AUTHOR'S NOTES:

This was my entry for the 2013 HP-Creatures Halloween Fest (hp-creatures . livejournal . com). The fest is over and reveals are out, so I can post this for you here. This fanfic is multi-chaptered, but complete. I will post a chapter up every couple of weeks until it is finished.

Here was the prompt I worked from:

Prompt:#3
Creature: Dhampir (Vampire off-shoot)
Pairing: Draco Malfoy x Theodore Nott x Hermione Granger

Thank you to my beta, Ladysashi – once more, you've come through for me at the 11th hour! Thank you to the Mod for hosting this fest.

Please review!

DISCLAIMER: "Harry Potter" is the property of J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. This fanfiction was written entirely for fun, not for profit, and no copyright infringement is intended. All characters depicted in sexual situations are above the age of consent.

TIMELINE: Post-Hogwarts

MAIN CHARACTERS FEATURED (alphabetical order, last name): Hermione Granger, Draco Malfoy, Lucius Malfoy, Narcissa Malfoy, Theodore Nott

SUMMARY: The heart wants what it wants, and biology be damned.

RATING: NC-17 (MA)

WARNINGS: Explicit Het & Slash sex situations, vampire blood drinking, explicit profanity, mental break, use of potions, characters a bit OOC for the sake of this fic.

IRON CLOSETS

By: RZZMG

The worst lies are the lies we tell ourselves.
We live in denial of what we do, even what we think.
We do this because we're afraid.
- Richard Bach

"Bloody hypocrites, the lot!"

Lying on his bed, staring up at the too-white ceiling of his room, Draco got his full rant on – and that motherfucking train was steamrolling down the tracks on maximum burn, too.

"The new Ministry poses all nice for the cameras and preaches tolerance in public, but behind the curtain, they lock me up in my own home for the next thirty days like some kind of rabid animal, citing a bullshit excuse of 'public safety'," he snarled, clenching his fists at his sides. "Slytherin's bollocks, I'm not like that mad dog, Greyback! I'm not going to go out and start attacking people. What the fuck do they think I am?"

"You're related to Vampires," Theo reminded him from his perch on the lounger. "Research indicates it takes approximately thirty days from the time of a Vampire's transformation for them to become comfortable in their new state and to restrain their baser impulses, specifically their bloodlust."

"But I'm not a Vampire!" Draco shouted, feeling his fangs elongate in his mouth as his anger increased. "I'm Dhampir! I'm a living person, born like everyone else. Vampires are Dhampir that burn their hearts up in some sickening dark magic ritual to gain immortality. They're undead ghouls, unable to reproduce, consume normal food, go to the loo – hell, they're scared of the fecking sun! They're like Inferi, only they live off the blood of the living, instead of cannibalizing the flesh. I breathe, eat, fuck, can make babies, like the sunlight, and take a daily shit. There's a world of difference there!"

"Not to the small-minded and woefully uneducated, there isn't," his friend reiterated. "What they know is that you both drink blood, you can both bench an Erumpent, and you both move faster than an Unforgivable. Ergo, you're dangerous." He licked his index finger and turned the page on the book he was reading. "They fear you because they don't understand you."

Draco growled and slapped his palms down hard at his side. "Bloody, bloody hypocrites!"

Being Dhampir sucked the big one! It wasn't half as cool as Draco had assumed it would be when his father had explained the change to him just prior to his twenty-first birthday. He'd thought his family's secret heritage would come with super-strength, super-speed, awesome body changes, a set of wicked fangs, and animal magnetism that would leave the ladies panting. Well, it had… only not in the way he'd at all expected. Instead of those things working in his favour, it turned out he was the one enslaved by his new 'gifts'…

"Fucking morons!" he hissed. "What they're doing is a clear rights violation! You'd think the way they're treating me that I was some psychotic freak or something."

"Or, Salazar forbid, gay," Theo replied, his tone flat and dry.

Draco growled. Theo may have been a top-shelf best friend, but the small jabs and disparaging comments he made every once in a while regarding the conservative values Draco was raised with were a bit annoying. Sure, over the last two years, he'd been willing to drop the Mudblood crusade, especially as it didn't make much sense to him after everything he'd been through in the war, but Draco didn't like the veiled implications that he was a repressed homosexual.

I am not gay.

"I ought to bring this before the court," he threatened. "Force the issue into the open. If nothing else, it would embarrass those gits in Magical Law to have someone challenging their absolute authority."

His quiet, reserved companion didn't immediately respond, having heard these same charges hurled about for the last week since Draco's transition, and bearing them in much the same manner as he was now – in silent contemplation. At any time, he expected his friend to make some smarmy comment about "same tune, different day," and march out, never to return, having finally grown weary of Draco's whining. He almost wished it did happen that way, as it would make things so much easier between them…

When the guy did finally reply, it was with an offer Draco hadn't expected: "Do you need more blood?"

