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.
Complete a thread started and set every month for twelve consecutive months. Each thread must have at least ten posts, and at least three must be your own.
Did You Know?
Did you know? Jewelry of jet was the haute jewelry of the Victorian era. — Fallin
A hidden gem, my own goldmine
You had the wide and wild eyes
You were a secret to yourself
You couldn't keep from anyone else
Now you're the biggest brightest flame
You are a fire that can't be tamed
You're better than ever, but I knew you when
This was Lester's first time visiting Sloane at work since she'd gone back to the zoologic gardens, and it wasn't really visiting, because they were actually here for the event. But he was here primarily to spend time with her on the exhibition she must have worked hard on, and it would be more fun to go through with her than it would be to go through on his own.
He found Sloane at the entrance to the zoo, and waved to Alvin, who Lester was sure would be abandoning them swiftly to do whatever it was Alvin did. (Flirt with Sisse, if he listened to rumors — Lester had not yet decided how he felt about that one.)
Lester put his hands into his jacket pockets. "You're going to know all the scares already," he said, tone too good-natured for it to be a real complaint. Hopefully she wouldn't poke fun at him when he got spooked by a creature she'd already given an innocuous name to.
Sloane hadn't felt this sense of pride in something since... well she didn't know when exactly, a long time, but her contributions to the Creature Feature for Halloween had been enough to make her feel like she'd made the right decision. It was a win she would take, because she hadn't had many lately.
That Lester had agreed to come see her hard work was a nice perk. She'd stopped using his bedroom as an escape, except when the nightmares crept in and she would sneak over after he left for work. She left everything exactly as she found it though, and wasn't sure if he noticed or not. It wasn't nearly as often as it had been over the summer. It was probably for the better. She shouldn't be using him for a crutch so much and it wasn't helping the confusing feelings she still harbored in his direction. Still, he was her best friend and she just wanted to be around him in any capacity. Burying her feelings had become second nature, as easy as breathing, and so she was used to it.
She had donned one of the nicer dresses from her time as Sadie, a pretty purple, and tucked her short hair back in a twist that kept it from her face. Nothing too fancy beyond that though. Alvin had not commented, probably too preoccupied, as they waited. It wouldn't take much to ditch him in favor of something else to pass his time, she was sure. She had a cloak for warmth against the cold night air, but she felt that warmth in her chest when she spotted Lester approaching. "Oh please, you know creatures are unpredictable." Who knew what would make an appearance on their walk, but she did know where everything was, so that as a little cheat.
Her dress seemed more Sadie than it did Sloane, and Lester felt awkward that he knew the difference. He pushed the thought aside and grinned at her comment. "Oh, sure," he said, lightly skeptical — they were both Gryffindors, but Lester was sure that if either of them were going to be particularly skittish tonight, it was him.
"Lead the way," he requested, "And make sure to tell me all your favorite parts."
Grinning, Sloane tugged Lester toward the exhibits, not bothering to look back and see if Alvin was following or not. She worked here, it was no secret she was friends with Hatch, people could think what they want. Her enthusiasm and excitement were vibrating off of her as she entered the hall where everything was displayed. There were invisible barriers between the the guests of the event and the creatures, strong wards that Sloane had watched Mrs. Miller put up in awe. Sloane could only hope to be as good as them one day. She was sure Mr. Miller was lurking around somewhere. Being legitimately twice her size helped ease people's fears about the creatures escaping.
"Come see Hank," she had her arm securely wrapped around Lester's pulling him toward the hodag enclosure. The large frog-like creature was hiding at the edge of the reeds of its enclosure. The bright red of his beady little eyes were visible, giving away its location if you looked closely. Sloane pointed it out and then to the little plaque detailing what he was. "He's from the Americas, ghastly-looking little bugger, like a large frog with horns." She thought he was almost so ugly he was cute, but she hadn't been allowed to handle any of the more dangerous creatures. Still it was all fascinating and she hoped the visiting magizoologists hadn't found her too annoying with all of her questions.
The journal she had started keeping information in, a guide of sorts, was starting to really fill up and she was going to need a new one soon. "There are some muggle myths about them, but they've been a bit of a pest for the American magical government lately." As far as she understood the relationship between magical and non-magical folks was more tenuous there than it was here. "There's a few things we borrowed for the exhibit." She added as Hank came forward, likely recognizing Sloane was one of the people who fed him. "Oh, there he is!"
