Hogwarts School: A Harry Potter RPG

CHARACTER INFORMATION
Character name: Helena Gaelian (soon Upright)

Previous and/or Current Character(s) if applicable: Lancelot Upright, Arthur Gaelian, Holly Priest

Character age: 18

Character education: Hogwarts Graduate

Strength and weaknesses (details please):

Strengths

• Potions -Helena is a very creative potioneer, more by necessity than choice. She has a natural talent for brewing, probably due to her fascination with herbology. However organic her potion skills may be, she is first and foremost a student in the arts of advanced brewing. She believes that learning is a perpetual state -she will never master Potions, because perfection is impossible to achieve.
• Determination -Helena refuses to give up, even if she fails spectacularly. She has struggled with anxiety, depression, and heartache for years, but has proven to be an incredibly resilient individual. This ambitious aspect of her personality landed her in Slytherin.
• Resourceful -No lengths are spared if Helena needs to find or accomplish something. From books to experimentation, she will figure out a method to the madness around her.
• Observant -Because she is so preoccupied with small details, Helena takes in a lot of the world around her without trying. People are difficult for her to interact with, so she often observes them in silent judgement. This same attentiveness helps her in potion brewing, where she measures and times everything precisely.
• Empathetic -Despite her barbed insults and aloof exterior, Helena is an incredibly sensitive young woman who struggles with her own emotional problems. Her cruelty is mostly a facade...she longs for companionship and has a secret soft spot for the 'little guy'. She herself has never fit in, and understands what it feels like to look at life from an outsider's perspective. It takes a lot to thaw through her icy barriers, but those who are dedicated will find it well worthwhile.
• Loyal -To her friends, Helena is unbelievably dependable and fiercely protective. Even family members benefit from this aspect of her personality, though she might not get along with them most of the time. Unfortunately, because Helena has so few friends, most people never discover this noble quality.

Weaknesses

• Obsessive -Small details can be just as hurtful as they are helpful. Helena compartmentalizes everything, and once she decides she wants to do something or that a mistake has been made, she is relentless in making things "perfect". As a result, nothing is ever done quite to her liking, especially in concerns to brewing. The concoctions she invents herself are under perpetual revision...even some of her most spectacular achievements pale in comparison to minor flaws. Her obsession bubbles over the edges of her cauldron as well: she has been in love with the same girl for over three years, and no matter how she tries to distract herself, she can't let Matilda go. "No" is not an answer Helena recieves easily, even when she's the one telling herself to stop.
• Vicious -Helena insults the people around her, taking masochistic pleasure in causing them emotional distress. She tells herself she does this because she's really a mean person, or because her targets deserve such treatment, but in reality, Helena is so afraid of being percieved as vulnerable that she frightens everybody away. Even with the people she loves, Helena can be accidentally snide or rude. Her temper isn't hard to provoke, though she does try to keep it in check.
• Bigoted -Helena was raised by the worst type of pureblood elitists (poor ones) who spent every moment of her childhood degrading muggleborns and their supporters. Somehow she has overcome the worst of this, because deep down, she'd have no problem sharing a room or a conversation with a muggleborn. But Helena still affects the persona of a typical blonde-haired pureblood, more out of habit than anything else. She uses the slur "mudblood" sparingly, but would have no issue labeling another person as such if they got on her nerves. Society expects her to hate muggleborns, so she does the best she can to accomodate the assumption.
• Awkward -In social situations, Helena is very uncomfortable. She knows how to behave like a wealthy aristocratic snob, but has found little use for the act with her peers and superiors. Making friends is something she does not know how to do. Most of the time, Helena avoids other people entirely. She's afraid of kindness, and mistrusts those who offer it too willingly. Once Helena has ascertained that an individual wishes her no harm, however, her ability to relax improves. She wants to be "normal". Making friends is part of that.
• Divination -Helena has virtually no talent in seeing the future, and very little desire to explore her own. When she looks ahead, pain and loneliness are all she anticipates. Divination might condemn her to such an outcome, so she avoids it and tries hard not to think about the direction her own life is taking. As a result, her third eye is pretty tightly closed. She's decent at reading facial expressions and vocal cues, but relies on nothing more than sheer intuition when it comes to deciphering the world around her.
• Wary -Helena has a deep mistrust for all things foreign to her, including people, places, and animals. This constant state of uncertainty and fear confine her to fewer choices and cut her off from the rest of her peers. She isn't good at trusting people, mostly because her father and mother betrayed her constantly growing up, and the only friends she has ever had both left her without warning. Because she never developed a healthy object-permanence, Helena controls everything else around her as a means of stabilizing herself.

