AUTHOR'S NOTES:
I apologise for the long break in between, but I finally got my mojo back for writing this story. Hope you like the update - it's ~9K worth of serious plot! Please review, if you would, and thanks for all of the lovely reviews which inspired me to pick back up this story. :)
Cossettan = Old English verbal noun meaning "a kiss". For the sake of this story, I have co-opted the term to mean a magical cocoon around a transforming Veela. Think of it as serving the same purpose as a chrysalis around an emerging butterfly.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Survivor of Indecision
Thursday, July 10th, 2031 (late afternoon)
The trouble with experiencing earth-shattering, soul-stealing, amazing sex was the memories.
It wasn't that there was anything wrong with happily reflecting on and daydreaming about the best few hours of your life – no, not at all. The problem was, Rose was discovering, it was difficult to pull your head out of the clouds when all you could think about was the way your lover tasted, or the feel of his sweaty skin sliding across yours, or even the way he felt pulsing deep inside your body when he'd come. To her chagrin, in fact, it was absolutely impossible to stop thinking about such things, especially when she was feeling the new bloom of love chasing those delicious thoughts at the same time.
Unfortunately, her distinct lack of concentration had already resulted in Rose receiving a split, fat lower lip and a bruised cheek this practice session. Her coach had finally benched her for a thirty-minute time-out when a Bludger that she should have seen coming nailed her in the side, knocking her into a vicious tail-spin. Things could have been a lot worse – namely, she could have collided with the wall she'd been heading for - if not for Eleri's quick thinking and fast wand work. Thank the Founders her friend had come to play spectator today!
Lying on her back across one of the benches overlooking the stadium, Rose threw an arm over her eyes and grunted at Eleri's question.
"Come on, dish," her friend pressed. "How was it?"
Uncomfortable talking about sex with Scorpius and his Veela with Eleri, afraid of hurting her friend, she merely said, "Exhausting."
Eleri nudged her leg. "You can tell me. I promise not to be jealous. I told you, I've decided to give Scor up and I mean it."
Rose shifted her arm and peeked at her friend. "El... it's not that simple."
"Au contraire. I'm Slytherin. If it's not advantageous to hold on to something, I let it go. That's the beauty of being labelled 'ambitious'."
"I don't want to hurt you again."
Eleri met her gaze without flinching, her pretty indigo eyes unwavering. "I won't lie to you, Rose. I think a part of me will always love Scorpius, but he's... he's not just Scorpius anymore, is he? He'll never be that man again now that he's Veela, too. Everything's changed, and there's no going back."
Rose sat up, groaning as her overtaxed muscles protested. "But you were with him after his transformation-"
Her friend firmly shook her head. "The Veela stayed as far away from that as possible. It never showed itself to me, and I tried very hard never to think of Scorpius like that when we were together, either." Her features tightened up with a touch of regret. "I don't think his Veela liked me very much, honestly, but that's actually kind of a relief, because... I'm not comfortable with the idea of having a monster touch me."
"He's not a monster!" Rose automatically defended. "He's… My Veela is... he's just amazing! He's so loving and caring - better than any human boyfriend I've ever had, actually." She closed her eyes as the memories of the night before returned. "He made such sweet love to me last night. It was his first time having sex -the Veela, I mean- but he was more concerned with my comfort and enjoyment than with his own. He gave me the First Mark, and it was..." She took a deep breath and smiled. "It was wonderful. I can't stop thinking about it."
"And that's why you belong together, the three of you," Eleri stated, "because you can love them both, and they'll make whatever compromises they must to make you happy." She shrugged. "I couldn't give them that. I don't have feelings for Scor's Veela at all, and I've been in a ménage a trois once - it wasn't my thing, really."
Rose felt her cheeks heat at the reminder of her unusual relationship dynamics. One body, two souls, both equally willing to make love to her at any time she wanted.
Noting her reaction, her friend laughed. "Too easy, honey. So, fight your inner prude and tell me more about how wonderful it was. Did you suck his cock? It's huge, right?"
With a blush hot enough to start fires, Rose answered Eleri's questions, but was very tactful about how she phrased certain things, careful of her friend's still-fragile feelings. Mostly, she kept the talk on what she'd done with the Veela, since it seemed that was a safer topic than discussing sex with Scorpius. Basically, it was a very weird discussion, but by the end of it, the two women were laughing and Rose felt closer to Eleri then than she ever had in all the years they'd been friends. It was nice to re-connect, and to know that despite weathering a pretty bad storm together, they'd come out of it stronger than ever.
"So what do you plan to do about Corwin?" Eleri asked, turning the topic to the future now that they'd exhausted the past.
Rose sighed. "I have to tell him that it's over between us. It's going to hurt him, but it's the right thing to do."
"When?"
"Tonight. I'm going over after practice."
Eleri ran a hand through her short, dark hair. "Merlin, I don't envy you that conversation."
Rose nodded. "Yeah, but it's like my dad's always said: sometimes you do wrong, but then you make it right." She laid her hand across Eleri's where it rested between them, and squeezed gently. "No matter the cost, you make it right."
It brought tears to her eyes when her friend immediately squeezed back.
X~~~~~X
"Rose, there's a hunky blond outside asking for you."
Rose's pulse quickened at her teammate's words. Apparently, Scorpius had come to see her after practice after all, unable to stay away. God, that was a sexy thought!
"Tell him I'll be out after a shower, if you would?" she relayed, grinning internally at how her lover would take that message. She was hoping he'd get hard just thinking about her lathering up under the hot spray, so when she got out and her teammates abandoned the locker room, she could drag him inside for a shag on the changing bench.
