𝕸𝖔𝖓𝖔𝖈𝖍𝖗𝖔𝖒𝖊

Act I - The Trials of Summer

Chapter 36 - The Truth of the Veela Part 1

"You might not believe it, but for the longest time, I never realised I was beautiful."

Harry sat at the kitchen table, with a teapot going. Fleur had an electric toaster, even though it was an old one, so he made them some toast and layered it with jam and strawberry. He hadn't quite gotten around to eating last night, not after the eye-opening discussion with Sirius, and Fleur looked like she could do with some breakfast.

Whether she ended up eating was an entirely different thing altogether.

Speaking of Fleur, she was sitting on the couch, looking like a mannequin. Granted, a very pretty mannequin, despite the dark marks around her eyes and her overall zombiesque experience. To be honest, even in this state, she looked a lot more fetching than any other girl he had set his eyes on.

"I know it's hard for you to believe that," she went on. "But I'm being honest. It might come across as fake to say that, but it's the truth. Papa always said he knew I'd be trouble from a young age. At first, I didn't know what he meant by that, but looking back, even he did not know what I could do."

"You lived with your father?"

She nodded. "I wasn't always Fleur Delacour. In fact, until my sixth year, I was Fleur Isabelle Zabini, daughter of Giuseppe Zabini. I was a pretty normal child. I was a nice, sweet young girl, an excellent student and friendly to all. But those innocent feelings of youth transformed once I hit puberty."

"I felt like I got hit harder than anyone I knew by that period of growth in my life. My body went into overdrive overnight as hormones bombarded me. Suddenly, I was a foot and a half taller and having… these," she cupped her breasts, and Harry felt his pants getting tighter. "I was wearing a C-cup bra. My hormones were out of control. I remember looking around at my classmates and wondering why they weren't being driven as insane as I was."

Something dark flickered across her face. "As if hormones had anything to do with what was happening to me."

Fleur looked away. "I could barely control myself. Couldn't think straight. I had this constant thirst that needed to be slaked, and I did the best I could to slake it. And it's not like that desire ever went away. I still feel as overcharged now as I did then. I just got a lot better at hiding it."

"By desire, you mean—"

Fleur glared at him.

Harry wisely shut up.

"I thought they were sexual at first. I tried my best to control those urges, but that was like fighting a tidal wave. These desires would not be stopped. They simply needed to be dealt with. Believe it or not, it took a while for me to get used to all the attention I received once my body filled out, to realise that these boys liked me as more than a friend."

Fleur eyed him. "I was very naïve, clearly, and it took a long time for me to accept the fact that all men reacted that way around me. I didn't realise my body had inadvertently placed me into the very adult game of sexual competition. I was still friendly and likeable, and this, combined with the fact that boys were flocking around me, had a startling effect. Girls came to me, wanting to learn my trade secrets. I didn't have any secrets, but that didn't dissuade them. It reached the point where even girls flocked around me, wanting to be my friend, and be on the receiving end of the attention I got. I became popular without even trying."

Harry arched an eyebrow but said nothing.

"Boys would keep telling me I was hotter than any of the other girls my age. While barely trying, I became well connected with the elite cliques and social circles of girls in Beauxbatons and I always went to the best parties. I saw how people would treat me, how they would do anything I wanted to gain my approval. Boys would preen and pose for me, and girls would include me in any juicy gossip. People would get nervous around me, even adults."

Harry opened his mouth, but she beat him to it.

"I know what you're thinking. It wasn't the Allure. At least, not the real deal. Until then, I was still a normal witch."

"I think Papa noticed it. Knowing my heritage, he probably feared it. He tried to tell me otherwise. But… it didn't work. Instead, I rebelled. I was drunk with power. It went to my head. Not that I became a huge, cocky bitch or anything…" she met Harry's eyes. "Well, maybe, but I think I was still friendly and positive. I've still got friends from Beauxbatons. But, I realised I could do whatever I wanted and get whatever I wanted. Without compulsions, love potions or imperius curses. I was superior. That was when… I gave in to my darker urges."

