Author: Lash_Larue
Title: "Other"
Pairing: Ginny/Hermione – this part Fleur/Pansy
Rating: Adult
Summary: Pansy explains why
Warnings: mentions of S&M, Dom/Sub
Word Count: 1650
Disclaimer: These characters belong to JK Rowling
The Hunters Part 18
"Other"
In the relative darkness, Fleur struggled to regain control, but her mind was filled with the picture of Pansy's throat under her heel, and Pansy's tongue on her-
She carefully moved her foot and knelt beside Pansy, the faint illumination from the bar letting her see just enough. "Pansy, are you hurt?" she whispered.
"No, just overwhelmed, I'm fine. Thank you, Fleur, for the dance," Pansy responded.
"I'm sor-"
"Don't you dare say that!" Pansy pleaded. "Don't take this from me, please. The lights will be back on soon, and I can feel the thrall fading. Let's get back to the table."
Pansy rose easily, and extended a hand towards the kneeling Fleur just as the lights came back on.
Fleur and Pansy were in virtually the same position they had been in at the start of the dance, leaving their stunned audience to wonder if they had really seen anything at all.
Except of course for Christopher, who was miming wild applause and mouthing Brava! in deafening silence.
"I think that I just witnessed an extraordinary performance," Hermione greeted them when they had resumed their seats. "You're right Fleur; the thrall is stronger, much stronger. Are both of you all right?"
"I'm fine," Pansy assured her.
"Non, you are not," Fleur corrected her, and she dampened a napkin in her water glass and gently urged the drying blood from Pansy's face. "You should put some ice on that; it will help with the pain."
"Then no ice," Pansy declared. "Are you ready for dinner?" she asked both of them.
"I need to freshen up a bit first," Hermione said.
"Here," Pansy said, and she handed Hermione a key. "Use the bathroom in the office, there's a line at the other one." Hermione smiled her thanks and left.
"Pansy, why – you do not strike me as one to submit to anyone, not willingly, why would you allow yourself to be –"
"Set free? Just for brief moments in time, to give myself to something greater?" Pansy broke in.
"I do not understand," Fleur said softly.
"I know that you don't love me, Fleur. Hell, I'm not even sure that I love you; I can't put a name to how I feel about you. Ginny, Hermione, I want them, they attract me, they excite me, and if they asked me to I would be on them in an instant. But you?"
"It is the thrall, that is all," Fleur explained.
"No it's not; it's not all of it. The thrall just gives me an excuse, an acceptable explanation for my actions." Pansy looked at her hands, the fingers knitted together on the table. "I was raised to use my will to dominate others; I was taught that it was my birthright and my obligation to do so. My father did it until he met someone better at it than he was, Voldemort, and then he used his will to advance the Dark Lord's cause. I refused to help him, and he put me under the Imperious curse, and threatened harm to my mother if I didn't comply."
Fleur reached to touch Pansy's hands, but Pansy pulled them into her lap, shaking her head.
"No. No tenderness from you, please. I can't take that, not yet," Pansy took a sip of water. "I fought the curse. I fought it for years, and every time I nearly broke free my father would renew it, and I would fight harder."
"So brave you are…" Fleur murmured. Pansy shook her head.
"It wasn't bravery, it wasn't even because I thought that the things he wanted me to do were evil, though some of them surely were. It was because I didn't want to do them, and he was trying to make me do them. If he'd just asked me, I might have gone along," she shrugged. "I didn't want to serve Voldemort because I saw no reason at all for my will to be subordinate to his. No reason for his wants to supersede my own, who the Hell was he? Oooooh, an Evil Wizard! He can kill us if we resist! We can all kill each other, can't we?" Pansy stopped talking and signaled a server, by now people were recovering, and the chatter was picking back up, and people were dancing. And drinking, Pansy smiled at that. She gave an order to the server, who backed away slowly, staring at Fleur. Pansy smiled at that too.
