Chapter Text
What if there was no light. Nothing wrong, nothing right.
Hazel had been walking around the slowly rebuilding ground of Hogwarts in a daze. According to Ron and Hermione, she had been walking in a daze since the final battle. She had been feeling off for a while now. Not that she would ever tell Ron or Hernione. She could almost feel their concern. No it was better for her to keep this a little secret. To keep quiet about the empty space in herself that she had been feeling for longer than the final battle. If Hazel was honest with herself, she would have been feeling nothing since her seventeenth birthday.
Of course the moment she thinks that, is the moment she gets dragged behind a hidden tapestry.
"mmhmm" is the only sound Hazel can make in her shock. It's not as if she couldn't try harder. Hazel had immediately recognized the perfume of her attacker. With a swift elbow in her attacker's ribs, she can finally shove him away.
"Have you finally lost your last two remaining brain cells or have they collectively decided to kill themself" Hazel whispers/shouts.
"No, I just needed to talk to you without thing 1 and thing 2 by your side" explains Draco in a far too calm voice. He is finally starting to look like himself again. Hazel knows that, now that Lucius is sent to Azkaban, Narcissa can help Draco without the interference of her husband. It's only been 2 months since Lucius' trial but Draco has become more calm and self assured.
"About?" Hazel's patience was wearing thin.
"Why aren't you looking for them?" Hazel was about to ask what he meant but Draco wasn't finished yet.
"Or just one of course. I could never figure it out with you. Not that I want to assume. You could be a member of a pack or just a duo bonding…" Hazel had to quickly interrupt Draco before he started sprouting more nonsense.
"What in Merlin's name are you on about?" Hazel asked. Draco stared at her as though she was the one sprouting nonsense.
"Don't tell me you don't know what I'm talking about" Draco's incredulous voice matched it's face.
"Does this look like a face in the know" Hazel had always been sarcastic but when someone made her feel stupid, her sarcasm took personal offense.
Before Hazel could ask more questions, Draco started pulling her towards the library muttering the whole way under his breath about stupid Gryffindors. Normally Hazel would have, at the very least, complained the whole time. But now Hazel stayed quiet. Normally Draco wouldn't let her live down the fact that the great Hazel Potter didn't know something, or he simply would have made fun of her until she would storm off, find Hermione and demand an explanation. So now she stayed quiet. Letting Draco drag her to the library for Merlin knows what.
~2~
Tony always had trouble sleeping but the past year was really testing the limit. Most nights he didn’t even try any more. When most people went to bed, Tony went down to his lab, improving the suit.
It wasn’t that Tony didn’t want to sleep, because god, he really did want to sleep. He wasn’t even picky anymore, not that he had ever been, but one night of peaceful sleep would be really nice.
He had once mentioned it to Pepper. Since then she had become some sort of mutated guard dog trying to make sure he slept. Her actions were noble but unhelpful. Whenever the clock hit midnight she fell asleep like Cinderella losing her ballgown.
Tony unfortunately knew how to fix his problem. It just wasn’t a solution he wanted right now. For the first time in his life, he felt like he had a hand on the steering wheel. But if he wanted to fix his problem, it meant that he would have to take his hand off the steering wheel while driving on ice. And Tony was terrified.
So not for the first time this summer, Tony lied when Pepper asked how his sleep was. With shame and guilt fighting with his arc reactor, he made his way back down the now well known road to his garage.
Today however, for the first time since he had been kidnapped, Tony pulled up his shirt-sleeve. There on his right arm below his elbow, was his heart. Not his literal heart but according to all the books he has read, his only reason to live.
He had always hated these marks. Never receiving any feelings or emotions through the bond. So Tony made the only conclusion he could make. Every single mark had rejected him or worse.
Naturally Tony had done what he is now known best for. He threw himself on every available bed and body he could find. It never quite filled the void but it made him feel a little less alone. Even if just for a few minutes.
The mark had been quiet again. Like it had been doing since May.
One year ago his pack mark started glowing. Tony got really excited for the first time. When he looks he let out a joyous laugh. Finally the pack had an omega. But the joy didn’t last.
It was only a day later when the mark started sending distress calls out. He had immediately started looking through J.A.R.V.I.S. hoping to find their pack omega. But before he could really start looking, Obie came and then Jericho and then, and then, and, then. When the dust had finally settled after Iron Man, in May, the mark had become quiet as well.
On days like this, he would start the day blaming his entire pack. He would give extra attention to the first and third alpha. He was the second alpha for a reason. He couldn’t deal with the whole pack responsibility. Even if the marks had been quiet. Well except the omega’s mark, but he had fucked that one up spectacularly.
With a huff and a puff Tony slumped down on the only chair in the garage. He hoped to never meet any of the pack, if any of them were still alive. He would only disappoint.
With that realization Tony vowed to focus only on Iron Man. He knew it wasn’t nice to Pepper but he seriously hoped this would break them apart. He knew she deserved far more than him as her boyfriend or even the salary she got from working for her.
