draco's face and he all but threw himself across the table to try to quieten Blaise, in case someone should hear him. They were in the library after all; there were people all around them. "We are not talking about this here," he hissed.

Blaise shook his head adamantly. "No. We are talking about this right here, right now. Your cowardice has really gone too far."
Draco narrowed his eyes at him, standing up stiffly from the table. "Fine," he said in a deathly low voice. "But if we're going to do this, we're doing it over there where there are less people to eavesdrop." He nodded to a pair of bookshelves over to his right where it seemed to be void of people. Without waiting for a response, he turned and strode over towards it, hearing his chair move and Blaise's footsteps seconds later.

"Well?" Blaise asked, crossing his arms and leaning against the bookshelf.

"How did you find out anyway? Did she tell you?" Draco demanded.

"It wasn't like it could've been anyone else; when I found her, everyone was still in class. So, how did you do it? How did you get her to kiss you back?"

"For the record, it wasn't completely my fault. If you hadn't told me about Veela Charms then I never would've thought about using them."

"You used them?" He asked, incredulous. "That's wrong and you know it! How – how could you even bear to do it?" Draco shrugged, looking bored once again. It was as if he didn't care what he did. Didn't it hurt him inside knowing that it wasn't through her own free will, that he made her do it? "Are you proud?"

Draco looked at him with a smug smirk and he almost seemed to stand a little bit taller. "It may not have been right and she may dislike me even more, but Blaise, it was worth it. So worth it."

Blaise looked at him exasperated. He wasn't meant to be proud of himself! No matter how good the kiss was! "She will confront you Draco eventually, and then what? What are you going to tell her?"

He raised his shoulders and spread his hands out in front of him. "That, obviously, the only reason she kissed me was because she harbours some intense sexual attraction to me and that, lucky for her, I've been in love with her for years. Then proceed to ask her if there's enough time to plan and have a wedding in less than 247 days," he said, highly amused with himself. Blaise, however, didn't seem to get Draco's humour and was looking at him with a less than impressed expression. When was he going to start taking this seriously? Draco sighed and rolled his eyes, feeling the judgement roll off Blaise, causing all of his amusement to disappear and his smirk to slide off his face. He turned around so that his back was now facing Blaise and lowered his eyes to stare at his shoes as they scuffed the carpeted floor. "Did you speak to her?" He asked quietly.

"Yes; I did."

"And why did she think I did it?" He murmured, running a finger across the spines of the books in front of him.

"I don't know, she wouldn't elaborate. Something about you proving a point."

Draco chuckled to himself. "So we keep that excuse," he stated simply.

"And what point were you proving exactly?" He asked curiously.

Draco shrugged. "I was angry. She discovered one of my traits by pure accident. I had to do something to get her to leave me alone - shouting wasn't working."

Blaise looked baffled and proceeded to ask his next question with caution. "And what trait was this?" Please don't let it be a noticeable one, please don't let it be a noticeable one, Blaise chanted in his head like a mantra. One of them had to be taking things seriously and if it wasn't going to be Draco, then it was going to be Blaise.

As if reading Blaise's mind, Draco paused for a few moments, jaw set and shoulders tense before replying in a stiff tone, "She saw how I healed."

"Oh," was all Blaise was able to say and Draco hummed in agreement. Moments of silence spread between them with the only sounds coming from the other students all around them and Draco as he took random books down and flicked through the pages. Conveniently, Draco found themselves to be in a part of the Magical Creature section and, flipping the book over that he had been staring at unseeingly, he saw it to be about dragons. Deciding that he may as well utilize his time well in the almost-awkward silence, he placed the book about dragons back and went about looking for one on Veelas. He didn't need to search long before he found one entitled 'Legends of Veela's'. Turning to the contents, he found a chapter that he felt appealed a little bit to the current situation and wasted no time in flipping to the correct page.

Getting Closer:
It is said that as the male Veela gets closer to its Mate that their wings, which start off as black, slowly turn white. There is much speculation as to what counts as 'getting closer' to their Mate, but through research and observations that we were permitted to conduct, there are three different ways that we have discovered.