Physical description: Helena has long blonde hair, which she usually wears in a pristine bun or cascading down around her shoulders. Her eyes are the color of gray ice, with a hint of blue that becomes more vivid when she is happy, crying, or wearing a complimentary color. Without any veela blood, Helena sometimes looks ethereal because of her incredibly pale skin, but more often than not she has the pallor of a fresh corpse. Her limbs are long and slender, yet easily bruised and lacking in strength. Her build is that of an anemic rather than an athelete, probably because Helena doesn't enjoy her food. She spends very little time in the sun as well, because she burns easily. There is a distinct fragility about her that makes her appear vulnerable, but she wards off this assumption by the way she carries herself: chin up, eyes forward, and expression aloof.

Personality: Helena is a sarcastic, sharp-tongued young woman with very little patience and a side-glare so severe it could melt a boulder. She is remarkably intelligent and resourceful, but can be awkward or cruel in social situations. She doesn't understand how to interact kindly with others, so offers a barrage of insults and threats instead of pleasant small talk. However, this caustic exterior hides an individual who is truly empathetic and endlessly curious about the world around her. Sometimes she attempts humor, but her jokes typically don't go over well. She is a dry, straight-faced enigma to almost everyone she meets, and has been labelled unapproachable by the masses. This self-inflicted isolation has rendered her lonely...she wants interaction, but can't figure out how to get it without humiliating herself.

Hopes and dreams. Why are you teaching at Hogwarts?: Helena never imagined that she would return to school, having suffered through seven years of dormitory life with sparse enjoyment. As it turns out, however, Hogwarts Castle has become a safe haven for her. Home life is unbearable, and she is about to get married to an abhorrent man named Augustus Upright. Teaching might be her only legitimate means of escape. She wants more than anything to be loved by Matilda Gaskell, but knows she can't control the other woman's emotions. So Helena settles for companionship, and is trying her best to figure out where she fits in. Teaching at Hogwarts is not so much a calling as it is selfish abandonment. She's certainly qualified, but not there for the benefit of the students...rather, for the benefit of herself.

Biography:

Childhood
Helena was born on December 2nd, 1921 to a pureblood family with rapidly diminishing wealth and a shoddy reputation. Her parents gave her the best they could afford, but starved her emotionally and used her as a way to distract the Pureblood world from their precarious financial situation. She grew up under the main care of a house elf named Millie, an albino reject with bright red eyes who loved Helena unconditionally. As a result, she never felt alleigance toward her parents, either one...Arthur saw her only during meal times or special occasions, locked in his study or off working at the Ministry, and Helena's mother was scarcely better. Kendral saw her daughter as a plaything, only calling upon her when the mood struck her to play "mommy". For the most part, when Helena had a bad dream or wanted to show off something she found in the garden, she called for Millie.

As far as childhood friends went, Helena had few. Other pureblood children kept away from her, mostly because Helena was a bossy playmate with little consideration for the desires of her peers. Having interacted with a house elf most of her life, she was used to giving orders and having them followed. Learning how to interact appropriately with other human playfriends was very difficult for her, so difficult that she never truly mastered it. After being told that she couldn't tag along for the dozenth time, Helena stopped trying altogether. Some of the only children who visited her home or invited her to theirs were the Gaskells, and even then, Helena rubbed them the wrong way. Her only friend was Matilda, who was closest in age to her and unfailingly kind. Between the ages of 6 and 9, Helena actually enjoyed their friendship and sought out Matilda whenever their families got together. But these rendevous grew less frequent over time (Kendral's unpleasantness drove the Gaskells away) and Helena lost her only friend.

By the time Helena recieved her letter to Hogwarts, she'd been limited to seeing her peers during dinner events only, and spent a majority of her free time roaming the gardens or exploring the vast, crumbling Gaelian Estate. Millie accompanied her on these adventures often, helping her play-pretend whenever Kendral did not have her scheduled for kitchen duty. Even then, Helena would follow Millie around the house, watching her clean or cook or do laundry. She was a remarkably pretty child, with speech and bearing cultivated carefully by her parents during private tutoring sessions (which she hated). Her skin was always a little too pale, though...like a flower grown in the shadow of a boulder, she never had the right coloring. Even her hair and eyes were icy blonde and blue, a striking look, but faded.


School
Being sorted into Slytherin was an expectation she managed to meet, though she never forgot how close she came to landing in Ravenclaw. The Hat even mentioned Gryffindor a few times, to her horror. But after seven minutes of frantic debate, the Hat yielded to her house of preference: Slytherin.