Draco turned his head to glance over at his childhood best mate. Theo was sitting on the cushioned chaise across the room, book open in his lap, his concentration zeroed-in on the page before him. Even as his baby blues skimmed across the words with an envious speed, Draco knew the guy's attention was expertly split between the conversation they were having and the research that currently engaged him. Theo was, simply put, a monster at multitasking.

It was no wonder his friend was dating someone like Hermione Granger. They were perfect for each other.

Granger… God, just thinking his mate's name conjured the memory of the scent of her on Theo, and that made Draco's balls ache. His pelvis twisted and rose from the bed in an uncontrollable move, and it took a serious exertion of his will to calm his body down. Jesus, his cock was pounding for another release!

He fisted his hands at his sides, refusing to wank again today. He'd already done it three times since he'd woken up, and stroking himself to the fantasy image of Hermione Granger was enough to make him sick. He didn't want to feel such things for her, and it made him ill to know he wasn't going to be able to resist the urge to pin her down and fuck her brains out much longer. Dhampir biology wasn't one to be denied for long, especially in the aftermath of one's transition upon their twenty-first birthday – a date and event that had recently come and gone.

"I already took from you today," he reminded his companion.

And it feels like some kind of mindfuck to be sucking down your blood while imagining myself jizzing hard inside your girlfriend.

Theo glanced sideways at him. "That's not what I asked you."

The thought of once more sinking his fangs into his best friend's vein had Draco's stomach tightening with hunger, and not just the type sated by feeding…

Don't think of him that way. It's wrong!

Theo was his best friend, his brother in Slytherin, his most trusted and loyal companion. They were boon-companions of the heart. The guy had never turned from Draco, had always offered to help him – even during sixth year, when the Dark Lord's task had proved nearly impossible (and then too terrifying) to ultimately complete. He'd sheltered Draco at his home that same summer to escape Voldemort's wrath, sneaking him around right under the Senior Nott's long, hooked nose, after word had gotten out that it had been Snape who'd killed Dumbledore and not Draco. He'd held Draco at night, when he'd been haunted by nightmares of being hunted down and slain in some hideous manner by his dark Master. He'd been at Draco's side all through seventh year, assuring no one caught Draco alone or bullied him. Theo had been at his trial, even, offering moral support and testimony on Draco's behalf (where he'd been, ironically, when he'd begun chatting up Granger, who'd been dating Weasley then).

In the years since, Theo had never abandoned him, even when the rest of their friends had cut Draco dead. And now that he'd had his world turned once more on its head, Theo was there for him to help him pick up the pieces. The guy came over every day, to help Draco research his affliction, to try to help him find a way around it, and to offer up his delicate, sweet veins for the cause-

-and even as he took from his friend and accepted his aid, Draco was lying to him.

The moment he'd smelled Hermione Granger's scent on Theo, Draco had known he would betray his best friend, as the Dhampir within him had picked its intended mate - Theo's girlfriend.

"It's unfortunate that you'd be attracted to Potter's little Mudblood friend," his father had said when he'd confessed his mate's identity to his old man in a moment of weakness and fear, "but there's nothing to be done about it. If she's your mate, eventually, you'll have to claim her. To deny the impulse will only lead to great suffering, boy, so do as I suggest and don't let your… friendship... stand in the way."

His friendship. Even his father had stumbled on the word, as if implying that what was between Draco and Theo was something else, something more.

No, it can't be.

Four months. All he had to do was ride out the next four months, and then the mating heat would go away. Dhampir were only afflicted with the uncontrollable urge to mate their mate and impregnate her during those four months between June and September, and then it was only once every three years. If he could get past it this time, he'd be free of the ravenous need for Granger for thirty-six whole months before it struck again. He'd have time to try to work something out in between, surely.

In order to do that, though, he needed to keep his strength up. Drinking blood allowed him to stay strong and resist the temptation to give in to the call of his lust.

"I am a bit thirsty," he admitted to Theo, buying a little more time for himself and them.

Without a word, Theo put his book down and stood up, already loosening the buttons on the collar of his shirt. That luscious scent of his mate wafted closer with every step his friend took towards him, but it was the look on Theo's face and the exposed dark hair on his chest that had Draco's lower body tensing up.

It's about feeding. That's all this is… all it can ever be.

Theo sat on the edge of his bed, and Draco's erection popped, tenting his lounging pants in an embarrassing display of sexual arousal.

It's because he smells like Granger. That's all.

Even as his fangs elongated and he reached for his friend, some part of Draco knew he was the biggest hypocrite of them all.

TO BE CONTINUED...

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Please review!