1. They can be close to each other in an emotional way. If they happened to be friends before coming into inheritance then it has also proven to make their wings turn whiter, quicker. Being close emotionally means that they'd be comfortable talking about and confiding their secrets in them or any problems about their life.
2. They can be close to each other by feeling comfortable enough to share things with each other. For instance, sharing a jacket, food and drinks are some of the things that could be shared. Anything that goes under the phrase, "What's mine is yours and what's yours is mine."
3. The last one is being physically close. This means that they're comfortable to be touched (holding hands, linking arms, cuddling). It also been shown that something more intimate than the aforementioned, such as a simple kiss, would also cause the wings to whiten.

There are probably many more things that can start the change, but so far, these are the only ones that have been accounted for as general information.

It is also said that once the Veela's wings start to whiten, then the Mate will start to have dreams featuring them both. It has been recorded in at least two accounts that in the dreams, the Veela will be shown in it's true form; meaning that if the Veela is male, it'll be shown with his wings and if they're one of the rare few, then they may be shown throwing fire. Therefore, depending on the sex of the Veela and what traits it possesses, their form in the dream may not look so abnormal. Also, depending on how close they are to the Mate, the dreams may not be so unusual. If they are close to each other, then they may have already featured in dreams so would have no cause for strangeness.

Draco felt as if his stomach had dropped out of his butt. So now, instead of being put off Draco as he had hoped, Hermione was probably going to be even more curious as to why he's suddenly showing up in her dreams with black eyes and wings and fire being thrown from his hands. Oh Merlin, when is life going to go the way that I want? Draco thought as he closed the book with a snap and shoved it back onto the shelf, gaining Blaise's sudden attention. Blaise looked at him, broken out of his stupor and asked Draco the one question that he had refused even to think about, "How are you going to tell her about you being a Veela? I mean, wouldn't it just be easier and better to tell her instead of waiting for her to discover it herself?"

"I don't want to tell her," Draco said like a petulant child. "It's not like it'd make a difference anyway. She still wouldn't like me."

"You have to tell her sometime Draco! You promised that you'd try save yourself and you know that she has a big heart – if being with you means saving a life, then she'll do it," he stressed.

"I know!" He groaned, turning back around to face him, frustrated. "What's even worse that I thought I had put the Hermione Granger off me by kissing her, which was stupid in the first place because – because why would that put her off me? She'd just want to know why! Now apparently my wings have begun to turn white because I kissed her, and do you know what that means? That means that she's going to be having dreams - and not just any dreams-" Draco's eyes flashed as they slowly turned black and he stalked towards Blaise, pointing back towards the place where he had put his book back – "dreams about me in my Veela form."

His hands were hot by now and he was sorely tempted just to throw a fireball across the room, but he resisted knowing that it wasn't going to do anything to help him – he'd just get himself in more trouble. Draco took a step back from Blaise, as by the end of his rant he had ended up right in his face, giving him his personal space back. "You could use that to your advantage, you know," Blaise said.

Draco's lips twitched into his trademark smirk, although it looked more like a grimace and said, ""I had begun to worry whether all your Slytherin traits had vanished. Well, as I said, the argument was over her involving herself, as if she had a right, so just dropping her hints would be counter effective."

"Yes, but even after these 'dreams' or 'dream', she'll still be curious about you. Why not just let her? You know she won't stop until she knows."

Draco hummed in consideration. It was a plausible idea, and it wouldn't take much on his part. If he wanted, he could just make Blaise drop all the hints and besides, Draco probably wasn't going to stop having incidents and so her curiosity probably wasn't going to either. Not as if he cared much anyway, no one could give two damns about what he did apart from, evidentially, Hermione Granger, and there were certain incidents with Hermione that he wouldn't mind repeating. No matter the dreams that she most likely, would receive. Slowly, his smirk-but-was-actually-a-grimace transformed into what it was intended to be as some of his troubles lifted, and said, "Blaise, my friend, that might just sound like a plan."

Blaise grinned, proud that his argument was so convincing since Draco could be extraordinarily stubborn about some things. "So, now that's sorted, what were you writing to your parents about?"

Draco rolled his eyes, giving him a deadpan look. "I'm sure that you could guess. It certainly wasn't about my Transfiguration essay, if you really do need a hint."

He sighed wistfully, "I wish I could see their faces when they see who it is. Don't you?"