"So then, back to the story… then Harry killed Voldemort, and Hagrid's little brother trod on my bastard of a father, and I was free. And ever since then I've done exactly as I wished, I have never let another's will dominate my own. Oh, I've done some "good" things, generous things, Hell, I've done downright "noble" things. But I've done them because I wanted to; because it gave me pleasure to do them, not because I thought that I was obligated to." Pansy paused as her order was delivered, and she poured the wine herself and pushed a glass across to Fleur. "It's a decent wine, here, you should eat something, you just used a lot of energy, what with the thrall and the dancing."
Fleur ate, and sipped her wine, never taking her eyes from Pansy's face. She felt like she was on the edge of something, she just could not tell what.
"Fast forward – then you walked into my place, and I felt something different. Something I'd never felt before, and not just the thrall," she struggled to explain. "Like I said, the thrall just gives me an excuse. What I felt for the first time in my life was the presence of someone greater than myself, someone whose will should take precedence over my own."
"Pansy, I am not greater than you," Fleur protested.
"No, you're not," Pansy agreed, and then she pointed at Fleur's stomach, "but she is. And that is why I am your surrogate Other."
Fleur's mouth dropped open, and the glass slipped from her fingers and shattered on the floor.
"And who decided this?"
"Your grandmother." Fleur stared. "After you left last time I thought about what I'd felt, and what you'd said." Pansy returned the stare. "And then I went looking. I know a lot of people, and most of them are inclined to help me if I ask politely," Pansy smiled. "One of these people got me a book about Veela. It was quite interesting, and then I went to see your mother."
"Mere? Why?"
"To offer my services, and she took me to see your grandmother, who by the way, is quite impressive."
"Indeed, and Grandmother accepted your offer?"
"She did, it did take some convincing, and I'm afraid that I ratted you out. Somehow your mother and your grandmother had the idea that either Ginny or Hermione was intended to fill the role of the Other for you. I straightened them out on that."
"And how did you know that?" Fleur demanded.
"Because you do love them, and I knew that you could never bring yourself to treat them as you would have to, that you would trust that the love would be enough. And so far it has been, I can feel her joy, her contentment, much as you can. But you, and she, will need the Other, for she is to be Queen."
"You do know what this will entail, I trust?" Fleur asked.
"More of what happened tonight, because as you said last time, Veela are in some sense predators, hunters, and I understand that. And because for her to be an effective Queen she has to learn to impose her will on others when it is necessary, and therefore you must impose your will on someone while she is becoming herself. And that someone is me, I am the metaphorical, and at need the literal, dirt beneath your feet. You don't love me, and it will not hurt you so much to dominate me, to hit me, to have me debase myself before you, and I am strong enough to test you and tough enough to take it. And I want you to do these things to me, I need you to, because it is all that I can do for her," Pansy said calmly, "and because if the only passionate touch I can have from you is a blow from your hand or your foot on my throat, then I'll take it and be grateful. Is that love? I don't know, probably not, I'm not sure it's even in me to give or accept love anymore. But it is in me to use my will to get what I want, and insofar as that is possible between us I have done so. I'm very selfish, you see."
"How angry were Mere and Grandmere at me?"
"They weren't angry at all; they were, however, afraid that you couldn't do it, not to Ginny or Hermione. I didn't tell them that you never intended to even try to, though. Your grandmother was going to send a member of your flock at the proper time to fill the role if it was needed. I asked her if any of them would truly want it, and not just see it as duty to the flock. Just as the magic that makes this child possible requires you to give yourself completely in love to other women, it requires that a woman yield completely to the Veela. It's not gentle magic, it's powerful, it has to be, it is making over a life at its very core, and at times it requires harsh measures. I understand about that too." Pansy emptied her glass.
"Don't wait so long to turn her loose this time. It's not good for the baby. I'll see you Sunday at dinner." Pansy raised Fleur's hand to her bruised lips, smiled, and walked away.