She grabbed her bath kit and headed into the locker room showers, swinging her towel and humming a happy tune.
Ten minutes later, she emerged squeaky clean and ready for some fun. The last of her teammates were just leaving through the door, and Rose was towelling off the water from her body. Opening her locker, she grabbed her comb from her bag and glanced into the small mirror hung on the inside of the door to begin combing through her long, damp hair.
An unfamiliar man suddenly appeared over her left shoulder.
She didn't even have time to scream.
"Stupefy."
X~~~~~X
"I said, wake up."
Slowly, Rose came to in an unfamiliar room.
As the Stunning Spell wore off, blurry objects came into focus, and her eyes began to pick out peculiar details of her location.
First and foremost, she was no longer in the Harpies' locker room, but in a location she didn't at all recognise. It appeared to be a bedroom. Modern in design, with sharp angles and a twenty-foot ceiling, the entire space screamed 'male'. The walls were painted a dark charcoal grey, offsetting the sleek, marble flooring, a few shades lighter. Spartan in decoration, there was little furniture in the room - just a bed with a large, black leather-upholstered headboard and matching frame, with a mattress wide enough to sleep three comfortably, two end tables to either side of the bed, a unique black crystal chandelier lamp hanging nearly to the floor, and on the wall, an old oil painting sans frame. Two candles had been lit under the painting on one of the side tables, and the golden glow they gave off showed the face of a some goateed, middle-aged wizard, his dress centuries old. He moved as a magical portrait would, and eyed her with a rather sinister smirk upon his face.
"Lovely," he pronounced after sizing her up.
She ignored him to consider the rest of her situation.
The second thing she very quickly noted was that her bum was plastered the the seat of an uncomfortable, wooden chair and that her hands were magically stuck to the arms. A powerful Immobilization Charm kept her firmly in place. Clearly, without a wand, she wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.
It occurred to her suddenly that she was still naked from her shower, too. Thankfully, though, her captor –whoever he was– had seen fit to wrap a towel around her middle, for modesty's sake. Her long hair draped over her shoulder was still wet, so she knew she couldn't have been unconscious for very long.
To her growing consternation, she realised that she'd been positioned at the foot of the large bed, in the middle of the only rug in the room (some black, plush thing that felt heavenly under her bare feet and made out of some sort of real animal fur). Directly in front of her, lying inert in the centre of the large, black and white modern-styled bed was Corwin. He seemed to be unconscious, not dead, as his chest rose with each inhalation and compressed on each exhale. His arms and legs were spread wide and chained to the four corners of the bed by thick, ropy links that looked sturdy enough to hold the likes of old Rubeus Hagrid in place. A black, satin robe covered him from neck to mid-thigh, but he was otherwise naked, too.
From her angle, Rose could see right between Cor's legs, and the sight of his soft, exposed cock embarrassed her. She immediately turned her gaze elsewhere, taking in other facets of the room, trying to shut the vision out of her mind. Despite their intimate knowledge of each other, seeing her former lover splayed out in some kind of lewd, bizarre bondage-a-go-go position was uncomfortable and it upset her.
"You're aware that she's a half-blood," the wizard in the picture proclaimed with clear distaste, speaking to someone else in the room. "I can feel her tainted energies from here." He turned his aristocratic nose up in disgust. "She is unworthy of our great lineage."
There was a shifting of cloth behind her, and Rose suddenly felt her captor standing at her left shoulder. His body's heat and his magical energies were a prickling aura against hers, causing goosebumps to break out along on her arms.
"Do you want me to burn your canvas, old man," her kidnapper threatened the portrait, his words biting and cold. "I will if you continue to try my patience in this matter."
Rose tried to turn her head to put a face with the voice, but was unable to, the spell upon her body keeping her locked in place.
"She is perfect, just like her Muggle-born mother," he continued. Gentle, male fingers caressed her shoulder in a less-than-chaste manner. "The apple didn't fall far from the tree."
Anger snapped in Rose's chest. If there was one thing she couldn't stand, it was being touched by someone who hadn't been given permission. "Get your lecherous hands off me, whoever you are, or I'll break them as soon as I get free!" she snarled.
The wizard moved his hand off almost immediately, but not because he feared her threat. His rumbling chuckle in the face of her warning made it abruptly evident that he found her more amusing, and less threatening.
"You have her fiery spirit, too. My boy chose well... but then, we McLaggens have always had a weakness for Granger women."
As he came around the chair, into her line of sight, Rose recognised the man in front of her in the face of his son.
"You're Corwin's father," she whispered, surprised to the soles of her feet.
Her captor gave a mocking bow. "Cormac McLaggen, at your service, Miss Granger."
Rose had never been formally introduced to her former lover's father, but she remembered him escorting his son to King's Cross every year with his stunningly beautiful wife on his arm. She also recalled how Corwin and he had been rather stiff and formal with each other during those interactions; there had been no good-bye hugs from his dad, only his mum. She'd always wondered why that was.
Well, now she knew: the elder McLaggen was clearly off his nut.
With a wry smirk, Rose corrected him. "It's Weasley. Granger is my mother. And, if you're really at my service, Mister McLaggen, then you'd release me from the Immobilization spell and let me on my merry way."
Cormac's grin widened, giving him an almost boyish cast to his features, despite the fact he looked... Wait, he didn't look like an old geezer at all. He should be at least as old as her dad, right? They'd gone to school together. So, why did Corwin's father appear to be only a decade or so older than his son, at the most?