Harry noted the euphoric expression on her face but didn't comment.

"It was fun. Watching boys compete for my attention. Watching the girls, desperate to do what I could. If someone had a girlfriend, I could twist his feelings by showing a little skin. If a girl was content with her own beauty, I made her feel ugly. When boys tried to give me expensive gifts, I loved it. I loved them when they tried to be smooth and failed. I saw them destroy their friendships for my ephemeral attention."

Harry could feel it. The power rising within her. A predatory aura was oozing out of her. Something in him wanted to grab it and crush its proverbial throat. But the rational side of him couldn't help but wonder why Fleur was taking such a circuitous route.

"It… it was intoxicating," she breathed. "Seeing those girls burn in jealousy made me feel blissful. Seeing them frequent cosmetic shops, seeing them bitch behind my back, seeing them fuck their boys, in blind hope of keeping them safe from me. The jealousy, the agitation, the anxiety. It was better than whiskey. Their reluctance at leaving their boys in my presence, their fear hiding behind their scorn, their fury and their distress whenever their men flocked over to me, bending backwards for my attention…" her lips twisted in maniacal glee, "and finally, their dismay, their utter horror at finding out that no matter what they did, no matter how much they allowed their boys to fuck them, they'd always, always be inferior goods. Their men would have their bodies, but I'd rule their minds.I was the one that was superior. Me, the one that was untouchable. Me, the one thing they'd never get."

She sneered. "You should've seen them. The boys. The men. They said I was too hot. Too good. Not one of them tried to win me over. How could they, when they'd lose control in a flash?"

Her expression darkened again. "As years passed, I realised that my power had become my curse. I was arrogant, dismissive, haughty, and demanding. I discounted everything but my pleasure. My obsession with seeing my friends in distress led me to cast them aside. There were no limits to what I could do. I didn't care who I hurt. I was… demolishing people everywhere I went. And with that, came a stark realisation."

She met Harry's eyes. "I knew there was no man that could satisfy me. How could they, when they were already wetting themselves in the first ten seconds of my presence? It frustrated me. Something had to give."

"Then it happened."

Harry instinctively flinched. And when he spoke, his voice carried an undercurrent of anger.

"What?"

Her eyes regarded him obliquely for a moment before her lips thinned slightly. "It was during my sixth year. I danced with Dion at our Yule party. He was fit and firm and cute, but I wasn't looking for that by the point I met him. I… I dragged him back to my room. He was smitten with me, everyone was, and I made out with him. Screaming at that allure-struck loon to go longer. I was frustrated. Frustrated at never being able to feel spent. Frustrated at his inability to get me screaming. I don't know when, but something broke within me. I… I demanded more, and more, and more. His passion, his lust, his growing agony as his tool failed to keep up with his desperation. My control was slipping. My demand, my obsession, my hunger overwhelmed my sanity. I was very impatient. Something had to give."

The storm inside him surged higher and higher into his chest. But Harry made himself sit there without moving, breathing slowly and steadily. To hear about Veela killing their prey for food was one thing, but to hear her say it, describe it in vivid imagery…

He clenched his fists.

His eyes hardened.

Fleur saw it. He noticed the glistening tears at the edges of those blue eyes. She knew what her words were doing to him. They were doing her no favours, but she said them anyway.

"Go on," Harry said, his voice seething with intensity. "What happened to him?"

"Dion… he never saw it coming. So I took him. I felt this… something surge within me. Felt it feed on him, from his very soul, and mark it as my own. I left my own scars on his mind, a mark so deep that he'd thrust and thrust and thrust. He was bleeding and in inexplicable agony, but he kept on thrusting."

The storm in him pushed higher and higher, tingeing every thought flitting through his mind with the echo of its furious howl. His eyes blazed, and his nails were drawing blood. And yet he couldn't help but stand transfixed and stare at Fleur.

