Agusut 1st, 1895 — Mrs Aldenhurst Home

The Aldenhurst drawing room had been transformed into a glittering miniature salon, its child-sized tables laid with dainty lace cloths and gleaming with tiny porcelain teacups no bigger than a walnut shell. Doll chairs stood beside each real one, their occupants ranging from exquisitely dressed French bisques to well-loved, slightly lopsided ragdolls with velvet noses. Lydia Aldenhursts mother did nothing by halves but her birthday this year was sort of....awkward. Some of the girls were still very much in love with their dolls - and then there were those who were already feeling the call of womanhood and playing with dolls was starting to feel too childish.

Euphrosyne stood at the edge of the room, her small gloved hands folded neatly over a white muslin reticule with embroidery she had stitched herself—moon phases, if one looked closely. Beside her, she carried her doll: Saint Clothilde, a delicate wax beauty with glass eyes the color of stormlight and a halo made of twisted silver wire. Clothilde wore mourning lavender, with tiny amethyst beads at her throat and a veil of netted black lace. With school less than a month away playing with dolls was already starting to feel like something 'children' did - not young ladies already away at school.

Effie curtsied politely as a maid gestured her toward one of the open tables. She made her way across the carpet with quiet, careful steps, as if afraid of treading on a spirit. At the nearest table sat three other girls and their dolls—one in a pink gown trimmed with lace, one with hair like spun copper, another that might have been older than all of them combined.

“May we join you?” she asked, using we quite seriously as she gently settled Clothilde into her chair before perching on her own and smiling at the other girls

  

Jocasta had been invited to Miss Aldenhurst's birthday party despite her not really knowing her. It was likely her father's doing, where he mixed with adults, she inevitably was encouraged to mix with their daughters. And that was ok, that was her role and she accepted it, particularly as her father had an eye for the better families of society.

It had taken her quite some though to pick her doll for today. It wasnt that she didnt enjoy her dolls, she found them pretty, and sometimes brushing their hair soothed her when she was feeling fraught. But... one did not play with dollies, it was a child's fancy that she intended to leave at home before school. She sat chatting with her legs together on one side and her doll, an antique that her father had acquired when they lived in Hong Kong. It was painted like a geisha and despite its obvious age it was in absolutely pristine condition. Joy turned as Euphrosyne Lestrange spoke and asked permission to be seated.

"Why yes you may, Miss Yujo was just regaling us of tales of the orient..." she said, gesturing to the porcelain woman who stared with dead eyes into a small cup of imaginary tea. She smiled to Effie, "Jocasta Flint, it is a pleasure." she added, before reaching for the tea pot.

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Euphrosyne Lestrange

  

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Euphrosyne’s eyes widened slightly at the sight of Miss Yujo—poised, elegant, and unnervingly lifelike with her painted crimson lips and flawless pale face. The word orient registered as something from a grown-up’s geography lesson, but she didn’t quite know where it was on the map.

“Miss Yujo must know many secrets,” Effie said softly, arranging the skirts of Saint Clothilde with a gentle flick. “She looks as though she’s heard everything and told nothing.” Her tone was reverent, like one might speak of a ghost.

She glanced up again at Jocasta and offered a composed, almost ceremonial little nod. “Euphrosyne Lestrange. Though my sisters call me Effie, and my mother calls me Syna when she wants me to listen.” She paused. “I listen either way.”

Clothilde’s veil had slipped slightly to one side, so Effie leaned forward and adjusted it with a delicate touch. “This is Clothilde. She was a nun. Or perhaps a librarian. Or perhaps both. My mother says past lives are layered.”

She accepted a tiny teacup poured with incredibly sweet rosehip brew and turned her attention back to Miss Yujo's owner. Are you for Hogwarts this year Miss Flint?” she asked Jocasta quite seriously, her mother had listed off some families that had girls her own age who she might expect to see there, she was sure Flint had been amoung them - but the girl wasn't familiar to her.

  

She nodded sweetly at the assessment of her doll, it was quite apt she assumed, particularly as in reality she had heard that Miss Yujo had once been owned by members of a Chinese courtly family.

Lestrange another excellent family name. "I am neither your sister, nor your Mother but I think I would like to call you Effie, and you can call me Joy." she beamed like the chold she was with the idea of making a pureblood friend but pulled it back in a little to remain demure. "I suppose your little nun knows many secrets herself, does she every breach the confessional?" she giggled and took a sip of her own tea. It was nice, it wasnt tea as she was used to taking it but if felt like a treat.

"Yes I am, I have been enrolled to begin in September, I'm quite looking forward to it. And you?" she had met a few students so far, prospective and current of various backgrounds but she wasnt great at judging their ages it had seemed. "Or are you already there?" she added.

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Euphrosyne Lestrange

  

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