"Clever, witch, but I don't think so," he replied to her request. "Tonight is a special night – one you're not soon to forget." He reached out and bopped the tip of her nose with his finger in a condescending gesture. "You've got a front row seat to one of the rarest events on the planet, my dear, so you just sit back and enjoy."
What the hell? He was treating her as if she were some sort of child!
As she really considered the man before her then, with his arrogant smirk and features that Corwin would clearly mirror in a few years, it suddenly occurred to Rose that she knew almost nothing about her former lover's family. In fact, as she thought on it, it struck her as quite peculiar that Corwin had rarely talked about his parents back during their school days, or even after, once they'd started dating. And he hadn't brought her home to meet his mum and dad, either. Why was that?
She knew from the gossip over the years that her boyfriend –ex, now, although she had yet to officially break it off with him– had moved out of his ancestral home and into his own flat quickly after their Hogwarts graduation... as in, he'd buggered out only a few days after receiving his acceptance letter from the Magpies. Perhaps he'd had –still did have?– a strained relationship with his parents, and that was the reason for his quick departure from their house, as well as for the fact that he'd rarely mentioned them or brought anyone around?
One thing was for certain: family wasn't one of Corwin's priorities. She knew he didn't care a whit for Scorpius, his own cousin. In fact, Cor had avoided Slytherin's former Prince like the plague when they'd been in school, and they'd been Quidditch rivals. Rose had always assumed that was because Corwin had been raised to behave that way due to the Malfoy's prior associations during the war, but maybe there was another reason-
-like, something having to do with the slightly demented wizard standing in front of her right now.
"So, what's the big plan?" she asked, trying to keep Cormac talking. Her father had always told her that, for a kidnapped victim, buying time from their assailant by keeping them distracted was essential, as it allowed authorities a chance to catch up. She'd squawk his ears off if it would give her family or Scorpius a chance to ride in to her rescue. "You going to make me watch while you do bizarre things to your chained up son?"
Cormac slapped her hard enough to turn her head and make her ears ring.
"My wife thought being mouthy and irreverent was funny at first, too." He began unbuttoning his crisp, white dress shirt. "She soon learned her place, as will you. Once the Veela ritual is finished, and my son makes you his mate, I'll coach him in the matter. He looks to me now for answers, just as I always knew he would, eventually."
Rose spit her disdain at his feet, trying to hide her trepidation. A queer, hollow sensation had opened up in the pit of her stomach and was beginning to turn her insides around. "I told you, you bastard, my last name is Weasley! And what are you talking about? What Veela ritual? Corwin's not-"
Her words arrested in her mouth as the elder McLaggen opened his shirt and let it slip from his bulky shoulders. He was utterly striking, his body that of a man in his late-twenties, not a man who should be in his fifties. A pair of black and gold feathered wings –Veela wings– unfolded from his back and spread out behind him. His curly, golden hair grew out and fell to his shoulders, and that peculiar dark nimbus that all male Veela drew around their bodies cast his luminous skin in shadow. His eyes shone through the gloom, though, sparkling like the sun - not a swirling, liquid silver, but golden and filled with fire, like molten lava. The curved fangs of a mature Veela male separated his lips, their length making it impossible for him to fully close his mouth.
Oh, shit.
"Our son transitions tonight," he stated with an eerie smile. That conflux of voices that Rose was now so very familiar with hearing indicated that the man and his inner beast were one. "He comes into his heritage – and finally takes his mate."
Oh, fuck.
All of Scorpius' earlier warnings about Rose's vulnerability –warnings that had seemed far-fetched and impossible before– now slammed home. "There are other Veela going through the Transition this year," he'd told her. "Unless I give you the Second and Third Marks, and finish this mating between us soon, another Veela can claim you at any time, if they want you - and they might not be so considerate of your demands for them not to force the Marks on you. It would be rape, and it would be a permanent bond. 'Til death do you part."
"You can't do this!" she shouted, panic taking her over her mouth. "I'm... I'm Scorpius Malfoy's mate! He's given me the First Mark, and I've already accepted him!"
Cormac moved so fast, Rose's terror levels shot through the roof. He was suddenly in front of her, bending down with his face pressed into the curve of her shoulder, inhaling her scent. "Yes, you smell of another Veela," he agreed, his lips hovering over her ear, "but we know you haven't yet conceived." His nose travelled down her body, sniffing her under her arms, between her cleavage, between her tightly-clamped thighs, and at the backs of her knees. Finally, he looked up at her again, and the grin he threw her was unpleasant and frightening. "You've fucked him, that's all. No Second or Third Marks."
Standing to his full height once again, he stared down at her, his head jerking in that strange bird-like mannerism of a Veela. "It's poetic justice that you are destined for our son, because your mother had always been destined to be our mate when she was your age. We'd already decided upon Hermione Granger during her sixth year, and had tried courting her to win her over early, but she'd continually dodged us then." His lips curled with disdain, his fists clenched at his side, and his fangs elongated with growing aggression. "Then, she'd slept with that Malfoy brat and given him what should have been ours! We knew, because we'd watched them playing coy with each other after that - casual touches in the corridors, heated glances across the dining hall. He was smitten like a young Crup over her, and she with him. It was obvious what they'd done!"
He leaned down until he was in her face, placing both hands over her much smaller wrists. The tips of his fingers, she noted, had sharp, bird-like talons, and he used them to heighten her terror, menacing her with them even as he stroked over her skin with a lover's gentle caress.
Rose's terror levels hit the roof. Her heart hammered so hard in her chest that she was afraid she'd go into cardiac arrest on the spot.