"I will actually, I'm telling them at Christmas. You can join us at the Manor, if you'd like; you're always welcome there," he said.

"I best not. I can barely handle you now, when you're angry, I'd rather not deal with Lucius too. I wish the best of luck for you though; perhaps you could bring Granger along instead." Blaise winked at him, enjoying his uncomfortable look at the thought. It was certainly too much for him to imagine. "Anyway, I think I'll be going." He checked his watch, said goodbye to Draco and just as he was about to leave, he told Draco that Cassidy wanted to see him and that he still needed to collect his things.

Draco didn't hang around much longer. Just finished melting his wax and then left for the Owlery, not knowing that, lurking behind the bookcase in the library while talking to Blaise, someone had unintentionally come to acquire, perhaps, all of Draco Malfoy's secrets. Right now though, they had no idea what to do with the information. Do they keep it to themselves and use it as blackmail? Do they tell everyone and have his secret out in the open so that everyone would be able to see what a hypocrite he and his family were? After all, almost everyone knew that being a Veela was a hereditary gene. What about Granger? She had a right to know about this especially since her life was somehow involved with The Draco Malfoy. They could just tell her and no one else – it'd be kinder to Malfoy and less embarrassing for Granger – but all the same, it might just ruin his life just enough. Moreover, what was this business about wings, and saving a life?

Well, they thought, if I'm going to do this properly, I'm going to have to get a better education on Veela's.

They slipped into the row of bookcases that they were in, knowing that it was the Magical Creatures section of the library, and checked out three books on them.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Once finished in the Owlery, Draco headed back down to Potions and strutted into Cassidy's classroom, not caring that he was currently teaching a Third Year class. He stood stoically (although he could feel quite a lot of eyes on him, and could hear the girls whispering about him) at his desk - after gathering his equipment and bag - waiting for Cassidy to finish ordering some students. It didn't take long for him to finish, and, instead of letting his class (who seemed like the most untrustworthy and conniving little brats Draco had ever seen in Ravenclaw and Slytherin) listen in, he lead him outside into the corridor. "I expect you to tell me, Mr Malfoy, if you hear any of them in there, even if it's just a whisper," the Professor said as soon as the door closed.

"Of course Professor," Draco replied, only out of the required politeness that he had to have for all the teachers at the school. "Blaise said you wanted to see me, sir?"

"Yes," Cassidy's face turned a bit grim - well, grimmer than it already was. "I just wanted to tell you, after speaking with Headmistress McGonagall about class today, that though you probably are trying your best at settling into your...inheritance and controlling your new instincts, if another incident happens we will be forced to send you home for a couple of days."

"Oh," was all Draco had to say in response. It wasn't a question, as if he wanted to know more details about his 'warning'; it wasn't challenging or angry in any way, it was just said in a really emotionless way. As if Draco knew that he'd have to return to the Manor quite a while before Christmas; perhaps if not tomorrow, then sometime during the next week.

"I hope you understand Mr Malfoy that this is only in the care and wellbeing of our students. The Headmistress knew that it was risky to allow a Veela as young as yourself to stay in the castle, knowing that you still had to find your 'Mate' when she heard that you were indeed returning, but she gave you a chance. Also-"

"Sir," Draco interrupted, "I know. It's also to protect me as well as other things. I understand." Cassidy looked as if he was about to say something else but, Draco, not really caring about this conversation anymore now that the main point had been discussed, saw no point in waiting around any longer. Before the Professor could get a word out, he interrupted again. "Professor Cassidy, I think you should know that your class is trying to brew a Shrinking Potion and are planning to force it down the throat of someone."

He stormed past Draco as soon as the words were out of his mouth, an almost worried look on his face, back into the classroom and, before he left, Draco heard the Professor screaming at the and the wails of a small child.

Clearly, they had managed to succeed.

Sneaky little bastards.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

She twisted her lips, looking him up and down as a gentle breeze whipped around her. The curly haired witch then turned her head away from him and gazed around herself for the tenth time since she arrived in the peculiar place. It was unusual, to say the least, and though it made her wonder whether she was actually dead and this was heaven, it was oddly comforting.
She'd never been to place a like this, not in any previous dreams, at least.

