fantasticbeasts_kinkmeme ([personal profile] fantasticbeasts_kinkmeme) wrote2016-11-23 07:27 am
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Prompt Post #1

 ROUND 1


FUCK IT WE'LL FIGURE OUT SPECIFICS LATER

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FILL [1/?]: Newt/other, eventual Gramander; arranged marriage, abuse, h/c, learning to trust

(Anonymous) 2017-01-15 08:02 pm (UTC)(link)
Hello! I come bearing an attempt at a fill for your prompt, which I hope you like. It's a bit of a slow-burner, because I am incapable of being succinct in my writing. I hope it hits the desired points of your prompt!

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The first time Newt is married, he is two months away from his 18th birthday. He is young to be married, even by the standards of the day, but the Great War has already been going on for two years and already more lives have been lost than anybody thought possible. The wizarding world of the UK has arranged with the muggle government to following similar conscription practices, and already the pride of the Scamander family, Theseus, is on the front lines and making a name for himself as a soldier.

Newt, just barely too young to be conscripted for the war effort now, will undoubtedly be dragged away from them, and neither can bare for that to happen.

Newt is working at the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, as a clerk for the Office of House-Elf Relocation. He makes very little and has even less hope of promotion- never mind the war, nobody wants to hire a wizard who nearly killed a first year student with a magical creature as a sixth year. Newt stays because it gives him ample time to observe the house-elves and take notes about their natures and habits, and because it’s the only place where he isn’t scoffed at for his interest in magical creatures. (At least openly.)

When he is notified of his marriage, he almost thinks it’s a joke- who’s worried about arranging marriages for their second sons in the middle of a war? But his father is standing there in the study with a parchment with the marriage contract awaiting his signature and seal, and his mother sits by the desk, wringing her hands.

“Father?” he asks.

“You’ve heard, I’m sure,” his father starts. He is standing straight and his hands are held behind his back. He takes a breath, “The muggle government has passed a new conscription bill. They’re desperate for soldiers. And despite the emergency decree, there has been pressure in the Ministry to let wizards participate. There is news that there are a variety of dark wizards gathering.”

“Yes,” Newt agreed. “Theseus has said as much.”

“Yes, well, with your brother being off and refusing to return, and making the case for wizarding participation… We will not have both our sons lost to this war if the Ministry gives into pressure, and the Prewetts need to marry their eldest before she reaches spinsterhood. So we’ve agreed with the Prewetts.”

“I- I’m sorry?”

“You are to marry their eldest daughter.”

Newt’s ears ring. His hands clutch so tightly around his knees that he has red prints on his skin hours later. “Marry?”

His father starts talking again: The Prewetts are recently married into the House of Black, but they are still far enough away from the main house that the Blacks would accept someone like Newt. The Scamanders need an old, respectable name to be attached to if Theseus is going to make it in the Ministry once the war is over, and the House of Black needs the cash the Scamander Hippogriffs bring.

Newt hears it but can’t comprehend. He wants to protest, to threaten to sign up for the war anyway, but he sees the seal of the House of Black on the contract. The contract is legal and accepted; Newt has no place to protest under the law. He signs his name to the marriage agreement without seeing the paper under his quill.

Three months later he marries the Prewett daughter, a woman whose name he will later have Obliviated from his mind. Newt remembers the wedding. He remembers the guests, so few for a wedding between pureblood families. He remembers receiving politely restrained congratulations that border on disdain, and impersonal gifts. He doesn’t remember the bride’s face, but knows she was about as interested in marrying him as he was in marrying a woman, though he hadn't dared to say it at the time. It was still a nice enough wedding and they are safe from conscription.

Once the ceremony is over, she wants little to do with him. Newt is okay with this, though he attempts to be cordial in the hope they'll have a friendship at least. She is not inclined to tolerate his preferences, though she does seek her pleasure elsewhere. Newt doesn't think it fair to try and stop her. (He would have done the same had there been anyone to seek pleasure with.)

His blind eye does not endear him to her, but her freedom lasts until her brother stumbles across her and her lover out in public in the muggle world, attending a play and retreating to a hotel. Had this reached the wizarding news, it would have been grounds for divorce and even distant Blacks Did Not Divorce.

+

Newt is given news of his divorce when he wakes up in St. Mungo’s burn ward. He has his wife Obliviated from his mind two days later.

As soon as he is proclaimed fit, he forces Theseus to give him a commission and joins the Great War. He’s sent to the Eastern front, where Ukrainian Ironbellies are known to live. (There is information that Grindlewald and his followers are trying to create an army of dragons. It’s Newt’s job to make the Allied Wizard an experimental unit first.)

Re: FILL [1/?]: Newt/other, eventual Gramander; arranged marriage, abuse, h/c, learning to trust

(Anonymous) 2017-01-15 08:20 pm (UTC)(link)
Brilliant start - so glad someone is filling this, and I love how you establish the background and include the history of the time. Really enjoying this

Re: FILL [1/?]: Newt/other, eventual Gramander; arranged marriage, abuse, h/c, learning to trust

(Anonymous) 2017-01-17 03:54 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you! I'm glad you're enjoying it so far! :)

Re: FILL [1/?]: Newt/other, eventual Gramander; arranged marriage, abuse, h/c, learning to trust

(Anonymous) 2017-01-16 03:21 pm (UTC)(link)
I like that you made the Scamanders the "nouveaux riches" of the story - an interesting take!Looking forward to more.

Re: FILL [1/?]: Newt/other, eventual Gramander; arranged marriage, abuse, h/c, learning to trust

(Anonymous) 2017-01-17 03:57 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you :)

It seemed fitting to give them the 'nouveaux riche' treatment, given how little we know about them (and that they don't fall under Big Wizard Families from the Harry Potter books).