School life was, unsurprisingly, very difficult for Helena to manage. Going from living with an elf to sharing a dormitory with a dozen other girls was overwhelming, and she found herself hiding in the library just to get some peace and quiet. In her classes, she excelled more than most of her peers, not having anything close to a social life or friends for distraction.

Because of her upbringing, she bullied her cousin Simon every chance she got, calling him far worse things than a mudblood. All of the resultant shame she felt at making him cry was chanelled into resentment towards him and herself. A few weeks into her first year, she also came across Matilda Gaskell, who was surrounded by admirers and companions. A strange mixture of rage, jealousy, and loss overcame her. She teased Matty mercilessly from that point forward, alienating herself even further from the only person she might have called a friend. Some of her yearmates got along with her out of necessity, not wanting to be on the wrong end of her sarcasm, but Helena never considered them companions. Eventually, they joined other cliques and left her alone.

It was during these first few years of school that Helena discovered how lonely she really was. She decided it was her parent's fault for keeping her cut off from the rest of her peers, and also grew to despise those around her who made friends easily, a talent she envied. Matilda grew more and more beautiful with each passing year, and the jealousy turned into something more complex. By the time she reached fifth year, Helena was so overwhelmed with emotion for the other girl that she scarcely knew what to do with it. Her jeers were crueler than ever, and only being locked in a broom closet with her could have uncovered the truth. She was in love with Matty.

And there wasn't a thing she could do about it.

Elizabeth Knightlock (now Reinhardt) proved to be one of the worst enemies Helena ever made when she outed her at the USO ball to Matilda. Their relationship seemed irreparable, and even after ruining Elizabeth's chances with Shadin Khal, Helena could not console herself. When Matty disappeared after the Time Warp, she became more introverted than ever, and the news of her impending engagement to Augustus Upright ruined her outlook on life.

Perhaps because she'd been so beaten down, Helena's level of vulnerability reached an all-time high during her 7th Year. She opened up to people she'd never shown much interest in before, and almost made friends. Her cousin Simon moved into the Gaelian Estate in December, bringing along his younger sister Catherine, and Helena decided not to be so hostile toward him. As it turned out, her father was the real villain in the family...he'd disowned Vincent because he fell in love with a muggle, then obliviated all memory of his sister Carolyn. Still, sharing the Estate with two more people made her extremely uncomfortable, and in an effort to get out of the Estate more often, she ran into somebody she never thought she'd see again:

Matilda Gaskell.

Their relationship, while confusing and emotional, picked up where it left off. Without the pressure of hiding her feelings, Helena treated Matty with genuine kindness, and this changed their friendship. They began to visit each other more often, and Helena's focus on school picked up again. She got top grades in her Potion's class, and even started inventing conconctions of her own...

This, of course, is where the trouble begins.


Now
Just before the end of her 7th Year, Helena tried to help Matty self-medicate by preparing her sleeping draughts. After several weeks of doses, Matilda began to develop a dependency, and Helena tried to invent a new potion to give her pleasant dreams -not as strong as the usual draught, and consequently less addictive. But the effects were not what she'd anticipated, and Matilda tried to kiss her under the influence. Remembering very little of the encounter, Matty didn't know any better when Helena offered her the potion a second time, but before anything serious could happen, Helena got cold feet. She loved Matilda too much to take advantage of her like this.

Even after admitting to the deceit, Helena remained friends with Matilda, though a new bond of trust needed to be formed. In early May, without the influence of any potion, Matty tried to kiss her again. A little too drunk, Helena confessed how much she loved her, but it didn't scare Matilda away.

Their relationship is more complicated than ever before, and with a marriage just around the corner, Helena is grappling with more than she can handle emotionally. She has decided to apply as a Professor's Assistant, knowing that she has to find a way to keep out of the house. Once she's married to Augustus, being trapped inside of the Upright Manor would be a veritable death sentence. Helena is determined not to let that happen. She has a life she wants to live, different from the one her parents have designed for her, and it involves freedom. She'll do whatever it takes to save herself, even if that means returning to Hogwarts.


SAMPLE ROLEPLAY
(Please respond to to this in third person past tense. Do not write the other characters' reactions. Only your own.)

The water by the lakeshore rippled, dark under the overcast sky, and thick with moss growth. Ripples grew into small waves, spreading in concentric circles that sloshed against the rocks and sent a small family of mice living in a rotted out log above the waterline scurrying for cover.

And then the lake exploded.

