Welcome to Hogwarts School :: A Harry Potter RPG! It's 1970!

Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - Frances Severin

Pages: [1]
1
Archived Applications / Frances Severin
« on: 29/12/2014 at 21:24 »

Application for Hogwarts School




→ CHARACTER INFORMATION.
Name: Frances Melchior Severin

Birthday: 00.12.37 on June 22nd, 1928 (1966)

Hometown: OX11 7FY, Didcot

Bloodline:
Muggleborn

Magical Strength (pick one):
Charms

Being, as she is, in favour of superficial, generalised knowledge, Frances is most likely to enjoy Charms work. As a significant counterpoint to her sister, who's much more interested in the theory and finesse of Transfiguration, she loves to duel with only Charms spells in order to make a point, that Charms is more useful.

Magical Weakness (pick one):
Transfiguration

More in defiance of her sister than anything else, Frances regards Transfiguration dull and unimportant. Moreover, with a fleeting attention and an easily distracted mind, she often fails to carry through with the design details , which only alienates her further from the practice.

Year (pick two): Third, fourth

Biography:
Your name changes with the vicarious nature of the shadows in your dreams.

Frances, for the utilitarian, tight-lipped fancy of your Gran, the woman whose dubious kinship allowed you roof over your head when your parents disappeared.

Francesca, for the frivolous songs your sister sings and the linguistic genius of your brother (-but you are all etymologically advanced, and you spew their Katarinas and Mathieus back at them in lieu of an actual comeback-).

Fran, for the self-induced acquaintance of people who clearly know you not at all.

They all shift and flee from the light when you close your eyes, Gran and Matthew in a lackadaisical cold war (-her misandrist views alienating him, his indifference choking her, slowly, ever so slowly, and she never much did trust in men after making a Squib of your father-), Catherine whispering sweet sentiments and breathing lavender and fairytales in your ears. The Mobius strip of not-too-well-known faces from Hogwarts come, turn, reappear in new lighting and then, only then, do you wake to find your sister lying beside you, an arm snaked around your waist.

On long summer Sundays, you will lie in your opposing beds, hair and heads hanging from the side to look at each other upside down, but you always see each other right; when the world is upside down, Catherine is still your fixed point, the Northern star, and you wonder at times whether one of you could be Alice and the other the looking-glass. You look alike, but you're nothing but poles (-and some say you're the north, but you know better, for Catherine is the one that ships steer by, the star-).

Your twin is a mixture of Greek fate and dramatics, fierce and wild and fire—not the sort you find in a chimney, for Catherine never could be confined to her room—and you're the one left with Latin logic and scientific endeavours, too much the spitting image of your Gran (-and there is your true rebellion, for Gran would never let anything but Grandmother suffice-).

Nihil sub sole novum, translates into I told you so as you receive your letter for Hogwarts, a fourteen second lag in all that you do, for you were born fourteen seconds too late and Catherine had already swallowed the light. It took you fourteen seconds longer to open your eyes, fourteen seconds longer before you stood and fell on feeble, thick, ugly and warped little legs (-little do you remember, but you've seen the photographs, and these do not move, thank God-). The Inevitable Quarter, a curse hardly worth escaping, you call it.

You've decided never to have children, for it makes no sense that you should participate in the mass delusion when the last thing the world needs is one more. One more to follow in others’ footsteps, one more to laugh and cry and utter words that have all been worn by strangers' lips, dried out and cracked on parched tongues, yet you still suck up dead languages and pass them back to your sister, and together, you draw secrets like music in the stale, pale morning mist, the black hole of history into which you will also dissipate one day, like the dewy fog that covers the ground on hazy summer Sundays.

When those days breathe, with warm rains and their sweet scent of lilacs, to fertilise the ground with the smell of drying asphalt, you go to the chestnut tree or open the high-paned windows in your Grandmother's study to enjoy the picturesque scenes from afar, like projecting reality onto a canvas without stirring a finger. On those days, you read and lie lazily in big, leather arm chairs, Earl Grey hanging from your fingertips, religion springing from the pages that you do not care to understand and the lines you read between (-and there had been a minister once from Budapest, visiting Gran as they all did, for her Pagan ways never seemed to muffle the awkward shuffling of their shoes against the Indian carpet, but all you remember is the fact that Matthew translates into Matthias in Hungarian, and now you wish to go there to bring back your brother memories of a church raised in his name-).

Melchior is an ostensibly mainland-European name, and like your family history in general, you treat it like the artificial pause it is between classical beginning and suiting end, marking it only with an M. Tragically ensconced in the memory of forgettable glory are your parents, your father unworthy of having his tale reported back to him (-and the memory of them both is like gossamer thin thread that breaks or yields at a single touch if it does not cling to your fingertips until all you want to do is shake it off-), your mother a simple woman who slips into oblivion, courtesy of her lineage; for it is all money and no blood.

Severin is your true heritage, for they trail the personality of your Gran in you, whether you wish it or not, and on most days you simply do not care.

As twins you inhale the same air and smoke and cinders from a once-tried cigarette, inspired by the ash falling from the old woman's tip. Her face is wrinkled with secrets and prominent visitors, for she still holds the gold and posture of a highborn that your father never managed. As twins you read the same books in the same languages, whether they're your favourites or not. You scoff and titter and sometimes you smile at each other.

