Charming is a Victorian Era Harry Potter roleplay set primarily in the village of Hogsmeade, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and the non-canon village of Irvingly. Characters of all classes, both magical and muggle — and even non-human! — are welcome.
With a member driven story line, monthly games and events, and a friendly and drama-free community focused on quality over quantity, the only thing you can be sure of is fun!
"Are you always this forward?" He asked teasingly since it would be a very short thread if he just ignored her entirely. — Tobin Cartwright in Take A Peek
Did you know? Churchgoers and worshippers had to endure a foul stench during prayers due to the amount of bodies often stored within the vaults of churches and chapels.
Laurentia would not have wished to be a Lestrange.
Her mother's marriage might have made her a Lestrange and the baby she was soon to have would also bear the name but Laurentia was proud to be a Thicknesse, even if she had to share the name with her brother. It was a proud name and her father's and she liked to have something of his even though she could scarcely remember him.
Still, if she had to be around a Lestrange she was glad that it was Gretchen. She had such pretty hair and sat like a proper lady on her horse and Laurentia immediately copied her as their governesses walked behind the horses being led along for their safety.
She glanced at Gretchen out of the corner of her eye and tried not to make it too obvious that she was arranging her hands in the same way around the reigns.
"Thank you for inviting me to ride with you. I usually have to go with Livius," she curled her lip at the thought of her brother.
Papa was always going on about building bridges like a proper lady should, and with none of her sisters wanting to go riding, she'd decided to invite Laurentia, who she supposed was really her cousin now. Either way, it was nice to have someone to ride with who wasn't as loud and boisterous as Meta.
Gretchen always felt like a grown-up lady when she got to ride. She had a lovely light-blue riding habit and a pair of proper white gloves and her hat had a real droopy ostrich feather in it. Even Blossom, the white welsh pony she borrowed from the Hogsmeade stables whenever she wanted to ride like most ladies, had perfect manners and a lovely set of red-leather tack which made her look like a proper lady's mount, especially with her loosely curled mane and tail in perfect ringlets.
"It's nice to have someone to ride with." She smiled graciously like she'd seen her mama do. Laurentia might not be a Lestrange in name, she knew how to carry herself well and she had a lot of promise. With a bit of help, she decided, she'd make a perfect Lestrange lady.
"None of my siblings really like riding, so poor Blossom was getting a little bored!" Gretchen gave her patient little pony a gentle pat, ignoring the fact that other ladies also rode her. "The spring is really a lovely time to go riding."
Sadly for Laurentia her brother actually did like riding and riding with her too, which she had once enjoyed because sometimes it was pleasant to have a twin who would always be there, but at other times she remembered that he was a boy and she wasn’t supposed to be anything like a boy! He rode altogether too brazenly too, forcing his horse into a quick trot that Laurentia could keep up with in theory, but she absolutely refused to in practice less she appear to be brutish as he would no doubt one day be.
Instead she copied Gretchen’s seat and patted her pony in the same way, smiling when the little thing made a noise of approval. He really liked her! Miss Lestrange was clearly very clever if she knew how to make animals happy!
“I think so too and I think Blossom is a lovely name. My pony doesn’t have one yet-” She did, she was called Peaches but Laurentia suddenly didn’t like the thought of just telling the older girl in case Gretchen thought it was silly. “Will you help me pick a name please?”
Gretchen smiled. Laurentia was certainly being good company, but there again if her mother had been good enough for a Lestrange to marry, then it was no surprise her children were equally good.
"I'm honoured." She gave a gracious smile like her mama did. "Well, Blossom was called Daisy when she was bought, which wasn't a very nice name. It's a cow's name- they're all called Daisy in the fairytales, aren't they?" She wrinkled her nose a little. "They called her Blossom because she liked to eat the Blossom on the tree in the middle of the mews. Maybe you could think of a name like that?" she suggested.
"Just not a silly name, like Blue or Goose." She laughed, remembering the names of some of the ponies the other girls had.
Laurentia breathed an internal sigh of relief that her pony’s name had not been chosen as one of the silly ones. Even if she could never tell Gretchen that she already had a name – or else it would be she that looked silly – she could rest assured that she wasn’t being ridiculous. Perhaps she could save the name ‘Peaches’ for another pet? It was her birthday soon after all and mama had promised her a puppy if she was kinder to Livius.
Which she had tried to do!
She agreed heartily that Daisy was a silly name and told Gretchen so before she fell quiet as she considered what she could call her horse… wait…
“She enjoys Peaches a great deal,” she said with a smile and wide eyes at her own perceived cleverness. “That’s a nice name isn’t it? And it isn’t nearly as silly as some of the other girls.”