A fountain erupted, splattering muddy water and assorted bits of lake bottom. Something very, very large thrashed and roiled, tentacles slapping wildly at the surface.

Elizabeth despised the squid, and more importantly, she disapproved of it. It was disorderly. Truth be told, she was the sort of woman who disapproved of a great many things, the disorderly ones most particularly. A tall, severe woman in her forties who never smiled, Elizabeth was so parsimonious with praise that it was said that if good will could be saved up she'd be sitting on a pile of it like dragon over a horde. The school's Headmistress was very good at disapproval.

Brown water flowed in a tent around her upraised wand, blocked by an invisible umbrella.

“He has a cold again!” Pythagorea Proud, the school’s much-harried Deputy Headmistress fussed, as she shook a spatter of mud off of her arm. She hadn’t been as quick with her wand work. “He won’t take his medicine. We’ve been trying all morning. Someone is going to have to deal with him!”

Arms folded, the tip of Elizabeth’s pointed black and very sensible shoe tapped against the rocky bank. She glanced over at their newest Professor, her expression thoughtful. “You’ll do,” she offered flatly, her tone leaving little room for argument. This was going to prove to be a very different sort of interview...

Roleplay Response:

Helena had never been good with animals.

Plants were more her forte, as they typically remained in one place and required sensitive care. Not so with creatures, magical or otherwise. There was a reason she used the Floo in a world full of sharp-taloned owls...she simply hated interacting with beasts. And this, without any possibility for debate, was the biggest beast she'd ever seen.

Water sloshed all over her shoes as she copied Elizabeth, using a shield charm to fend off the worst of the spray. Before them, the squid flailed like a beached whale, repugnant and impossibly large. Helena had been in the wrong place at the wrong time when Pythagorea Proud summoned as many professors as possible to the lakeside...she'd been forced to march outside, grim-faced, only to stand on the muddy banks reticently.

“He won’t take his medicine. We’ve been trying all morning. Someone is going to have to deal with him!”

Helena raised an eyebrow, not envying whoever that "someone" happened to be. She looked about for the Care of Magical Creatures professor, realized he wasn't there, then turned back to find Elizabeth staring her down. Realization swept over her as another wave of water crashed against her shield.

“You’ll do.”

Helena opened her mouth to refuse, flushing a soft shade of pink. As a student, she'd never interacted with Elizabeth before...she saw now how lucky she had been.

"I'm the Potion's Assistant, not an animal tamer," she retorted coolly. "What do you think I'll be able to accomplish that you can't?"

---

Other:

I saw under the Application Guidelines that depending on the circumstances, you may ask me to teach a different class than the one I have applied for. If that is the case, it would make most sense for Helena to teach Herbology because of her affinity with plants. She would also make an excellent librarian, should you need one.

I didn't mean to make it sound like I wanted to be treated differently from other members, and I'm sorry if it came off that way. I just wanted to understand why the objections were being made, and appreciate that this is a site where members are allowed to raise issues like this with the administration team. Thank you for responding to me so quickly. I'll make the necessary changes.

    [/center]

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→ CHARACTER INFORMATION.
Name: Holly Priest

Birthday:

Hometown:

Bloodline:
Muggleborn / Halfblood / Pureblood / Unknown

Current Levels:

Current Year: 6th

Year Requested: Junior

Reason for Transfer:
Holly's family was devestated by the time warp. Her mother Ivy is the only person she has left, besides her uncle Aconite (who resides in Azkaban). In an attempt to help Holly cope with the loss of her father and brother, Ivy has decided to move them both to the United States. Far from being distracted from the time warp, Holly feels more disoriented than ever.

Biography:
If you are applying to be a first, second, or third year, your biography must be at least one hundred words long.
If you are applying to be a fourth year or above, your biography must be at least three hundred words long.

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

[Beauxbatons] Ecole Request:
Culinary Arts / Humanities / Literary / Performance / Studio Art

[Hogwarts] House Request:
Gryffindor / Ravenclaw / Hufflepuff / Slytherin

[Salem] Society Request:
Bishop / Knight / Pawn / Rook

Personality:


Appearance:

CHARACTER INFORMATION

Character Name: Lancelot Upright

Gender: Male

Age: 32

Education:
Graduated from Hogwarts. Was a member of Slytherin house.

Residence:
Upright Manor, located on an unplottable stretch of 53 acres owned by the Uprights and protected from muggle detection.