Lester hadn't seen Sloane this excited since before she was Sadie, and laughed with startled cheer while she dragged him towards one of the enclosures. It took him a moment of squinting to see the red eyes of the critter. Lester bent to read the plaque. "Rhinelander," he sounded out, sounding just as charmed by the place name as he was by Sloane.
When he looked up, Hank was coming towards them. There were horns going down his spine, and he was almost-trotting as he sped up, looking a bit like a cat wanting to come for dinner. "He knows you!" Lester exclaimed, cheerful — their mutual excitement probably undermined the eeriness of this whole situation, but Lester was delighted to see how much the animals liked Sloane.
set by Fallin!
November 28, 2024 – 6:04 PM
Last modified: December 22, 2024 – 12:22 AM by Sloane Bixby.
Sloane waggled her fingers at Hank like one would while entertaining a toddler. She chuckled as he peered at her, head cocked to the side. "Sorry friend, I don't have anything for you." Gently she squeezed Lester's arm, pleased to see him just as excited as she felt.
"Food is a powerful motivator." She shrugged. "I wasn't allowed to handle the more dangerous creatures, but I did feed almost all of them." From a distance, with her wand typically, but still the creatures were not stupid and they didn't often bite the hand that fed them. She still had at least another year and a half until she would be able to move on from the internship of her career, and then she would likely take on an apprenticeship somehow, but she hoped to travel. She loved hearing all of the stories from the Millers and their friends that came in and out. Even Mr. MacKay would tell her stories from his own adventures.
Watching Hank in his enclosure for a second, Sloane turned to watch the people around them, huddled together to feel safer, eyes alight and cheeks flushed from the thrill of seeing the spooky creatures. It was hard not to feel that little swell of pride in her chest at having a hand in it. "There were so many different creatures brought in, I almost filled up my field journal." She explained as she tugged him toward the next enclosure.
"Bertram is quite friendly, I was allowed to work with him." The acromantula was creeping along his enclosure, no doubt looking for a place to nap. "Raised by humans from a baby, he's so soft." Spiders hadn't ever been her favorite exactly, but for some reason the giant ones didn't bother her. Almost everything was less scary after petting them and with a cutesy name to go along with.
Food was enough to get Mercy's old cat to be friends with him, but it was strange to think of it as being a motivator for an actually dangerous creature. He happily followed Sloane to the next enclosure, glancing at the people who were actually scared. He was glad she was with him.
"I probably would have taken N.E.W.T. Care of Magical Creatures if I knew acromantulas were soft," Lester joked, raising an eyebrow at her. If he'd taken N.E.W.T. Creatures, he would have been a Creature-Induced Injuries healer for her — but Lester didn't know how to explain that, because it felt to him like one of those things that almost went without explanation. It was like telling her that he was proud; he wasn't sure how to verbalize things like that, now that she was alive again.
Looking at the acromantula made him shiver. He turned to her, sheepish. "Spiders."
Sloane could understand the aversion to spiders, but Bertram was so lovely to work with. Lester had to see. "Let's go around the back." She was allowed back there at any time, in case something needed to be handled, but she wanted to show Lester just what it was that she did. It felt good to be good at something again. Something that wasn't quidditch, something she could make a career of with only her OWLs, and it could take her places.
There was a giddiness to her excitement that she had to keep contained, but she felt alive for the first time in a while and it was exhilarating. She let go of Lester for a moment and approached the glass of the acromantula's cage with a smile. She whispered something to the spider with a giggle and then took Lester's hand again, lacing her fingers with his. "Come on." She tugged him away from the exhibits, short legs working double time to escape the crowds. Merlin she just hoped Mr. Podmore wouldn't mind. Surely it would be fine. It was just Lester.
This really was the happiest he'd seen Sloane in ages — while Lester had an impulse to caution her to slow down, or to stay on the paths that he was allowed to be on, he couldn't puncture the fun energy that she had around her. He gave her hand a squeeze.
"Just don't get me eaten," Lester said, eyes crinkling up at the corners with amusement at her.
"I would never." Sloane laughed in an exaggerated whisper. She probably wasn't supposed to have Lester back here, but it would be fine. She didn't have access to the more dangerous creatures, just the ones she could handle, so this was fine.