"We'd hated your mother for making us into the fool, and spent years trying to forget her with other witches," he continued his tale, "but we could never stop wanting her. She was like a splinter under our skin. Every article in the paper about her drove us mad. Every glimpse of her in Diagon Alley made us desperate to have her. And we were right to feel so! Upon our transition, it was her that the magic chose for our match - her face we saw in our mind's eye. She'd been meant to be ours!" He shut his eyes and his expression scrunched up with pain. His nails bit into her skin, breaking through. Tiny pinpoints of blood welled to the surface. "But the vision changed to our second mate's… because the magic knew… it knew Hermione was already pregnant with you, and that she could not be ours!" He withdrew his claws, and slammed his hands down on the wood of the chair to either side of her knees in frustration. "We'd lost her again because of her whoring ways!"
Rose hadn't been sorted Gryffindor, but right then, her parents' fiery heritage was beginning to burn in her mouth. She was suddenly very angry. Angry that her respectable mother had been called a whore. Angry that she'd been kidnapped by a man whose fixation on her mum had led to Rose being kidnapped and tied down like some sort of ridiculous sexual sacrifice. Angry that Corwin had been similarly abused, and for the same reasons. Angry that she'd been forced into this whole Veela mating crap thing against her will, and that she was nothing more than a pawn in a sick game of biological obsession.
She spit in Cormac's face. "My mother is a good woman, you sick fuck! Just because you're not man enough for her doesn't mean you get to impugn her honour. And as for me… you can take your Veela mating shit and shove it where the sun doesn't shine, because I chose Scorpius Malfoy and his Veela for my own, and no amount of force is ever going to change my feelings for him!"
Like a bi-polar switch had gone off in his skull, Corwin's father's temper was suddenly icy calm. Wiping her spittle from his cheek, he did no more than give her a placating smile. "We'll see about that," he stated. In a blink, he was standing at his unconscious son's side, staring down at his boy. "He's going to fuck you into the floor tonight and get you with our grandson, and by tomorrow morning, you'll be begging him for more." He smirked with supreme confidence as he said, "We may have lost the chance to be with Hermione Granger when it was our turn to have her, but at least our son will not lose this chance to have her daughter." He reached down and petted Corwin's golden head. "One of us will have a Granger witch in our lifetime… and then this offensive curse will be broken once and for all."
Rose knew then that she wasn't dealing with a man who was wholly sane. Something was broken in Cormac McLaggen and his Veela, and she wasn't sure she was getting out of tonight's kidnapping with her life if the man's son rejected her, or vice-versa.
"Why doesn't anyone know what you are?" she asked, changing tactics. "How could you possibly keep such a secret from the Malfoys? They should have sniffed you out a long time ago at some Christmas in-law family dinner or something."
The elder McLaggen's smirk widened, and his tone filled with haughtiness as he glanced over at her, and then beyond her to something high up on the wall. "You'll find out in... about four minutes."
Oh, God, she thought, feeling her anger dissolve again in the face of a growing alarm. Corwin was going to go through his transition right now! What should she do? How could she break the binding upon her to get free before then? Truthfully, she'd always been shite at wandless spells, so the chances of her getting free without a wand in her possession were practically nil. Still, there had to be something she could do…
Think, THINK!
She concentrated, trying to move even something as little as her pinkie finger. No luck.
Rose may have been sorted a Ravenclaw, and creative solutions had always been her forte, but in this scenario, she had to admit that the chips were seriously stacked against her.
McLaggen turned to the magical portrait over his shoulder. "Pontus, go fetch our mate. It's time."
Pontus... Pontus… where had Rose heard that name before?
The elder wizard in the portrait walked out of the frame.
"Let me go, please," she pleaded, no longer prideful enough as to be above such things. Her horror of being mated to someone other than Scorpius and her Veela fuelled a level of desperation in her that brought her near to tears. "I'm Scorpius' mate! He chose me, and… and I chose him! You can't take us away from each other. It's cruel and wrong on every level!"
"You won't think so once it's done," Cormac asserted without reservation. "In fact, you'll feel quite satisfied with the new arrangement, I'm quite sure." He plucked his wand up from the nearby bedside table and pointed it at his son. "Rennervate.
Corwin came to in a jerking motion. "F-father? Wha-?" He seemed confused with his surroundings and then with the fact that his arms were bound.
He yanked on the chains and opened his mouth, clearly to demand an explanation, but before he could utter a word, he jerked again and his eyes flared wide. A golden light spilled from between his lips and began emanated from his body, surrounding him… and then he began screaming. His back bowed off the mattress.
"The Manifestation begins," his father ritualistically intoned and stepped back.
As the howling went on and on, stopping at irregular intervals for Corwin to draw rapid, panting breaths before launching into another round of pain-filled yelling, Rose's heart went out to her former lover. He writhed around on the bed as much as the chains allowed; his pain was seemingly all-encompassing and unending. He shook and jolted as the magical aura around him shifted, changing through every colour of the rainbow before returning to that stunning sheen of gold she'd seen earlier.
Corwin's mother hurried into the room from elsewhere within the house, dressed as all pureblood women of her station: in a conservative, high-necked witch's dress that fell to her wrists and ankles and fashionable, square-heeled shoes that allowed for no glimpse of bared toes. Her hair and make-up were perfect, her jewellery expensive and gaudy. She was the epitome of a high society dame... except she was clearly an emotional wreck. She stayed far away from the bed, closer to the door, as if afraid to come in, but there were tears in her eyes as she watched her son's suffering. At one point, she even cupped a hand over her mouth to stifle a sob.