It wasn't anything spectacular, just a large, vast area of nothingness. There was ground yes, but it was hard to tell the difference between it and the sky. It was as if there wasn't even a sky. So that was it then – no sky, no sun, no clouds, no moon or stars, but for some reason, there was still wind. When she called out there was nothing but an echo that answered her and only after she walked around aimlessly in a place with no horizon, did she finally come across something. However, it wasn't really what she was expecting in the least.

So, here she was, standing in some sort of colourless infinity, where the only other things that existed were Draco Malfoy, a tree and an array of flowers between them. She didn't even know why she started talking to him, but it didn't bother her greatly. It was just a dream, right? They didn't mean anything.

"So I see you do work for the devil after all Malfoy," Hermione said dryly, bringing her head back to face him and eyeing his black angel wings.

"Oh how witty Granger; but if you'd care to notice, my wings aren't completely black," Draco said, making a big show of shuffling his wings.

And, true enough, they weren't entirely black. Right at the bottom, where the tips skimmed the would-be ground, there were a few white feathers. Hermione's eyebrows drew together in confusion. "Why are they like that?"

"Because, I have gotten closer to you," he stated simply. He now tore his eyes away from her face to look at his wings himself. He wasn't particularly fond of them, they were a bit obstructive and a bit heavy, however, they did make him look threatening and if he did say so himself, the black contrasted well with his hair and made him look rather handsome. "Well...sort of."

"What? Is that your deal to get back into heaven? I can't imagine why they'd want you back," she scoffed, folding her arms.

He chuckled, pushing himself away from the tree and took a step towards Hermione so that he was now standing in the flower patch. "That is because Granger, I am no angel. I have no deal with a God and I have no deal with the devil – I am me."

"Oh? And, who are you Malfoy? Who are you really?" Hermione asked sarcastically, raising an eyebrow.

"Angelic by looks," he said, grinning, then spun around and in a blink of an eye, the tree was in flames. "Destructive by nature." Hermione took a step back away from him with wide eyes and her hand over her mouth, staring at the small flame in his hands and then back to the tree. She heard the crackle of the flames, tasted the smoke in the air and watched as a charred branch snapped off, but she wasn't getting any hotter and it seemed, neither was Malfoy who was looking rather smug with himself.

She coughed as the amount of smoke increased and dried her throat while Draco just stood there; flapping his wings so that the smoke didn't affect him, though it was just wafting more of it towards her. "Well? Aren't you going to put it out?" He said, looking around him in boredom. Spluttering a bit more as her eyes started to water, Hermione reached into her pocket for her wand (that she was more than sure wasn't there a few minutes ago) and put out the fire with a quick aguamenti. Once put out, the tree was nothing but black and all traces of smoke vanished into thin air. Draco cleared his throat in the silence, catching Hermione's attention again, looked down at his wings and said, "Pity." He clicked his tongue and looked back up to Granger who was staring at him in puzzlement. "I was rather proud of the white feathers. Didn't you like them Granger?"

She opened and closed her mouth a couple of times. How was she supposed to respond to that? How was she supposed to respond to anything when moments ago, Malfoy had just set something on fire with just his hands? Besides, she didn't even see such a problem with his feathers; the white ones where only covered in ash, all he had to do was wash them. "To be honest Malfoy, I don't particularly think that wizards or witches are meant to have wings," she said as she walked towards him. She thrust her wand at him, which he took hesitantly, and told him, "Here. Wash them."

He sat down on the flowers, causing a burst of lemon to assault both of their noses. Hermione scrunched up her nose from the sweetness of the smell and Draco, as if sensing that a question was about to come out of her mouth about it, stated, "What you smell is lemon verbena, apparently it attracts the opposite sex. And the other flower is a bittersweet; it means truth."

"Bittersweet it also poisonous," she said dryly. He grinned at her, completely unfazed, as if he had known it all along and was just waiting for her to work it out. Although, he probably was waiting, he seemed to know everything about this place. When he didn't reply, she sighed and asked a question, hoping to understand a bit more. "Why are they here?"

"It's your dream. You tell me," he shrugged and went back to cleaning the feathers.

"If it was my dream you wouldn't be here and everything would make sense."