Tugging him through the back door, she led him down the short corridor to the back of the acromantula's enclosure. There was a gate that separated the spaces and she wouldn't open it, but she could get his attention. He might have found a place to nap by now, but she could usually entice him with one thing. "Bertram!" She whisper-called to him. "I have your book!" They had been reading a herbology book on wand woods and the spider was hooked. The more-sentient creatures always fascinated Sloane the most.
"He's really into trees?" Sloane chuckled, shrugging a little, forgetting she still had her hand in Lester's. Maybe it was because he had never been wild, but he liked to be read to about trees from across the world. Sloane was learning just as much from the little exercise, even if Bertram remembered far more about what they read than she did.
Watching Sloane this engaged had been strange enough already, but now she was loudly whispering to the giant spider about a book, and it got even weirder. He was going to have to tell — well, he never got to talk to Sisse in private long enough to really tell her things, so he wasn't sure. He was going to have to tell Sloane how strange this was later.
He squeezed her hand again. "I knew they understood some language, but —" Lester shrugged. Being into trees required a level of sentience that he hadn't been prepared to expect, to be honest.
It was easy to hear Bertram rustling his way toward them in the enclosure. He had this lovely low baritone sort of rumble to his voice that always made Sloane chuckle. "Bixby," he greeted, holding onto the x sound for a breath longer than most people did.
"Hello Bertram," she reached in with both hands to run them over his head fondly. Eight eyes closed at the feeling and she had to chuckle. "This is Lester, we've been friends since childhood." A strange concept for the spider surely, since he had been solitary most of his life, aside from his human. The spider barely opened half his eyes to look, but acknowledged anyway.
After a moment of attention, Sloane reached up to a shelf, standing on her tippy toes to get the book down. "I can't stay long, but I can finish that page about hawthorn trees?" She offered. He had been likely close to sleeping, so may not even be interested, but it would give Lester a moment to see him.
After his agreement, he meandered toward the corner of his enclosure and hunkered down. "Just a few minutes," she promised Lester, before starting in where she had Bertram had left off in his book earlier.
The spider not only knew Sloane's surname, even if he pronounced it a little differently than most people did, but now she was petting him. Lester was trying not to look as nervous as he was, half so that the spider didn't know and half so that Sloane didn't.
But she was reading the book, and the spider was listening, and so he sat down next to Sloane on the ground and listened to her read the book. When she reached a stopping point — the end of the section, or just when she needed to take a breath — he managed to say, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Bertram."
He looked at Sloane afterwards, hoping for approval.
Sloane watched both the spider and her best friend out of the corners of her eyes between paragraphs. Bertram was watching them curiously, and she subconsciously leaned into Lester comfortably, amused as he used a pause in her reading to introduce himself. The spider acknowledged with a click of his pincers, but nothing more. Sloane was still learning to read some of his mannerisms, but he was peculiar either way.
She read for about ten minutes, plenty of time to finish their section in the book and for Lester to observe the acromantula up close. Sloane thought he was a little more impressive in the daylight, he was quite large, though not as big as she'd heard they could grow. Putting the bookmark in where she stopped, Sloane smiled at Lester. "What do you think?" As much as she'd been looking forward to the events tonight, Sloane was pleased by the turn of events leading to these few quiet minutes.
The spider did not take Lester's introduction as an opportunity to eat him, which Lester was going to take as a win. He listened to Sloane finish the section, then looked at her with a soft smile when she asked him what he thought. "I think that it's exceptionally good to see you in your element," he said, tone warm and genuine.
That was, really, all he could think — that Sloane was clearly at ease here, which he liked to see, and that if the skies could not be her element anymore than he was glad that she had found a new one.
Sloane was beaming at Lester's appreciation of her gains. She often felt like she was still floundering and she wanted to be good at something again. That he could see she was enjoying herself and doing well with this meant a lot. What she hoped he couldn't see in the dim light was the blush on her cheeks. Her life was not settled yet, but it was better than it had been. She was making progress. This was good for her, even if everybody had worried about it when she'd said she wanted to go back to the zoo.
"We should get back, there's lots of other fun things to see." She was going to get sentimental and mushy if they sat there like this much longer and she was trying very hard not to put too much pressure on Lester anymore. He'd done enough, continued to do a lot for her without much effort, but she didn't want him to feel like he had to. Taking advantage of his friendship was not something she ever wanted to do for an extended period of time and now that she was sort of on her own two feet again, she wanted to keep it that way.
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