J’ai Demandé À Ma Mère

"Mamon?"

"Yes, Fleur?"

"Does Grand-mère eat her boyfriends?"

Pause. "Who told you that?"

"Nobody."

"Fleur..."

"It's true! Well, Adrienne from school said she did, and I wanted to find out for myself, so I didn't really hear it from somebody else because I came up with the idea for asking you all by myself."

"Oh, Fleur."

"What?"

I was eight years old when I first asked my mother that question. I say "first," because it was not the last time I ever asked her, nor was it the last time she refused to answer.

When you are eight, you think yourself invincible. Untouchable. Too young to enjoy all the idiocies and insecurities of adolescence, you rest easy in the assurance that no matter what happens, your parents will save you, and that they can answer any question. It is not until you are older that you come to realize that they cannot, in fact, answer everything; and it is not until you are even older that you come to realize that you do not want to know the answer to every question you ask. But when you are eight, every curiosity has a simple solution, and so I asked my mother, ignorant of my question's true implications, ignorant of everything about what it meant to be one-quarter veela except that it made me pretty and that I could sometimes get other people to do what I wanted. And I sometimes wonder if, at the supposedly more mature age of twenty-two, I've learned anything at all.

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"Mamon?"

"Yes, Fleur?"

"Well, I - I - "

"Yes?"

"Well, I was walking home from school, and one of the men working on the road - he, he kissed me. On the mouth. He kissed me on the mouth."

"He what?"

"Kissed me. And I don't know. It felt - weird. I don't know why people like kissing so much, Mamon, it was disgusting."

"Did he try to do... anything else?"

"No, the other men were watching. He didn't have time to do anything else."

"Thank God. Fleur, you're not at the age where you like kissing quite yet, but even so, if you have any - any questions, ask me."

Thoughtful pause. "I'll be ten next year. Do I have to like kissing then? Ten is grown up."

"Fleur..." A sigh. "You don't have to like anything you don't want to like."

I never told my mother this, but I found myself fascinated by that kiss, studying it incessantly. It had seemed at once thrilling and disappointingly prosaic. Thrilling, because it was something that only adults did, and every child, I think, looks at becoming an adult with anticipation. Disappointingly prosaic, because by the time that disgusting man had finished, my curiosity had dimmed to a single shred of disgust: That's it? Is that what all the fuss is about?

It seemed a terrible letdown.

My disaffection with sex dates from that kiss, I think. I felt jaded, cynical at the age of nine, and thoroughly disgusted with all the ridiculous human mating rituals by the time I was thirteen. Why get so excited about something you can simply have for the asking? Oh, I experimented - I lost my virginity at the age of fifteen, and every so often I met someone who I thought was interesting enough to actually flirt with. But for the most part, it was really rather dull; you can only hear someone confessing their "undying love" for you so many times without becoming fed up with the whole thing.

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"Mamon?"

"Yes, Fleur?"

"How did Grand-mère get to France from Bulgaria?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, veela come from Bulgaria, so what are we doing here?"

"There are veela all over the world, cherie. There's not some sort of law that says we only have to live in Bulgaria."

"But weren't we originally created in Bulgaria?"

Pause. "Yes. But that was centuries ago."

Here's a quick piece of history for you: A few centuries ago, before the International Confederation of Wizards became involved, it was a common practice for veela colonies to sell their excess young to slave traders. Very economical, you understand - the average colony can only support so many veela, so it makes sense that any excess be culled away. Such a one was my grandmother. My mother never told me, trying as she did to preserve whatever scraps of my innocence that she could, as no one had done for her. Grand-mère, however, did tell me. I shouldn't be surprised, I suppose; veela are far more pragmatic than humans about most things.

We have reason to be.

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"But Mamon?"

"Yes, Fleur?"

"Is it really true? About Grand-mère eating her boyfriends, I mean?"

"You'll just have to ask Grand-mère, won't you?"

"Mamon! That's not fair!"

"A lot of things aren't fair, cherie."

"But I want to know!"

"Fleur, when - if - Grand-mère decides to tell you, that's her business. You can't always know the answer to everything whenever you ask."

"Why not?"

"People have a right to keep secrets. You'll be grateful for that when you get older."

When I get older. Such a distant concept. It's ironic, really; we only are willing to ask questions when we are young, but it isn't until we're old enough to fully understand the answers that we no longer want to know.

A veela's legacy is comprised of two kinds of hunger: Sex and cannibalism. Many different kinds of them - and sometimes the combination of the two - but always going back to the same fundamental drive. And Grand-mère is, above all else, a full-blooded veela. She looks like a human. Her anatomy is similar to a human's. She even thinks somewhat like a human. But always, beneath the thin veil of humanity, are a veela's instincts, a veela's legacy, a veela's appetites. And when I finally learned the answer to my question, I discovered that, yes, it is true that veela look as they do in order to satisfy both those appetites; I remember feeling my eyes pop out as Grand-mère explained, bland and serene, how she once ripped out her lover's throat and then ate him.

I was fourteen when she explained that to me, a cynical old woman in a young girl's body who thought she knew everything. It's not until now, though, that I've finally understood. Part of me belongs to the veela, primal and cruel and beautiful, the kind of creature who will sell her own young to slave traders. But with human blood comes something alien to a veela: The ability to live beyond appetite. The ability to care for someone besides yourself. The ability, even, to love. And if a seventeen-year-old boy can defeat one of the most powerful wizards in history, perhaps a quarter-veela can simply be human.

"Mamon?"

"Yes, Fleur?"

"About Grand-mère..."

"Fleur, we've been through this already."

"No, it's not that. Well, it sort of is." Pause. "Just assuming that it's true - I'm not saying that it is! - well, will I..."

"Will you what?"

"Will I ever have to eat someone?"

"No, Fleur." A sigh. "No, cherie, they'll try to eat you instead."