In exact opposition, Corwin's father stood a placid, silent sentinel over his boy's bed, a smile of triumph across his lips as he watched his son struggling in agony.
At one point, Corwin began crying, so great was his agony. He looked to his father with blue eyes pale and pained, silently entreating for help, but nothing but garbled grunts and moaning came out when he opened his mouth.
"Stop it, please," Rose whispered. "Make it stop! Give him something for the pain, at least!" When Cormac McLaggen scoffed at her suggestion, she snarled at him, "What kind of monster are you? You're his father! Help him!"
Cormac raised a golden eyebrow at that. "I have a better idea: why don't you help him."
His wand waved in her direction, and the Freezing Charm was released.
Rose slumped in her chair with relief, but Corwin's distressing shouting soon had her up on her feet. He was still her friend, no matter that things hadn't worked out between them, and she intended on helping him – even if it meant a temporary borrowing of her parents' reckless Gryffindor bravery to achieve that aim.
Clutching her towel around her to assure it stayed in place, she made a mad dash across the distance to try to take Cormac's wand from him. He easily deflected her with a twitch from his wand, however, having anticipated her move. She was rather forcefully pushed towards the bed by an invisible hand, where she summarily fell in an ungraceful heap across Corwin's body.
The moment her skin touched his, Cor's cries abruptly cut off, to be replaced by small, plaintive whimpers instead.
Struggling for leverage, Rose managed to move her body off of Corwin's and keep her towel from slipping with a frantic grip. Her former lover began screeching again in pain the moment she was no longer in contact with him.
"Touch him," Corwin's mother implored, wringing her hands, tears streaming down her narrow, rouged cheeks. "You're clearly to be his mate. He needs your touch. It'll calm him and make it easier."
"I'm not-" she protested, but the sounds of Corwin's continued agony became too much to bear. She glared over at his father. "You evil, manipulative bastard! Give me the wand, if you're not man enough to help!"
Resolutely, the older man shook his head and stepped back, out of reach. "Lie with him if you're friend enough to care," he countered.
Recognising the futility of trying to snatch the man's wand –he was just too damned fast– Rose was resigned to trying anything to help in any other way she could. She took a seat at her ex's side and reached out to hold his hand. Maybe... maybe this would help him. Merlin knew, no one deserved to suffer as Corwin was suffering.
The instant her fingertips met his, Cor's wailing ceased and he collapsed into the mattress, boneless and panting, as if he'd been given a temporary reprieve from the pain.
"Oh, Cor," she whispered, recognising the truth. He really did love her, enough that his Veela had clearly chosen her for his mate already. She knew because his magical aura now resonated with hers, much the same as Scorpius' did; she could feel its gentle melding with hers where their skin connected.
"The Manifestation is complete," Cormac stated. "Now comes the Emergence."
Rose was about to ask what in the hell that would entail, when to her utter surprise and horror, she actually felt the next waves of changes already occurring under her fingertips: in a series of loud popping noises, Corwin's bones seemed to thicken, and the muscles, tendons, and ligaments around them to become firmer.
He gripped her hand tight, his eyelids fluttering open to stare at her in shock. "Hurts," was all he could choke out before the transformation of his physical body really began.
In disbelief, she watched as the skin of his arms and legs stretched to accommodate powerful muscle building under the skin. Through the top split in his robe, she noted the ridges of Cor's abs became even more defined, and his great ribs expanded as his body adjusted. His jaw firmed up, removing the last of his baby fat, and the cords in his neck stood out, seeming almost bull-like. He hardened all over, every angle slightly sharpening, becoming stronger.
Even more shocking to her, however, was when his erection came to life, pushing through the lower split in his robe. It grew taut, standing straight-up between his legs with proud arousal. It rippled as an inch, and then two of muscle and flesh were added beyond its original size, making him longer than he'd been before. For deeper penetration, she guessed. His penis thickened, too, giving it a wider girth, and heavy veins lined the underside. It twitched and darkened as it became engorged with blood.
Rose was unable to look away, despite her best intentions to do so. It seemed as though Corwin had unintentionally grabbed a hold of her magical aura and done to her what his father had done earlier with his spell: he'd temporarily immobilized her. Worse, when she tried to close her eyelids to shut out the sights before her, an odd compulsion forced her to reopen them and to watch. It was as if she had no will of her own for those few minutes.
Corwin tilted his head back as far as it could go on the pillow, opened his mouth, and let out a low moan. The sound was coupled with the same trilling-purring sound that Scorpius usually made when he was well pleased. His hand tightened around hers, his pelvis undulated... and suddenly his cock released all that pressure in a magnificent explosion. Wet, sticky seed shot all over his lower half in powerful spurts as he came with a satisfied cry.
His pleasure was unstoppable then; it went on for long minutes as he continued to orgasm all over himself. His hips tensed, released, and thrust upwards in a rhythm that simulated the sex act, as if he were fucking an invisible lover, and he ejaculated every few moments in another rush of erotic sensation and a series of impassioned sounds.
"Rose," he groaned as he came for the fourth time, creamy, white come flowing from the heavy, swollen head of his cock, dripping down his long length to bath him in his essence. "Rose... Need you... Please."
For a long while, his body continued to go through its freaky sexual liberation, even as it continued to physically evolve. The orgasming got to be a predictable event; Rose could tell when Cor was about to climax again when a strong tremor rocked his flanks hard enough for her to feel it in her own thighs as she sat on the bed next to him. The entire thing was frightening and uncomfortable, honestly. She felt like a voyeur to a very private scene, and didn't want to think about Corwin in such a manner any longer. She didn't want to be forced to remember the beginning of their relationship, when they'd been hot for each other and she'd become wet just looking at him. Things had changed since then, and she didn't want to consider her former lover as anything but an ex ever again.