"Good point. But if it were my dream, then you'd not have a chance to speak because we'd be too busy repeating what happened in the corridor yesterday." He smirked and Hermione was filled with an unknown emotion, knowing that he most likely wasn't talking about their argument but what happened after it. He stood back up and handed Hermione her wand back, clearly finished with using it, but he was so close that she had to tilt her head most of the way back to look at his face when he spoke. "Well I don't know Granger; as the bittersweets seem to insinuate, perhaps there's something to learn from this."

Hermione looked unconvinced, but a powerful feeling of curiosity had settled over her. "Like what?" She asked quietly, something about the closeness of the two of them seemed to call for their voices to be lowered.

Draco chuckled humorously as he stepped back away from her and everywhere around her began to darken until she could no longer see anything. When he spoke again, his voice was softer than it had been the entire time he was speaking to her previously but it still echoed all around her. "When you want to learn something, where do you go?"

And, with a gasp, Hermione awoke.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The library, the library, the library.

She needed to get to the library.

She didn't really know why, but she just needed to get there.

Okay, well, she did know why she needed to go there - because Dream Draco Malfoy told her to, well...sort of - but even if he hadn't have implied that she needed to go to the library, she still would've. After all, who doesn't check out a book on dreams after you just had a very vivid one of your enemy and you'd never (through a whole eight years of knowing each other) ever had him feature in one. No matter how small his part was or whether he died or not. She had smelt and tasted the smoke and flowers for Merlin's sake! That had never happened before! And even in dream form, she still didn't trust Malfoy, so she needed to find a floriology book and see for herself what bittersweets and lemon verbena implied.

There were just so many things that she needed to find!

Wings, why did he have wings and claim neither to be an angel or a fallen angel?

Why did he have fire?

Why was she even in a completely white infinity for crying aloud? That had never happened before! She'd never been in an infinity of any kind or colour and so, thinking about it, since she visited the land of dreams almost every night since she was born, it was very unusual just to come across it now and seems to know it so well. She could've been walking around for a long time, but she seemed to find Malfoy rather quickly.

Hermione Granger reached the library rather quickly and flitted around the room like a bee on a quest for honey, madly searching for her needed books. She found the one on floriology easily and found, much to her irritation, that the Ferret was indeed correct about bittersweets and lemon verbena. Finding the one on dreams however, proved to be more difficult.

It was only when Hermione had finished searching the entire library twice (including the Restricted Section thanks to permission from Madam Pince, seeing as she was an Eighth Year), did she ask Pince if she could see the record sheet of all the checked out books. She'd only made it to the second page before her eye had gotten drawn to a certain Draco Malfoy and the book that he checked out, which, interestingly enough because he hadn't taken the class, were all linked to Magical Creatures. This proved to be rather interesting. He did definitely look like a magical creature of some sort in her dream - but not an angel, as she had to keep reminding herself. Who said angels existed anyway?

Looking back to Madam Pince, Hermione asked if she could check out the exact same books that Malfoy had more or less a week ago. Malfoy had returned them only days later, and she doubted that anyone else would borrow these specific books, so she was optimistic that they were still in the library. She was then, astonished, to find out from Pince that, apparently, the books she wanted (no more than the three) had been borrowed only yesterday by the same person. The name seemed familiar, as familiar as trying to recall the names of the cousins that you haven't seen in around a decade was, but she was too miffed to dwell on it. All that she knew was that she needed answers and someone had just stolen her chance!

A/N- Just a short little chapter, I hope you liked it! I'm really sorry that this story is dragging on and there hasn't been a lot of Dramione, but it IS my first Veela fic, and I'm not sure how to get to that point (I don't really want Draco just to go rampant in his Veela form and them coming to a random mutual understanding, like some do). That's why I need reviews to help me along, and I haven't really been getting a lot. I promise that if I do get help and suggestions (I'm willing to even team up) it'll improve! Like, I know I sound whiny and desperate about all this stuff, but it does mean quite a lot to me.

Who do you think it was that overheard Draco and Blaise's conversation? And do you think it's the same person as the one who borrowed the books that Hermione was wanting? What did you think of Hermione's dream?

Please tell me in a review! I take criticism and I enjoy getting them! Favourite and follow as well please!