Her voice was histrionic. Her eyes were bloodshot, and glistening with tears, rolling down her cheeks. She could see what she was doing to him, the impression he was forming about her. Once a dear friend, Fleur would be lucky if he even recognized her as a person after this.

And yet, she did it anyway. As if letting him know how it felt was more important than anything else.

But… why?

"I didn't care!" She screamed. "His mind was shattering, he was screaming in agony, and yet he kept on thrusting. His mind was wrought with the horror of being unmade, his soul was screaming as I drank upon its despair. I didn't even know when his body had stopped moving in helpless acquiescence to his desires, when his lifeforce had flickered like a candle, when he was… when he was…"

Fleur froze.

As did Harry.

She met his eyes again. "It. Was. Orgasmic. I had never felt such pleasure. That last scream of pure horror, that realisation that his life was getting crushed, the terror of drowning in ecstasy. It was sweeter than honey. It burned me like firewhiskey, made me feel euphoric!"

She met Harry's eyes. "That's when I knew what I was."

"An apex sexual predator."

Fleur flinched as Harry used Bill's words to describe her. She was gripping the edges of the chair tightly. If Harry didn't know better, he'd have thought she was restraining herself from running away. Yet she stayed and kept talking, digging herself into an ever deepening hole.

"And then my life changed. Maman appeared." The way she said it, it was like she was using the vilest curse in the book. "Not my dotty, busy Maman. Not the woman that managed her business all over the continent, so busy that she could only see me once a week. No, my real Maman. Apolline Delacour."

The Black Widow, Bill, had called her. A woman, Sirius had described, that had built an empire across Europe, purely through seduction and manipulation.

And Fleur was her daughter.

Fleur Isabelle Delacour.

"I'm not sure what Maman did," she said in a low voice, "but they swept the entire matter under the rug. I now knew what I was, a Veela, and according to Maman, it was time for me to learn about my legacy. Become a successor to her empire. An empire that would be mine for the taking."

"And your father?"

Fleur met his eyes, albeit only for a second. "He refused to meet me. I thought it was because he was ashamed of what I had done. Of what I had become. Maybe that is true even. But Maman said, she said that Papa… Papa didn't want me to find that just being with me gave him wood. That is what I am, Harry Potter. A demon."

Harry flinched at that description. He knew what she meant. He took several slow, deep breaths, separating mind from body. He had thought he had heard the worst of it from Bill Weasley and had expected to understand it after hearing Sirius's commentary on Veela. But to stand there and listen as Fleur re accounted those deeds, to experience that alien, inhuman mindset of hers….

His stomach churned.

Part of him wanted to just walk away.

The rest of him was trying to tally this Fleur with the girl he knew. The girl that was shedding tears while tearing her heart open and admitting her sins out loud. The girl he thought of as a friend.

"I began living with my Maman. She changed my name from Zabini to Delacour. I got a new wand, one with my grandmuzzer's hair as a core, and it worked so much better after my… transformation. For the entire year, Maman taught me about being everything she was— a master seductress, a master manipulator. She taught me how to make others putty with just words. She showed me how enthrallment was a magic stronger and far more terrifying than even the Imperius curse. But… but the knowledge of what I had done didn't leave me. It haunted me, gave me nightmares. I did everything Maman asked me to, but I feared myself. Feared this… demon I know as the Allure. Feared my power. I.. I became private, hiding my own fears beneath my arrogance."

"I wanted freedom. But Maman wanted a successor. I wanted to not be a predator. My Allure wanted nothing else. I… I need an exit. And an exit appeared."

Harry had a sudden flash of insight. "The Triwizard Tournament."

Fleur gave him a wry grin. "The Triwizard Tournament. A thousand galleons. A career of my choice. A life away from Maman. So, I came to Hogwarts."

The pieces were slowly getting into positions. The picture was still incomplete, but it was clearer than ever before. Harry waited for her to finish.

"It wasn't easy, of course. How could it be, with my Allure active and flaring? It wasn't possible to hide what I was. Boys would get enthralled the moment I entered the room, like your friend Weasley."