She was determined to fight against whatever it was Corwin's biology was trying to force upon her.
Using every bit of her concentration, she attempted to do what Theodosis Black had done and redirect her magical energies to shut off Corwin's hold over her. Sweat dripped down her forehead and beaded above her upper lip as she focussed all of her mental fortitude to the task of regaining her body's autonomy in such a manner.
It took an intense effort, but after half an hour Rose was able to shut her eyes and retake some independence of movement. Shaking from head to toe, fighting off the feel of Corwin's lusty, affectionate aura stroking against hers, she moved to disentangle his hold on her hand. Unfortunately, he defied her attempts, squeezing tighter to lock her in place. She increased her struggles... and he increased the pressure. Eventually, their battle of wills caused his grip to become quite painful, and that's when Rose began imploring him to let her go and truly struggling to get away. Corwin held fast, however, and she was unable to break free.
"Please," she wept, tears streaming down her cheeks, "let go, Cor. You're really hurting me!"
Corwin's body went stone-still a beat later. All of the shifting under his skin abruptly ceased, and his hips lay motionless against the mattress. No more ejaculations were forthcoming from the rigid, inflexible stalk of flesh between his legs, either. Instead, a golden, soft light began to throb around him, encasing him, giving the impression that he was contained in some sort of light-based cocoon.
"The Presentation, at last," Cormac intoned. "The cossettan is split and he comes."
The strange, magical chrysalis that surrounded Corwin split down the exact middle, and a particle wave of heat and light burst outwards from its dissolution. Its energy passed through Rose like a wave rolling over the shoreline... and her body reacted, becoming instantly aroused. Her womb clenched, and her pussy ran wet with instant, acute need.
Even as the scent of her sexual musk filled the air, Rose clapped her free hand over the area of her core, embarrassed by her body's response. However, like Corwin's earlier arousal, her own was difficult to stop once it had started. It was as if their roles had been reversed. Her clit throbbed as her pulse pounded through it, and her internal muscles rippled and rolled as her desire swelled. Resenting the forced pleasure, she fought off her orgasm as best she could, but she was exhausted from the day's intense physical and mental activities, and her body had no choice in the end but to give in. With a cry of despondency, she tossed her head back and climaxed.
Her peak was short-lived, thankfully, and very soon she was panting and crashing back to the earth, tears of helplessness and frustration wrung from her eyes.
By her side, Cor's chest suddenly expanded as he took a deep, full breath, his lungs filling with air. He sniffed at the same time, scenting the air... and released a loud, rumbling purr of pleasure that thrilled the room. "Mate," he hissed, his eyes snapping open and zeroing in on her.
Oh, God, no.
Corwin's Veela had finally awoken.
Biting her lip, Rose renewed her struggles to get away, this time with greater fervency, her panic fuelling her attempts. When she managed to disentangle her hand from his sweaty grip and slipped away, he flexed with a strength she'd have never guessed he could possess and broke the chain that held his wrist secured to the bed. The half-inch, thick link snapped like it was made of the thinnest, weakest of metals, and fell with a clank off the side of the bed. Then, in a quick snatch-and-grab, he recaptured her hand.
"Our mate!" Corwin and his Veela sounded triumphant.
"Let go!" she begged, becoming hysterical for the first time in her life. She tugged hard against his hold, trying to escape, scratching and digging her nails into his flesh to get him to let her loose. "I'm Scorpius' mate! I chose him!"
She heard another set of links snap and knew Corwin's arms were now both free. She knew what this meant for her.
"Please, don't do this!" she beseeched, even as he yanked her towards him. She collided against his steel-hard chest at the same moment her towel slipped to her waist.
"Mate," Corwin and his Veela combined purred against her ear, their voices merged. "We see you in our mind's eye, even without the ritual's completion. You are ours!"
A strange, wonderful scent permeated the air then, saturating Rose's every sense: the crisp, clear fragrance of a Scottish forest in early spring, coupled with the intoxicating scent of leather and the musk of sweat. It reminded her of Hogwarts and Quidditch, and that sense of safety she'd found within the fortress of her childhood. It lulled her with the memories of flying and the freedom she'd found riding the air currents and touching the sky.
It drew her in, like a shiny lure on the end of a hook...
"No, don't do this!" she cried, fighting against his Veela magic, pushing in vain against his chest as his arms held her in a formidable embrace. "Stop! I don't want this, Cor! I don't want you!"
She felt his magic like a tingle of electricity across her skin, and the last two chains fell free with finality. Completely unfettered at last, Corwin flipped her onto her back into the centre of his bed and mounted her.
"NO!" she shouted, as he pressed his nose into her neck and inhaled...
He paused, and a snarl of absolute fury left his lips, startling her.
"I smell him on you!" he growled, the crush of his body nearly suffocating as he pressed her into the mattress. "A male. His scent covers you!" His nose followed the path of her body down under her breasts, under the pits of both arms, at the bends of her elbows, dipping into her bellybutton, and lower still.
Rose struggled to push Corwin off, but he was so incredibly strong and his hold was completely undeterred. She was the ant fighting to push back the hurricane, her efforts completely futile.