Occupation:
The Uprights are so enormously wealthy that none of the potential heirs need to have jobs. Their money is invested and reinvested again by the current family head, who is forced to share the rotating wealth with his two brothers. Lancelot has always had a sinister sense of fun, and devotes much of his time chosing muggle victims to torture or exasperate. He has killed six people within the last ten years, all of them muggles. The world sees him as a collected pureblood socialite, but in reality, Lancelot has become a notorious serial killer.

Do you plan to have a connection to a particular existing place (for example: the Ministry, Shrieking Shack) or to take over an existing shop in need of new management?
No.

Requested Magic Levels: (see here on how to do this)
If you want levels above the usual 32 total, please read the roleplay instructions carefully upon scrolling down.

• Charms: 9
• Transfiguration: 8
• Divination: 7
• Summoning: 8

Do you wish to be approved as a group with any other characters? If so who and for what IC reason?
I'm not certain what this means. The Uprights are being submitted as a family group. I will be playing various members. I don't want to open the family up to anybody else at the moment, I'm trying to establish them right now before I let others in. But I'm just starting with Lancelot for now. There are more Uprights to come.

Please list any other characters you already have at the site:
Helena Gaelian, Holly Priest

Biography: (300 words minimum.)

Lancelot is the second child of Perseus and Claudia Upright. His older brother Augustus inherited the bulk of the Upright fortune from birth, leaving Lancelot in permanent second place. Always bitter about this, Lancelot has attempted to murder his brother no less that six times. His parents caught him twice during his youth, once when Lancelot tried to drown Augustus in the family lake, and another time when Lancelot fooled Augustus into climbing onto the roof in an attempt to push him over the edge.

His younger brother, Bartholemew, was born three years apart from him. The sickliest of the Upright brood, in infancy, Bartholemew barely survived being smothered by Lancelot while their mother was away. He fought back so feebly that Lancelot lost interest and went outside to play with his toy broom.

Lancelot followed Augustus into Slytherin house when he started attending Hogwarts, one year behind his older brother. The entire school knew them as the Upright Boys, sometimes mixing them up because they looked so similar. With identical blue eyes and the black hair, Augustus' stockier build was the only telltale difference. As they aged, however, Lancelot shot up in height, and Augustus became heavily muscular. People stopped confusing the two.

He flew the Quidditch field in solitary wonder every night from sixth year to seventh, excelling in classes that amused him and failing those that he considered 'time wasters'. In his seventh year, he was accused of assaulting a fifth year girl in the bathroom, but the charges were mysteriously dropped the following week. Several owls disappeared during his stay at Hogwarts, as well as a few cats that never returned to their owners.

When Lancelot finished school, he travelled the world for five years, ordered out of the home by his father (who detested his son's odd habits and cruel behaviors). When he returned, he was arranged to be married to Magdalene Wordsworth, a halfblood with an enormous inheritance from her dead wizard father that added to his personal fortune considerably. Maggie, who turned out to be a morbidly obese librarian obsessed over the Daily Prophet crossword, was a highly unsatisfactory wife. To this day, he has not been able to get a child off her. They do not share the same bedroom, but see each other always at the dining table, where she eats three times as much as he does.

Lancelot murdered six people during his travels, evading capture by moving quickly from place to place and being scrupulously careful in chosing his victims. All were muggles, and all were left horribly disfigured in the gutters and alleyways of their hometown. He kills in the same fashion always, using wandwork to torment his victims, then staging the crime as muggle-on-muggle. He collects hair from the corpse's head before disapparating, a signature move that no one has yet noticed. He leaves a galleon in the pocket of the men he kills.




Roleplay:

It was impossible for Dianne to stay out of trouble. It wasn't that she was looking for trouble, it's just that trouble always managed to find her. Today she wished she could find something equally familiar but more comforting.

The five-year old girl hugged her puffskein closer to her and brushed her face in its soft fur for comfort. She had named him herself and he was always her special pet. No she was certain she had never gone down this side street before. Her anxiety increased every second as darkness fell as she walked down the road. A loud noise came to her left and she buried her face in her pet's fur completely. The scared girl bolted the opposite way slamming the both of them into the wall of the nearest building. Tottering back a few steps she found a door a few feet to her right and ran to open it. What light there was inside spilled out into the darkness and she spilled into the room.

Once in, she was caught between the impulse to curl her cloak up more tightly around her and loosen her grip on it. She wasn't alone anymore but she was now among strangers instead, which was nearly as terrifying. Her puffskein had recovered from the shock of the wall and now was purring contentedly as the girl hugged it, causing a mildly calming effect on the girl. Gathering her courage, she marched up to the nearest person, pulled on the nearest clothing hem and blurted out in a loud voice:

"I'm lost and it's dark and I wanted to know where I am but I'm not scared but I am worried that Sambundeakin is scared because he's little and needs something to eat and wants to go home."

