Welcome to Charming, where swirling petticoats, the language of flowers, and old-fashioned duels are only the beginning of what is lying underneath…
After a magical attempt on her life in 1877, Queen Victoria launched a crusade against magic that, while tidied up by the Ministry of Magic, saw the Wizarding community exiled to Hogsmeade, previously little more than a crossroad near the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. In the years that have passed since, Hogsmeade has suffered plagues, fires, and Victorian hypocrisy but is still standing firm.
Thethe year is now 1895. It’s time to join us and immerse yourself in scandal and drama interlaced with magic both light and dark.
With the same account, complete eight different threads where your character interacts with eight different usergroups. At least one must be a non-human, and one a student.
Did You Know?
Braces, or suspenders, were almost universally worn due to the high cut of men's trousers. Belts did not become common until the 1920s. — MJ
Grimacing, Sara studied her reflected in the compact mirror she kept in her drawer for just such these occasions. She was not yet bruised by the stunning spell that had brushed off her cheek only an hour ago, but rather there was a patch of her skin that looked uneasily like it was contemplating the green-edged indigo smudge to come. At least it had missed her eye this time. The salve for that stung like fuck and made her look like she was weeping.
Touching the tender flesh gingerly she rummaged in her drawer one-handed for the pot, growling to herself when her hands found nothing but tissues and tobacco. And a galleon she had forgotten about. She pocketed that for later but it did nothing to help her face right now.
“Sandow!” She shouted across the office, startling an intern that she promptly ignored. “Have you been in my desk?“
"No," Ivy shouted back, because in her experience if Hyde was shouting it was better to cover her ass sooner rather than later. She turned the thought over in her mind, considered it. She probably had gone into Hyde's desk for something at some point — it happened, sometimes, and that was why Ivy didn't keep anything she wanted secret in her own desk. She pushed herself back and stood up.
"Missing something?" Ivy asked, ignoring their poor intern. She probably would have taken it back, if it had been her — but she wasn't confident enough in herself to avoid double-checking.
“I need to do something about this,” she pointed at cheek, slamming the drawer shut in frustration and flinching when the noise somehow made her sore face hurt. The intern, wisely, took that as his cue to escape the room and Sara watched him go with suspicion. She dismissed it quickly though: he wouldn’t dare.
“I got caught in the face with a stunner and I don’t fancy spending the next week explaining myself,” leaning back in her seat she tilted her head towards the other woman, giving the impression of assessing the other woman even when her mind was firmly on herself. “Have you got anything I could use?”
The intern fled, and Ivy flinched with sympathy at the sight of Hyde's face, which did look sore. She would get a shiner, if she didn't find bruise salve — and Ivy hadn't stolen the whole thing, but she certainly went in there sometimes and swiped a fingerful.
She pulled open her own desk drawer. "Does star grass salve work for you?" she asked.
“Suits me,” Sara said with a shrug of her shoulders. If she had paid attention in herbology she might have had an opinion to proffer but plants and such had been Atty’s domain – the fact she had gotten through the training on poisons was a miracle in itself, but thus far she had survived with only a few incidents of being violently sick after taking the wrong thing.
She trusted Sandow enough though.
“You might have to give me a hand, if I look in this mirror for much longer it’ll crack out of protest.”
Ivy took the pot of salve out of the desk drawer and strode over to Hyde's desk. "The bruise isn't so bad," Ivy objected, sitting against Hyde's desk and unscrewing the top of her salve.
"Does the other person look worse?" Ivy was sure that they did — Hyde did not quite have Ivy's temper, but she had decades of skill under her belt and the energy of someone who would be good with a curse.
“They’d be hard pressed not to,” Sara said with a grimace as she braced herself. Up close she was horribly reminded of quite how much younger the other woman was, but there was no use dwelling. She had had her days of being young and nimble, now she was old and prone to bruises but one day it would befall Sandow too.
Unusually, and bearing in mind that most of her other colleagues had been men with brains roughly the same size as their balls, she hoped Sandow made it that far.
“I had to hand him over to the constabulary in the end. Apparently it’s not for the likes of us to bother with.”
Which was typical. Some days Sara felt like her job was simply to mop up the streets.
Ivy scooped some salve with her finger, and began to dab it very carefully to Hyde's face. "Sometimes I wish our actual cases were as obvious as people disturbing the peace," she mused. This was partially because she liked fighting, and getting into fights — she did not like paperwork and the patience required of their other cases.
Once upon a time Sara would have concurred; the lure of being an auror was certainly not the paperwork and drudgery portion of the life, but she had learnt to use that time wisely. Cuts and bruises were quicker to heal when one left them alone and didn’t add to them like being black and blue was all the rage.
“No one goes on sprees like they used to,” she said with a sardonic smile. “What does it say about us that we’re hoping someone goes rogue just so we can give chase?”
Ivy finished dabbing the salve onto Hyde, and wiped the residue off her fingers on the inside of her robes pocket. "In my case I believe it says that I have a temper," she offered, with an equally sardonic smile. She was well-aware of her flaws.
If Sandow had a temper then God knows what the rest of them had. A death wish, probably.
“You’re alright,” Sara said, patting the other woman’s arm in thanks. The salve was already making her eye feel better: she really ought to get Atty to make some more for her. She certainly wasn’t going to manage to do it herself.
“You’re no worse than the rest of us.” Which as probably damning with faint praise, but she had never claimed to be a fucking greeting card.
Ivy snorted. "Not sure what that says about us," she said, and straightened up. "Do you want a tea? I'd go to the break room," she said. It wouldn't do to be too friendly; the aurors, broadly, weren't. But a little friendly was fine, and she liked Hyde.
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