His Veela Heritage by RiverWriter

chapter 17

Draco was standing in his bathroom at the Manor, halfway undressed, before he realized that he'd effectively just abandoned Hermione alone with his parents. Well, not alone, there was his aunt and the werewolf baby. But he doubted she would appreciate that distinction, she'd surely concentrate on the part where he'd just popped out of dinner without warning. No matter that it was her godson’s fault.

Sometimes having a mate was really difficult. He would have thought it would be easy, given that they were a perfect match. But she was Hermione. The woman was a force to be reckoned with and she would not be bribed, or bought, or distracted.

No, when he messed up she wanted him to genuinely apologize. She wanted him to be remorseful. She wanted him to change his behavior. Before his relationship with Hermione began he could have counted on his hands the number of times in his life he'd issued a genuine apology.

And even after he did all these things she usually made him suffer for awhile before she fully forgave him. For instance, the one time he'd accidentally called Teddy ‘werewolf baby’ out loud, she’d refused to let him touch her for hours. An entire afternoon he’d planned to spend snogging her had been lost to that slip of the tongue.

Oh well, the damage was already done. He'd just bathe and dress quickly and then pop back and throw himself at her mercy. He’d also have to keep an even sharper eye on the werewolf baby, because he had an evil streak.

Which is why Draco called him werewolf baby, not because of any lingering prejudice he still felt towards werewolves (people who lost their minds and turned into terrifying monsters once a month, what was there to be prejudiced about?) No, he called him that because, like werewolves, he had a hidden dark streak and his father happened to have been a werewolf. It was simply convenient.

Hermione didn’t agree, with the nickname or his reason for it, in her mind Teddy could do no wrong. Everything he did was adorable. But Draco knew the truth. Teddy considered Hermione to be his (that little outburst over dinner had been no surprise to him) and he was fully prepared to defend his territory. Draco had a long term plan to win him over (unlike Hermione, he was certain the kid could be bribed, he was part Black, after all), but until he could accomplish that he had to stay vigilant.

One moment of distraction at the shock of watching his father treat Hermione with respect, and he’d ended up wearing Teddy’s dinner and a very nice glass of wine. He’d been run out of his own house while the werewolf baby stayed behind with his mate. And he just knew he was going to be the one in trouble for it.

He finished showering, toweled off, and dressed in record time, carefully transferring the little box his jeweler had sent him earlier that week into an inner pocket in the new set of dress robes as he did so. He went back in the bathroom to fix his hair and shrieked when he caught a glance of himself in the mirror. His hair was pink.

Pink.

The sauce and the wine had dyed his hair pink. And it wasn’t even a consistent color. Sweet Salazar, he was spotted! He looked like he had a Pygmy Puff on his head!

He considered his options as he ran his fingers through his previously beautiful hair, examining it this way and that. Hopefully, a few more washings would return it to its former glory, but he didn’t know how long it would take, and he needed to get back to the glen. He could glamour it, but anybody sufficiently familiar with his magic, meaning Hermione and his parents for sure, would be able to tell he was wearing one and ask about it, which would defeat the purpose of wearing a glamour in the first place.

There was really nothing to be done. He closed his eyes and accepted his fate. What was one more humiliation?
He'd left his cloak behind so he simply twisted on the spot, back to the glen. He appeared in the entrance hall of the castle and went in search of his family.