She paused to draw a breath in her nearly never-ending sentence, "He misses my and his mommy."

To explain the scared girl held up the custard-colored puffskein. Sambundeakin the puffskein, however simply purred as if nothing on earth was wrong in the world.

Roleplay Response:

Lancelot studied the shady establishment with narrowed blue eyes, visage hidden. He was a thin man, his form hard and reedy. A gold clasp fastened his cloak about him as he stepped forward, partially illuminated by the lantern. The lower half of his face shone, smooth and pale. His lips were red and glistening with saliva- he licked them, a pale tongue darting out past straight white teeth.

"Dung."

Thin fingers snuck between the folds of his cloak, clutching a wand, and he whispered something unintelligible as he pointed it at his face. At once, his features became foggy, confused. The hood lowered. Sleek black curls were tied back, beautiful and lustrous. Crunching across gravel, he aimed his wand at the door of the establishment and it creaked open slowly. Dragon-hide boots gleamed in the dull light, and he took a sweeping glance of the place.

Drunken patrons, a motley assortment of ghoulish men. Dirty mugs, sour firewhiskey. The stink of sweat and loneliness.

Lancelot curled his hands into fists.

Slugs, oozing between the cracks of society, moist mongoloids. The thing he despised most was the stench, the mixture of body odor and alcohol. It was time to sterilize the threat.

It was time to invite one of them outside for a cool evening stroll.

Cracking his neck, Lancelot's eyes darted to the left, latching upon the sloping back of a corpulent man with no hair and a whiskey in hand. He started to move, but the hem of his cloak snagged, and he looked down to find a little girl holding onto him.

"I'm lost and it's dark and I wanted to know where I am but I'm not scared..."

Her voice was high and tinny, like the racket of a bird.

A purring puffskein was hoisted up to him, limp in its owner's hands. A ragdoll. Just like the girl, whose arms and legs could be snapped like twigs by an uncareful hand.

"Where is your mommy?" he asked her softly. His voice was deep and smooth, a well-oiled baritone. Extending a hand, he offered it to her, carefully avoiding the rodent she clutched. "My name is Mr. Williams. Shall we find her?"

OTHER
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Hello! I just altered the application to fit within site regulations.

Updated!

THE BASICS
Name: Helena Gaelian

Former Character's Name (if you had one): None


CHARACTER DETAILS
House Request:Slytherin: Helena comes from a family of Slytherins, and takes after most of the basic Slytherin attributes. She is resourceful, ambitious, and calculating. Also, she never forgets and rarely forgives, and isn’t afraid to play dirty if it means getting what she wants.

Year:
Type in your two year choices here.
5th Year, 4th Year (preferably 5th)

Bloodline:
Pureblood / Halfblood / Muggleborn / Unknown

Magical Strength (pick one):
Divination / Transfiguration / Charms / Conjuring & Summoning

Magical Weakness (pick one):
Divination / Transfiguration / Charms / Conjuring & Summoning

Biography:
Type in your character biography here.

Helena was born in early morning on December 2nd, half an hour before sunrise. Because her family was both rich and powerful, Mr. Gaelian insisted upon a traditional birthing- that is, within the privacy and confines of the Gaelian Estate. He was not present during the actual event, but waited until a week had passed before inspecting his daughter for the first time. He discovered powder blue eyes, a full head of magnolia blonde curls, and very pale skin. Satisfied that she would at least be fair, if not pretty, he did not visit her again until a few months had passed. This time, he observed with arrogant pride that she had already begun to show signs of the traditional Gaelian beauty. He continued to check up on her in this way for the first few years of her life, paying her little attention other than to ensure that she was progressing adequately. When she first displayed traces of magical powers in her third year, his interests in her increased drastically. She became his project, though his emotional proximity to her remained distant.

Helena’s childhood was lonely and lacking. From birth, she was surrounded by women over the age of thirty who had no concept of what it meant to be a child. By the age of three, she was expected to dress, speak, and act like a miniature version of her mother. This was an unrealistic expectation, if nothing else but for the fact that Mrs. Gaelian spent her entire life clinging to the highest rung she could on the social ladder. Some of Helena’s first lessons included speaking only when spoken to, understanding how to pick out the wealthiest man in the room, which words and phrases were appropriate for polite company, and the difference between wizards of high and low blood status. From youth, she was doomed to be a bigot.