Pepper was one of the only people who knew his pack was still alive. For Pepper her pack was a painful story. Her pack should have contained five people. One alpha, two beta’s, one omega and one delta. Unfortunately for Pepper only the delta was still alive. The beta hadn’t had the chance to meet any of her pack before tragedy struck and her alpha, omega and fellow beta had died. Pepper still didn’t know how it had happened and she had yet to meet her delta, but it wasn’t looking good.
~3~
“Read this. Read that. Only peruse this book if you have read this” Draco was doing a very good job in burying her under a mountain of books.
“Who says peruse these days” Hazel couldn’t keep the teasing out of her voice. So far Draco had been nothing but kind to her. She knows she shouldn’t be teasing him but for the life in her she couldn’t.
“I do and so does any well educated person. You wouldn’t know” Draco said with finality. He gave Hazel a faint smile. One Hazel would store in her mindplace for as long as she lived. Meanwhile Draco had started walking to another bookcase. These books seemed to be talking about souls while all the books that Draco had already given her were talking about bonds.
“Can’t you just tell me what’s wrong with me” Hazel all but begged. Draco turned around with a desperate yet soft look.
“I don’t know where to start. Merlin I don’t even know what you do and don’t know”
“Luna always says to start the story at the end”
“...”
“What? It works” says Hazel. The right eye of Draco has started to twitch. It seems as though he was debating with himself before he decided to throw caution in the wind.
“You need to find your mate or mates. Knowing you, it will most likely be a bloody pack you need” Hazel could only gape at him with an open mouth like a fish out of water.
“I beg your pardon, mate!” she finally shouted.
“Will you tone it down?” Draco shushed her. “You might be the savior of the wizarding world but I don’t think Madam Pince will care when you shout in the library”
Nothing seems to register as only one word kept repeating itself. Mates. Those words kept repeating in her head for the next three hours. She was still walking around in a daze but now it came from just one word.
That night, as the efforts of rebuilding Hogwarts before the school year was set to start again, Hazel lay in bed desperately trying to read all the books Draco had given her. Finally she understood. With a trembling hand she pulled up the sleeve of her night shirt. There they were, the weird symbols that appeared on her skin the night she turned seventeen.
Closest to her elbow were three symbols. The first was a red, white and blue star. The second was a weird diametrical shaped symbol that Hazal thought looked like a diamond. The third was a white wolf with a red star.
Hazel quickly looked back at her book on soulmates. According to this book, these three were the alphas of the pack. The star is the alpha in command, the diamond is the second in command with the wolf being the third in command. According to the book, the alphas were the protectors of the pack. They always had the loudest opinions and were known as the leaders of the pack. Something Hazel found interesting was the fact that alphas always sired the pups. They could never carry a pup no matter what their birth gender was. They were responsible for the safety of everyone in the pack. As an extra footnote was also some information Hazel barely glanced at before she turned beet red. ‘It is tradition that the alpha in command sires the first pup/puppies of the pack with the first omega found in the pack. This consummation mostly occurs within two years after the pack is formed. (Sometimes a pack will have puppies before the pack is completely formed. This practice is becoming more popular in recent years. A more traditional pack will most likely still wait before the pack is completely formed.)’
Below the three alphas lay the betas. She could immediately see an arrow. That was closely followed by a falcon bird. The third Hazel wasn’t sure of. At first glance it looked like some misformed house. When she looked a second time she thought she saw an upside-down tornado.
Looking back at the book, it told Hazel that these were the betas. The book wrote about every beta having the same status. There was no first or second. Every beta had the same standing. In some packs it mattered who joined the pack first to define its standing within the pack. Something in the book intrigued Hazel. 'Whether a beta can sire or carry depends completely on the gender they were born with. In a large pack some female betas can experience difficulty conceiving before an omega is introduced to the pack. These problems disappear when an omega is bonded in the pack en/or pregnant with a pup.’
The more Hazel read the more confused and curious she got. There were only two more rows and Hazel began to get a suspicion what destination she was. Still she continued reading.
The third row was for the deltas, according to the book. They weren’t masculine nor feminine. They also weren’t like the betas. Some claimed they were more like robots than humans. The book luckily gave more information about deltas. ‘The biggest misunderstood destination can only be the deltas. While there have always been alphas and omega. It has only been in recent history that we see newer destinations like betas and deltas. Although betas are still considered a newer destination, it has been far longer around than deltas. Deltas first appeared in the beginning of the 20th century. Scientists claim deltas were around longer but they simply didn’t dare step forward in fear for their pack or themself.’
Now it was finally time for the destination Hazel was most curious about. If she were to believe this book, it would mean that she was an omega. Of all the symbols so far she hadn’t really felt any deep connection with any of them. Only the bottom two remained. One was a simple black spider (although she found it anything but a simple black spider), and the other one could only be ‘The Deathly Hallows’.
Hazel quickly flipped to the right pages about omegas. As she had expected omegas can only carry pups. They can never sire a pup no matter their birth designation. Reading further, she started to sweat. ‘A common misconception about omegas can only be their heats. While many are right about the fact that omegas can get a heat, they are mostly wrong when they can get a heat. An omega can only get to the peak of their fertility when they find their alpha. Even if a pack has multiple alphas, an omega only needs to find one pack alpha before peak fertility can be reached.
That night Hazel went to bed with more questions than she got answered and a throbbing clit.