Harry snorted, remembering Ron's shenanigans.

"But it was still better. I was away from Maman, and I immersed myself in Occlumency, using it to suppress the Allure. Madam Maxime helped me a lot with that. It did nothing against the passive Allure, but it made me feel… normal."

She paused and sniffed. "Well, as normal as it can be, in that large, cold, dark stone castle. Beauxbatons was so much better!"

Despite himself, Harry snorted.

Fleur grinned. "Then the tournament began, and then… you happened."

Harry wasn't sure how much he enjoyed being treated as a walking-talking catastrophe, but he let it pass.

"You… you made me angry. I zot, 'what is this boy thinking?'" Harry spluttered, and Fleur grinned, "he's just a leetle boy, and now that he got caught, he pretends the tournament is nozing? I forgot about you after that. Your performance in the tasks was… average, but you scored and kept up with the rest of us. Especially in the second task. I was so angry. The only time Papa came to see me, and I gave a most pathetic performance. Maman looked at me like I was a failure. I hated it. I hated her, but I hated being looked down upon even more. And then, you saved my sister. You, the illegal champion, this useless fourth-year, saved my sister when I couldn't."

She paused. "Then the third task happened, and everything went to hell."

Harry knew what she was talking about.

"I… I cannot describe how it felt on the receiving end of the cruciatus. I've always prided myself on being superior. Being strong. And then, screaming my lungs out like that, writhing on the ground while that putain — it was terrible. And then he kicked my wand away, called me weak, and then walked away. The vines slowly crept over my skin and dragged me into it. I wanted to scream, but my lips wouldn't move. I wanted to move my hand, to fight and escape, but my body was already out of control. I was down, bleeding wet, and defeated, and completely at the mercy of the vines."

She paused and gave him a soft smile.

"Then you came. I remember it. I remember feeling that warmth. It… it was warm. Like being in Paris. Like when Papa took me on those gondolas in Venice. Like… grapes. Like Gabrielle hugging me. I could breathe. I could — I was living again. You returned my wand in my hand. I heard you speak…"

She closed her eyes. "Keep her safe," you said.

She opened them, and Harry found them filled with tears. "Safe. I… I hated it. Being kept safe meant I was weak. That I needed protecting. You've no idea how many nights I've woken up, dreaming of that exact moment. Keep her safe! Keep her safe! Keep her safe! It reminded me of how weak I was. How— how—" Fleur struggled to find a word, but she got nothing appropriate. "I knew why you had done it, and I was grateful for it, and I hated myself for being grateful. I… AAAARRGGHH!"

She grabbed an empty teacup and smashed it against the floor. Harry silently cast a Reparo and replaced it. It made her scowl harder.

"I failed in the Triwizard, and with that, my options were gone. I didn't want to return to France to become my Maman's puppet again. And I needed a solution for my Allure."

"Gringotts," Harry concluded.

Fleur nodded. "Goblins are quite good at psychomancy. I wanted to become a wardmaster, and Gringotts hires the best of the best. Becoming a Gringotts employee meant receiving goblin-instruction on Occlumency. It was tough, but it allowed me to change, learn, and become better. I learned to redirect my urges to other things — wine, books, even ice-cream. I let this new phase of my life be my new focus. It wasn't great, but it would do. William was an annoyance, but I had dealt with his kind all my life. Worst-case scenario? I'd marry him. I knew the rules. He'd not be able to handle me, so I'd have to do the handling. Learn to be happy with being an average stay-at-home parent. Keep myself from destroying his poor, delicate ego. No, I'd be more dainty, more conservative. He'd not shake my world, but hey, who would? At least, I'd be away from France, from Maman, and from letting my Allure destroy everything I held dear." She exhaled. "I would not yield. I would not be conquered. My sight was clear, my virtue true, my focus... unyielding."

They had finally come full circle.

"Then you met me." Harry said.

"Yes," Fleur half-scowled. "You happened to me. Again."

Harry snorted.

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