Her relationship with her parents was unhealthy and fractured. Her father, Arthur Gaelian, only took the time to see her once a week for a routine inspection, in which he would quiz her on her vocabulary, ask her questions about etiquette, and instruct her to perform some small feat of magic. Almost never could she satisfy this last requirement, for as a wandless child with little control over her powers, she could not summon up magic at will. Often, Arthur would look upon her with subtle displeasure and have her dismissed from his sitting room. Kendral Gaelian, her mother, was even less supportive. While she played the role of comforter, when Helena was crying in her arms, Kendral would suggest mildly that maybe next time, if she tried harder, she could make her family proud. This inferiority complex led to Helena adopting a fiercely competitive, obsessive desire to learn and master all areas of magic. By the age of eight, she was well-versed in Herbology, Astrology, and Potions. Anything not involving a wand she devoted herself to.

Behind the scenes, her various caretakers struggled to contain her frequent temper tantrums and sullen episodes. She proved early on to have a sharp and nimble mind, accompanied by an unyielding stubborn streak. She knew how she was expected to behave, but often chose to ignore her training when the mood suited her. As a child, such defiance was dealt with by her chief caretaker, a hefty witch named Madam Gertrude. Spankings usually sufficed, but as she aged, the punishments became harsher. On a few occasions, Mr. Gaelian got involved, an anomaly that served to terrify the girl into temporary obedience. However, she was warned that if she ever misbehaved in a public setting, Arthur himself would administer her punishment.

When she turned nine, she was called her into her father’s study for what she thought would be a routine inspection. Dressed and coiffed and postured perfectly, she stared with silent shock as he announced that her beauty and skill surpassed his expectations. She would begin to attend important functions alongside him. This was a huge promotion. She was now becoming, as he put it, a young lady.

For two years, she spent most of her days taking lessons from various tutors and learning traditional magical practices from her mother, while in the evenings she would either eat at the long and daunting table with Kendral, or accompany one or both of her parents to a dinner party. There, she learned what it meant to work a room. With one grand, sweeping glance, Helena knew exactly who and what she wanted to have. She also learned the names and genealogies of all the important pureblood families, focusing mainly on the ones with young boys her age. She was intended to marry one of these boys, her mother informed her. Helena did not waste her breath explaining that the thought of marriage repulsed her.

When she received her owl from Hogwarts, her parents rewarded her with an entire new wardrobe and a reminder of their expectations that she would be sorted, like all her family before her, into Slytherin. Helena didn’t doubt that she would be. The hat, on the other hand, had difficulty placing her. It vacillated between Ravenclaw and Slytherin for so long that Helena feared she would be a hat-stall. It did eventually decide on Slytherin, a cause of relief for the girl, but she never forgot how close she came to tarnishing her family’s flawless reputation.

Life at Hogwarts challenges her abilities to cope constantly. Even within Slytherin, she is deemed unapproachable and cold. Her peers avoid her, and she them. Helena has become something of a pariah, albeit one that inspires rumors and occasional curiosity. Helena refuses to befriend any but the most influential, and even then, she never truly devotes herself to anyone. It goes without saying that she is a terribly lonely person.


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Personality:
Strengths: Helena is quick thinking, precise, and manipulative. For somebody sorted into Slytherin, she has a streak of loyalty that most Gryffindors would be proud of, although she will never admit this. When she loves, it is with a full heart. Unfortunately, it is rare that this trait surfaces.
Weaknesses: Physically frail, over-confident, and lonely, Helena relies purely on the precision of magic to protect herself from the world around her, including the people in it. She bruises very easily, refuses to admit when she is wrong or unsure, and offends almost everyone around her as a means of keeping them at a firm distance. Unfortunately, this means that she struggles constantly with her own self-inflicted isolation.
Likes: Helena has always enjoyed the study of plants, especially poisonous ones. What she lacks in bulk and sheer brute power, she makes up for with knowledge. She might not win in a dueling match with an exceptionally powerful witch or wizard, but she knows exactly which type of plant sap to sneak into their midmorning tea to kill them. She claims to enjoy solitude, but in reality, Helena loves to observe the people around her. She is a quick learner and can spend hours in the library reading, something that almost landed her in Ravenclaw.
Dislikes: Helena hates individuals who either try to provoke her temper or intentionally challenge her in front of others. She thinks that people who show too much emotion are weak, and likewise detests those who over-indulge in food, alcohol, and sex. She especially dislikes people who over-indulge in these things publicly, perhaps because she fears encountering such overwhelming tendencies within herself.