At the top of her pelvis, Corwin halted and jerked his head back, snarling with greater savagery. In that bobbing, bird-like fashion of the Veela, his attention shifted to her face and he stared at her with angry eyes swirling gold. In that moment, his Veela transformation finally became manifest. His hair lengthened to his shoulders, giving it a slight curl much like his father's. His skin gained a luminous patina, even as dark shadows were drawn about him from the corners of the room. His eyes glowed in that eerie fashion of Veela males, and his wings stretched out wider than the bed - golden with brass-coloured tips. He flapped them once to signal his great irritation, creating a powerful breeze that blew out the wicks on the candles nearby, making the room darker still.
As Rose's terror levels ratcheted to heights previously never encountered before, Corwin moved back up her body with clear resolution. When he was even with her mouth, he locked onto her gaze with a determination she'd never seen in him before.
"Who was it? Was it our cousin?"
When Rose didn't reply, terrified that if she opened her mouth he'd try to give her the First Mark, he tightened his grip on her wrists and shook her.
"It was our cousin, wasn't it? We smell his seed inside you!" he thundered. "You let him fuck you! You let him have what was ours!"
A whimper of distress escaped her throat, and Rose shut her eyes again, and prayed that her mother or father or Scorpius would find her soon.
"It matters not, son," Cormac proclaimed from his position near the bed.
Corwin's head snapped up, as if he was just now aware of witnesses to his mating. He hissed at his father in warning.
"She is your to take," his father continued. "He did not give her the final Marks. Claim her."
"Stay away," he warned, baring long, vicious teeth. "She's mine!"
Cormac stepped back again and held his hands up to show his intention not to harm or interfere. "Yes, son, she is yours. Take her."
"Corwin McLaggen, don't you dare!" Rose refused him, her anger making her brash. "I'll never forgive you!"
He turned back and stared at her in silence for a good, long moment.
"What makes you think I care?" his Veela asked. That bizarre conflux of voices was suddenly absent, announcing to her that the beast had taken over Corwin's body completely, sublimating him.
Holy mother of Merlin, Corwin's Veela was a split entity like Scorpius' was! How was that even possible?
She grasped at straws. "Corwin loves me. He said he did! If that's true, he won't let you do this to me. He won't let you rape me and steal my choice in this! I trust him not to hurt me." It was a straight-up bluff, but it was all Rose could think of at that moment to continue to stall.
The Veela's head jerked again, and he stared down at her through narrowed, contemplative eyes.
"I saw you, you know," he stated, a threat hinting at the edges of his biting tone. "That night back in school, when you fucked my cousin. I watched you, just as that dark-haired witch did. I nudged Corwin to follow her when she followed the two of you down into the dungeons." His lip curled with biting cynicism. "I watched that selfish runt take you against the wall like a common whore." He frowned, as if he were bothered by what he was about to say next. "Corwin was heartbroken. He'd fancied you for years, but after that, he'd wanted to stay away from you. He tried to get over you by dating other females. Me..." His cruel smirk was back in place. "I just wanted you even more, my dirty, little slut." He shrugged. "Unfortunately, my host had control of the body then, so we did it his way for a few years." His smirk bloomed until he resembled a shark, all gleaming, white teeth. "Not anymore, though."
Rose shook at his implication. "Corwin, stop him, please!" she begged, pushing against his hold on her wrists. They tightened even as his hips dropped and he spread her thighs apart with his legs. "I'm in love with Scorpius and his Veela! I'm sorry, but... it's true. I can't be with you like this! I'm Scorpius' mate!"
The Veela's gaze turned inward, and he frowned again, and Rose recognised the expression as one Scorpius often wore when he and his Veela were internally arguing. The debate was short-lived however, as the Veela's attention shifted back to her and he shoved his cock between her legs, seeking entrance.
Rose fought him in earnest then, bucking wildly, twisting and turning as far as she could. Corwin's Veela was not to be deterred, however, and all her struggles only allowed him the one thing he'd wanted from the start: a way in. He shoved hard, and was suddenly inside her to the hilt.
Rose screamed and began crying.
"No! Please, Cor, don't do this! PLEASE, STOP!"
The Veela's mouth dropped to her throat. "You are finally mine," he claimed, and without further ado, he bit her.
Something in Rose short-circuited. There was a shift in her magical energies again, and she screeched as her body went haywire, every nerve ending exploding with fire as Corwin's Veela skipped giving her the First Mark, and went right to the Second. The pain was incredible – beyond anything she'd ever known.
All the lights in the room went out, plunging them all into stygian blackness.
"Stupefy!" she heard a woman shout out twice in quick succession, and then Corwin went completely slack and slumped atop her with his full weight, temporarily knocked-out. A second later, he was being shoved and rolled off of her.
Someone took hold of her arm, and with a thunderous crack, Rose was Apparated away to safety.
X~~~~~X
Rose and her rescuer popped back into existence outside a townhouse on an unfamiliar street in an unknown city just seconds later.
She glanced up to learn the identity of her saviour...
It was Corwin's mother, Daphne McLaggen. The woman looked as if she might faint, her face pale and sweaty, her eyes wide with fear.
She held fast to Rose's arm and tugged her up the stone steps to the solid, black door of the townhouse, frantically knocking upon it, uncaring that it was now late at night and most of the street was asleep in their beds. A minute or two later, a tall, reedy wizard with a full head of white hair answered the door. He took one look at the two women, and herded them inside.
"What happened?" he asked, shutting and locking the door behind them and angling them all for his sitting room.
As they were seated on an antique, well-worn sofa, the man conjured a lap blanket from a nearby chair and spread it out with a twitch of his wand. It fell over Rose's shoulders, covering her nudity.
"Corwin's transition. It's as we suspected all along," Lady McLaggen stated, as if that explained everything.