Inside out, however, you swallow tears like words that were never meant to be uttered, for though your Gran swears by a dual deity, you once prayed to the Christian god that Catherine might be right, that you would escape your parents and their suffocating way of life (-and now the souvenirs you have of them are tainted, tainted with a blind wish to the wrong God and the only thing you remember is why you wanted them gone; the scent of their love turns to rust in your mouth until you cannot speak, wondering if it's their blood you can taste-). You won't cry, but you know that you're lost.

Now, you can never go home, for you're a godkiller and a murderer in one breath, and the kingdom of heaven burns inside you because you sunk the holy words with spit. You don't know what to believe anymore, for your Gran is adamant about Herbology, but for once you fail to deliver. Neither nature nor scripture lends you any relief at all, so instead you suck at fingertips to prolong the aroma of this world's pleasures.

Your tears come too early, for your parents have not yet met and never will, your very existence is a paradox, and you carry the burden of that knowledge on your shoulders, like a ship wrecked on the rocks with its sails still rising to the wind.

→ ADDITIONAL INFORMATION.
Note: This section is optional, and is up to you to complete.

House Request: N/A

Personality: N/A

Appearance: N/A

→ SAMPLE ROLEPLAY.
Please reply to one of the Sample Roleplays below.

Option I:

Blimey, the Great Hall was packed. It seemed like everywhere a guy looked there was some clown waving around a House banner or yelling about the game.

'Can you believe it?' 'No way!' 'This must be the biggest upset in Hogwarts Quidditch history...'

Stupid Quidditch.

James flopped into an empty seat at the end of the table, shoved an empty plate out of the way, and let his head sink onto his crossed arms, squishing his freckled nose down flat against the tabletop. He wasn't sure why he'd even bothered to come here, since he definitely wasn't hungry. He'd probably never eat again, in fact. He didn'tdeserve to eat. He hadn't stopped in the locker room to change out of his muddy, sweaty uniform after the game either, because he was pretty sure he probably didn't deserve to be clean too; and anyway he couldn't stand to see the looks on his team mates' faces after he blew their chance at winning one of the biggest games they had ever played.

Just one lousy shot. That's all it would have taken. If he could have just got that one stupid foul shot to go through that one stupid hoop, they could have won and he wouldn't have been the biggest blockhead in the entire school.

As if to prove the point, half the people at the next table suddenly broke into a loud victory chant. James pressed his face further into his arms to hide the bright red blotches he could feel creeping up his cheeks. That was it. He was just going to have to run away and move to Nova Scotia. He'd just cost the three-year-in-a-row Champions the Quidditch Cup! How do you ever live that one down for crying out loud? He was only a second year and he was going to spend the rest of his life as 'that dumb cry-baby kid who dropped the Quaffle!'

It felt like every set of eyes in the room was boring into him, and James couldn't stand it anymore. He jerked himself back up from the table and stomped right back out of the Hall the same way he had come in. As he stormed into the quieter hallway outside, he could hear footsteps somewhere behind him. James rounded on the sound and began to shout, his brown eyes shining with tears. "WHAT! Haven't you ever seen a loser before? Why don't you just take a picture!"



It was fascinating. Flying woke memories of the bittersweet songs of Icarus, the boy who’d craved life too much and thus tumbled to his death; a boy who should have chosen his gods more wisely. The sun breeded monsters that only come out in the night, because anyone wanting so badly was bound to be scorched.

Flying was therefore Catherine’s area of expertise, for it was a Greek notion. The Romans stole Greek gods, but Hermes was from Hellas first, and like everything else connected to Frances, the Latin names came second.

Of course, flying was a secret obsession.

Notebooks lay hidden in the Common Room with aerodynamic figures and engineering formulas for perfection of the twig curves (and Frances wasn’t entirely sure that hay wouldn’t optimise the velocity of the brooms, if only she could find a strong enough adhesive), notebooks that Catherine knew of but never commented on. Research on the attributes of flying capabilities coupled with the latest course of interest – Care of Magical Creatures – to tie the agility of pixies and fairies to the development of broom trajectories.

The Great Hall was brimming with noise on the outcome of the game, but Frances had to admit she hadn’t paid as much attention to the strategic placement of balls and players as to the scribbles in her notebook. The result wasn’t lost on her, the masses demanded attention, and it was a passive feat to listen to people who couldn’t be overheard, but she didn’t celebrate.

Three houses joined in comradery, vindictive in their happiness at having found a new Quidditch Cup Champion amongst themselves, but Frances had to admit the odds weren’t exactly stocked against them.

Clatter of cutlery and stomping of feet became too much, and she got up and got out. A couple of people were veered out the doors before her, eager in their recount of the afternoon’s events.

Frances shot them out.

"WHAT! Haven't you ever seen a loser before? Why don't you just take a picture!"

His voice was shrill and indistinct ( - indignant, Gran would have corrected her, but Gran wasn’t here, and Frances was the master of her own vocabulary - ), but his face was known. For a second, Frances entertained the idea of continuing her route and let the cheering squad in front of her deal with the torrent of no-sense-of-situation, but they looked to have had the same idea and hurried on.

Frances, however, had plans and sketches to get back to, so instead of lingering, she politely replied, “Perhaps because Wizard pictures move, and your coordination skills aren’t exactly at the best today, is it?”

Hopefully, he would be too stunned to be aggressive, and she would be able to get back to the Common Room. She’d just had a brilliant idea on using Jellyweed as an adhesive, and Catherine would bring her food later.


→ ABOUT YOU.

Previous Characters (if applicable): Eve Hallows

How did you find us?: Back in the day, through Google.


Pages: [1]