Appearance:
Helena is tall, refined, and intimidating upon first glance. She carries herself like a noble, with perfectly straight posture and trained facial features. Seemingly oblivious to social norms, she rarely smiles upon greeting someone and overlooks the practice of hand-shaking.  Lithe, graceful, and particular about each motion she makes when in the public eye, she can be sensitive to the scrutiny of others and will try her best to achieve "perfection" by using elevated text in conversation and written correspondence. Even when around those that she trusts, it is hard for Helena to relax.

From an aesthetic aspect, she is considered by most to be exceptionally attractive. At the peak of her own perfection, Helena gives off the air that she has gradually blossomed into a beautiful young woman,as opposed to bursting into bloom. She carries herself with an ancient and well-bred refinement, a trait that clashes with her obvious youth. Like those in her family before her, she has long blonde hair, blue eyes, and alabaster skin. She belongs to the class that raised her: wealthy wizard aristocracy. It is behind this veneer that the true woman is caged, struggling to escape the walls that her society has erected around her.

SAMPLE ROLEPLAY

Option II:

“Oh, come now!"

Astrid Bixby’s voice carried down the corridor, the tall blonde girl not far behind. Her interviewee – or victim, depending on perspective – turned a corner and she frowned. They were always soelusive when she needed them. Sure, they would talk as if there was no tomorrow during class, but once she actually needed them to say something, they were nowhere to be found. Gryffindors.

Flustered, Astrid stopped in the middle of the corridor and stared, her parchment hanging limply from her hand. She was a good reporter, really, and she always did her best to make sure that everything she wrote was accurate. She glanced down to the quill, eyeing it with disdain. It wasn’t her fault if her quill misquoted. How was she supposed to know? It made for interesting articles, at least, and if she had misquoted the Head Boy last term as saying he had a love for stuffed animals, then that gave him personality. Astrid sighed.

A pout formed on her lips as she turned away, discouraged. The corridor was mercifully empty, though the doors to The Spellbound – the school newspaper – were ominously closed. Corbridge was a mercifully sweet editor, but Astrid was terrified of disappointing her all the same. She hadto come back with quotes.
Her eyes, blue, trailed her surroundings before choosing a new path, and she turned down a new corridor. A figure was ahead, and her eyes lit up, an impossibly rosy smile blossoming across her lips.

“Hey!” Astrid called, her voice light and singsong. She trotted to catch the person, her shoes clicking on the stone floor. “Wait up! It’s for the paper!” Her legs aided her admittedly poor running, and Astrid gasped as she came closer. “What do you think about serving frog legs at lunch? Some say it’s a delicacy, but others think it’s plain gross.”

Sample Roleplay Response:

Helena touched the doorknob of the empty classroom and froze momentarily, shutting her eyes with an inhale.

She had come here too frequently, and for no good reason. Empty classrooms weren’t off-limits to students, strictly speaking, but she doubted getting caught in one would bode well for her. The trouble was, she loved the silent echo of past lectures, whispering students, and scratching quills. It pleased her to think of having just missed the mass of students and conversation. As she stood there, the dimming sunlight slanted through the windows, illuminating swirls of dust motes. She couldn’t bring herself to turn the handle and leave this haven behind.

The desks were crammed up against the walls, unused except for one, which she had moved to the center so as to have a place to sit. The scrubbed, chalk-stained blackboard stood sentinel behind a vast desk abandoned by a professor years ago. She had sifted through the drawers on multiple occasions, finding a broken quill and some yellowing spellotape. Nothing else remained, but she pocketed these worthless trinkets nonetheless, hiding them in her school trunk for safe keeping. Magpie-like, she couldn’t leave them behind in good conscience. They carried a sense of the empty classroom about them, and as such, they belonged to her.

Deciding that she would return again the next day despite a growing feeling of unease and guilt, Helena released her breath and opened the door, wisping into the corridor. She wore the Slytherin uniform perfectly, with nothing out of place or ruffled. Likewise, her hair and face seemed to glow as though they too had been perfectly coiffed and arranged. Her expression, from the minutest details of her brow and mouth, were to some degree controlled as well. Only the shout behind her caused a shift in demeanor, straightening her posture as her eyes narrowed.

“What do you think about serving frog legs at lunch? Some say it’s a delicacy, but others think it’s plain gross.”

“Only someone as…uncultured as yourself would waste time debating something so inane. If this is what the school paper is focusing on, I’ll certainly be cancelling my subscription. Excuse me.”

Scowling, Helena turned on her heel and stalked away.

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