"Non, that is not possible!" Fleur replied sharply, shoving the brunette roughly against the brick wall of the alleyway. Hermione felt her head crack against the unforgiving material, wincing in pain as the blonde continued to stare at her with a cold glare. The good news was, in being held to the wall, the wand pointed at her neck had dropped slightly, giving her room to breathe.
She put her hands up as a gesture of surrender, showing she was unarmed, "I know it doesn't sound likely, but please, just hear me out on this."
"Very well, but make it quick or I may just decide to kill you after all."
"You accused me of being under your thrall last time we met. Which means you've used your thrall on me."
"Obviously. It was how I planned to rob you after all. This is nothing new." Fleur looked bored with the direction of the conversation, playing with her wand, a slim white piece of wood, intricately carved with unique swirling, looping designs. Hermione watched her long nimble fingers, feeling desire spread through her body.
She gulped nervously before continuing on, "So, my theory, your thrall is an active ability correct? You have to maintain it for the effect to continue on and when you stop, its effect stops."
"Yes, is there some revelation buried in here or are you going to continue to tell me what I already know?"
"I'm getting there but I have to make sure these assumptions are correct, if they are, it will prove what I am saying.
"You haven't used it on me since our first meeting," Hermione stated factually, a smirk playing upon her lips, ready to take the blonde by surprise, but it was she who was taken by surprise instead.
"Incorrect," Fleur chuckled as the younger witch's face fell, her smirk dropping with it, shrinking back into herself, her cocky air disappearing in an instant.
"When?" A small voice asked, unsure of itself, unsure of the world and everything it contained, as though the ground had just vanished beneath her feet.
"The next time I found you, I was going to use you to find out when you were getting close so I could disappear."
"Is that it?" A small amount of confidence returning to the brunette.
"Yes. Surely you knew that already?" The blonde asked, an eyebrow raised in question.
"No, I haven't gone a moment in your presence without feeling it, even now, it took a while for me to realize it, but after you left the first time, I was already addicted. I can feel your thrall reaching out to me, pulling me in and after you're gone I want more."
Fleur seemed unimpressed with this revelation, still playing with her wand, a moment of silence passed before she looked up, "Oh? Is that all? Hmm, I thought there would be more."
Hermione looked shattered, her face falling, her mood deflating, "No, that was it. I know there isn't much information out there, but I think that's it. I think your thall affects me more than others because I'm your mate. When I was being influenced by another Veela's thrall, I was back to normal as soon as it was over, well, mostly normal," Hermione looked down at the ground, almost ashamed of what she was about to admit, "I felt like I'd betrayed you when it was over, I felt wrong, and her thrall didn't feel like yours. I didn't like it like I do yours. And I think that means there's something more between us."
Fleur still looked at the brunette wish unimpressed, "You seem smart, so you shouldn't be surprised to know that there hasn't been such a thing in centuries," Fleur looked away adding as an afterthought, "As if such a thing could happen to a Delacour."
Hermione sensed that to be her chance and dove forward, enveloping the blonde in her arms, holding her close, unwilling to let go, "There's no reason it can't."
A forced laugh erupted from the blonde as she attempted to shove the other woman away from her, "You have just proven your ignorance of the Delacour family. No one who knows of our history would ever say such a thing."
Hermione stood firm in her beliefs, challenging Fleur, unwilling to accept her statements as the truth, "Then tell me what makes you so unworthy of love." She had resisted the attempts to be pushed away, and while there was now space between them, she held firm onto her hands, looking her in the eyes, brown meeting a tearful blue as the Frenchwoman began to try and explain the reasoning for her beliefs.
"My family has long scorned Veela traditions, believing them to be outdated, we have these abilities so why not use them? Why should we hide our gifts, our culture like we are outcasts? I am not wrong so why should I be treated as an abomination? The other families, they believe that we should blend in and not use our gift. They see it as a curse. And because we would not repent, we were exiled - erased from history like common criminals, and so that is what we became. My sister and I, are the last ones. We watched our house burn as children, our parents murdered in front of us simply because of our name. With nothing left we had to survive, one way or another. We do not deserve love just as our parents did not deserve life."
Her voice cracked with emotion and Hermione felt her heart breaking, she carefully wiped away her tears, "I still don't think that makes you undeserving of love, if anything, you deserve more of it." She pulled Fleur back into a hug, noting that this time, she encountered no resistance, the older woman's strength of will faltering as she was shown genuine affection for the first time in a long time.
Hermione stood there comforting her love for a long while, holding her close as Fleur dissolved in her arms, after a long while passed, she whispered, "Come on, let's go somewhere more private." Feeling a nod of agreement against her chest she apparated the both of them back to her home.
So far things had gone better than she could have hoped for, though it was a bit more tense to begin with than she had really expected. But the both of them were now standing in her living room, a fire crackling in the fireplace, casting a warm reddish glow about the room. Fleur had taken a seat upon her couch while Hermione had gone to fetch a pot of tea from the kitchen.
Hermione had used the opportunity to allow Fleur to compose herself once again, knowing the other witch liked to appear presentable even at her worst and felt like she was invading too far into the other woman's privacy. When she returned, the blonde had wiped her tears and, aside from a few quiet sniffles, seemed put together enough, she accepted the cup she was offered with a quiet thank you.
The brunette sat at the other end of the couch, putting as much physical space between them as she could, she'd intruded far enough already. They sipped their drinks in a comfortable silence, neither wanting to speak, the crackling of the fire and the chirping of crickets outside the only sound. Finally, she couldn't wait any longer, "So, what does this mean for us?" She carefully looked at the blonde, her eyes expectant, hope shining in them, the amber color reflecting the firelight.
Her breath caught in her chest as the moment drug on forever, waiting for an answer, time had frozen for her, but it came crashing down, her heart breaking again as she received an answer she should have counted on but had not prepared for, "I don't know."