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 1894. It’s time to join us and immerse yourself in scandal and drama interlaced with magic both light and dark.
How were things for you this month? J has been doing something different lately that is helping me deal with It — still inside and carefully kept safe, don't worry — and things have been a little better because of it. Which is weird to think of; I didn't think anyone could come up with something to help, but if this keeps helping, he did manage.
I get worried in the fall, though — it's almost my anniversary. That is to say that next month marks seven years of this, which feels like a very long time, and yet it's going to be the rest of our lives.
Sorry — I shouldn't be bogging you down with my own thoughts about this. I hope you're doing well.
Things must have gone well for you if you have the energy to write me letters the next morning, hm? And it seems as though you're feeling rather optimistic, saying it's been a little better when there's still one night to go. I'm happy for you, but you have to tell me more about it than that, you know. Is it anything that I could do? The Ministry isn't exactly keen on experimental treatments (or, to be honest, any kind of treatments whatsoever) but I think my father still has enough sway that he might be able to convince them, if we really thought it was going to make a difference. He got the trunk down there for me, after all, and that's been a huge help.
You don't have to apologize for 'bogging me down' with your thoughts. I like your thoughts. If I didn't, I wouldn't write to you.
Do you count your anniversary from when you were attacked, or from your first full moon? If it's the latter this month is mine. Four years, not seven, but still, I think I know what you mean. It seems like forever sometimes, doesn't it? Like your whole life before it happened all happened to a different person. But maybe that's just me, and maybe it's because so much changed right when it happened.
I probably wouldn't say this to anyone else because I don't think they'd understand, but I think the first full moon was worse than the attack. Not that being bitten by a werewolf is a walk in the park or anything. I remember I had nightmares about it almost constantly for those first two weeks, though now it's harder to remember. Of course I don't remember anything about the first full moon, either, but I think the feeling afterwards was worse. Being attacked is a thing that happened to you, but once you have your first full moon it's a thing that's a part of you, and that was — I suppose that's when your life really divides itself into the before and after. So I count from September.
This letter is getting a bit dark, isn't it? Blame two nights of no sleep, I suppose. I'm excited to hear about whatever J is doing that's working.
For me, I think the attack was worse. I don't mean to disagree with you — I don't, actually, disagree with you — but I was so ill after the attack, and by the time the transformation came around I think I didn't have the energy to be afraid of it anymore. I do feel like my life before was entirely different — it takes over everything, doesn't it? I'm always thinking about it, and I'm lucky, because most people don't know.
I've been counting from the attack, but — maybe there's two anniversaries. You and I weren't particularly lucky in autumns, I suppose.
J became an animagus. His theory was that werewolves tend to leave animals alone — which was true — and that It may not be hostile to a person in animagus form. So he's been sitting with me during full moon nights, and — it's been working. I'm really very worried that I'm going to hurt him, but I think It has been less agitated, and — he tells me that nothing's happened so far. Of course I don't remember, so I have to believe him.
Your Friend,
A
set by MJ!
September 28, 2021 – 11:51 AM
Last modified: September 28, 2021 – 11:53 AM by Magnolia Addams.
You're allowed to disagree with me, you know. I don't mind.
That's quite an impressive bit of magic! Tell him congratulations from me. That's quite interesting, too, that people can do that and It doesn't bother them in that form — I wouldn't have guessed, but I'm so pleased for you that he did. Of course that isn't the sort of thing I could copy from you — the Ministry won't even agree to a normal animal for me. I think they're worried I might train a dog to unlock the door from the inside, or something. As if I have any desire to break out. But it's just as well, because I don't think my cat has any desire at all to accompany me. She always gives me something of a look when I'm back home between full moons. Maybe it's only because I've been gone all night and she's confused, but I don't know. Sometimes I think she knows something's strange about it, like she can smell it or sense it or something.
If there was a way to remember what happened during a full moon, would you want to? I don't have any ideas about it, just a hypothetical. If someone made a spell or a potion or something that would make you remember, would you take it?
I wonder if that's something normal animals would catch onto — the scholars don't think that It hunts normal animals, (hence why J thought to become an animagus), but I'm sure that they still know something's weird. Maybe they even know to avoid It. I don't know.
I think I would want to remember. Maybe just once, though, so I knew more about what those nights were actually like. What about you?
I don't know. Sometimes I wonder what happens during full moons — like if It just runs around all night in the chest or what It does — but that's more like... Like if someone were able to get the memory out and put it in a pensieve and I could watch It, as though I were standing there, without being It, I think I would do that. If there was a way to remember it while it was happening — do you think it would feel as though you were trapped in your own body and watching something else move your arms and legs and you had no control? Or do you think it would feel like it was you?
Either way, I don't think I would. Not to really live through it.
I feel that it would have to change things about what the wolf does, if we were able to keep our own minds in Its body. But you're right — living through it would be terrible.
I suppose that J could tell me what it's like — or the werewolf capture unit. But they both have their own perspectives, don't they? Everyone would come into it with bias.
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