Apparently, it did, because the wizard's eyes filled with the light of understanding. "You Stupefy'd them both, I take it?"
The witch nodded, her wand hand shaking.
He turned to look at Rose, his gaze clinical in its assessment. "That won't put them down for long. Ten minutes at the most. They'll both be up and feral after that, and then..." He shook his head. "She can't stay. Your son will follow the magical trace here, and you know what that will mean." He reached out to tilt Rose's head so he could look into her eyes. "And she needs medical help. Her aura's way off the charts. I can't fix this, love."
"I sense it," the other woman said, "It's only a matter of time for her, I know. Oh, Theo, I shouldn't have come here, and I'm sorry. I've put you in danger. I just didn't know where else to go! His Veela... my son's Veela had taken over, like my husband's does. He was raping her!"
"W-w-where are w-we?" Rose asked while huddling under the woolen blanket, feeling her energy draining away. Her body was cold from head to toe, her teeth rattled her skull with their chattering, and the echo of residual pain made her bones ache deep within the marrow. She was beginning to mentally drift, too, her consciousness catching the words but taking a few moments to register what was being said. Something was very wrong...
The wizard shook his head as if her question were unimportant. "Do you have a safe place you can go, one that's protected by strong magic? A place where there will be enough wizards and witches to protect you in case you need to stop a rampaging Veela?"
Rose's first thought was the Malfoys, but what came out of her mouth was The Burrow instead.
"The Weasleys. Good choice," Theo stated with a nod. "Come, we need to go. No time. He'll be right behind you once he wakes up."
"Some clothes-"
Theo shook his head. "No time!" he insisted. "I have to scrub your signature or he'll find this place. We need to shift it to her family's residence." He grabbed a hold of Rose and yanked her to her feet. "Sorry, but the blanket will have to do for now. Your grandparents will get you into something warm once you get there.
Before Rose could protest, she was pulled over to the Floo. Theo thrust some sparkly green powder into her hand. "Call out for The Burrow. Stay there. I'll send word to Draco and his family, and to the Aurors."
The world blurred before Rose's eyes, and she started to tip over, her knees giving out. The Floo powder fell from her hand to the floor. Lady McLaggen caught her before she hit the ground, thankfully.
She coughed up blood.
"Shit," Theo swore. "You're going to have to go with her."
There was some more movement, but Rose was feeling decidedly too ill to pay much attention. She shut her eyes and leaned into the soft embrace holding her up.
"Meet you later, if I can," Theo promised them.
An instant later, Rose was travelling through the Floo to The Burrow. The nauseating feeling of being pulled and compacted loosened her stomach, and she vomited up everything in her belly, including more blood, on the way in to her next destination.
X~~~~~X
With a jarring halt, they arrived at The Burrow, the familiar smell of rosemary and lemon verbena filling Rose's nose.
Corwin's mother started shouting for help.
The sound of pounding feet answered. It grew louder as people rushed down the stairs from the higher levels, and then voices were raised in consternation as they entered the room and were greeted with the unexpected sight of Rose naked except for a blanket, and both she and Lady McLaggen covered in blood and vomit.
"Rosie!"
Her father's alarm made fresh tears flood Rose's eyes. "Daddy," she whispered, feeling raw and vulnerable, weakly reaching for him.
Her father took her in his arms from Corwin's mother, and carried her over to the comfortable couch that she'd loved to laze upon during warm summer nights as a child. With careful and gentle discretion, the blanket she'd been provided was wrapped tighter around her by gentle hands.
"Merlin Almighty, Petal, what-?" her grandfather exclaimed, coming into the room and also noting her state. He sat at her father's side, gently turning her head to inspect her injuries. "You're bleeding. Who did this to you? Good God, are those... bite marks?"
Her father made a strangled sound.
As her grandfather's wand cleaned her up and healed the injury at her throat, Rose's body once more went into a state of heightened shock. Her tremors increased as, an inch at a time, at a rate that was faster than anticipated, she felt her body begin to shut down.
Instinctively, she knew her body was having an adverse reaction to having been given the First Mark by Scorpius but the Second Mark by Corwin. Somehow, her magical energies had been twisted up by being claimed by two different Veelas.
She felt like she was dying. Maybe she actually was.
"Grandpa, I need mum! Please get mum!" she cried, knowing her mother would be able to help. If anyone in this world understood the issues of Veela mating, and would be quick to find solutions, it would be her mother.
"Roz, what happened?" her father whispered, sounding strangely vulnerable and scared.
"Scor," she whimpered, using the last of her energies. "Find Scor... Please."
Her father secured his hold around her, and with ancient strength borne of a paternal need to protect, he got to his feet and carried her to the Floo. "We need to get you to the hospital first, but I need to know if I can Floo you or if we can Apparate. How bad is it, baby?"
Rose's consciousness was slipping away. Tired, she rested her head on her father's shoulder and began to give in to the allure of oblivion.
"His Veela... he went mad..." she whispered, the effort of speaking just that little taking the last of her strength. The world began to go mute. Voices were talking, arguing, but her brain couldn't interpret the words any longer. Every bit of her hurt, from the soles of her feet to the top of her head. It hurt just to breathe.
Her heart beat was a slowing rhythm in her chest, drowning out everything else.
Thump-thump.
Thummp-thummp.
Thummmmp-thummmmp.
Rose let go and was swallowed up by the dark.
TO BE CONTINUED...
AUTHOR'S NOTES:
Did you see that coming, dear reader? What do you think is going on with Cormac, Daphne, Theo, and all of the Veela? How as it that the Malfoys never knew? Stay tuned to find out...
Please review!