She nodded impressively and kept her head up high as her mama and grandmamma had taught her.
Gretchen considered for a heartbeat, before giving a little nod.
“Yes, that is a lovely name.” She decided with a smile. “Very fitting to summer, and very pretty. Poor people wouldn’t even know what a peach was, would they? But it’s definitely not silly- I heard one of the girls had a pony called ‘Marie Antoinette’! Can you imagine that?” She laughed.
Gretchen nodded self-importantly. Laurentia might not be a Lestrange, but at least she knew where she stood in society. There was nothing worse that those born to upper class, pureblooded families who didn’t know their allegiances. Well, apart from muggle born people trying to be better than proper wizards, of course. “It’s not their fault that they don’t know any better I suppose. Mama says that style is a matter of breeding, so it’s not surprising such girls should look up to us. They can still be rather silly though.”
Gretchen was just about to make another comment when a slum child ran in front of her pony to retrieve their little hoop that had spun out of control. She gathered Blossom’s reins as the pony broke into a canter, even managing to stay seated as she gave a little rear, the ponies hooves only a little above the ground. One of the groomsmen was almost pulled off his feet, and another shouted at the child. Gretchen got her pony back under control and walked her back to her friend.
“Are you hurt?” She checked. “How dare he!” She fumed, choosing outrage over showing the brief flash of fear she’d felt. She had to show Laurentia that a Lestrange was never afraid!
Laurentia had squeaked when the pony had fled but all in all she was rather glad that she hadn’t behaved like a baby and screamed. Nobody had been hurt – she couldn’t see what had become of the slum child but she honestly didn’t care what had happened to him – and the ponies were under the control of the groomsman again and she didn’t look childish!
She glanced over her shoulder all the same, keen to see where one of the groomsman had gone and her eyes widened when she watched him lash out at the poor child with the crop he had for the ponies. The blow was sharp and swished through the air and Laurentia heard the howl and flinched. She had never seen anyone been beaten before in her life but the child was hit again, the groomsman’s hand clasped hard around his shoulder. She glanced to Gretchen and wasn’t sure whether the older girl had seen – certainly she didn’t seem to be reacting.
Laurentia resolved to do the same and tried not to breath a small sigh of relief when at last she heard the groomsman send the boy on his way and returned to them.
“I’m quite well thank you. Peaches didn’t seem to mind too much.”
She reached out her hand to scratch the ponies head affectionately, suddenly wishing she could bury her head in the furry mane rather than sit upright like a proper lady. But she had to behave herself or else she would never be accepted!
Gretchen did, in fact, see the groomsman hit the child, but she didn’t let surprise pass her facade. Naughty children ought to be punished, and if that boy had actually caused her to properly fall and hurt herself then he’d have suffered something much worse that just a beating. Gretchen and her siblings were rarely beaten, of course. Like good Lestranges they knew their place and manners, but slum children couldn’t have Papas who loved them as much as hers did. If they did, then the child wouldn’t be so silly as to run out in front of horses, would he?
“He was certainly very silly!” Gretchen agreed in her most pompous tones, turning Blossom around so she could continue her ride. “And foolhardy. One would have thought that even a slum child would know better than to run out in front of horse! His parent’s can't have taught him very well- though one would have thought it was common sense. What if our ponies had thrown us? Papa would have been so angry at him.”
Laurentia could well imagine. Gretchen’s papa was a gentleman she had only seen once and she had certainly not spoken to him but he had seemed very scary indeed and she had clung to her mama’s hand for the whole experience. He hadn’t said or done anything especially unkind but there was a sense of unease she had never felt from her own papa and she certainly didn’t feel when she was around her new step-father.
“Perhaps he doesn’t even have any parents?” It was a curious thought. She had lost her papa, so her mama had replaced him as soon as grandmamma said was decent and that seemed perfectly logical to Laurentia, but what if they were so poor that they couldn’t afford to replace a parent!?
“My step-papa says that some of these people are so poor that they don’t even have shoes on their feet!”
Laurentia was tempted to look over her shoulder and see if the stupid boy had such articles, but she didn’t think she could bear to see his bruised face again. Instead she rested her hand in Peaches’ mane as a means of comfort, leased with the pony brayed happily at her touch.
“Well, surely he has to have a parent. Children don’t just take care of themselves, do they?” She wrinkled her nose a little. One would have thought that even with one parent, they’d have thought to wash him. In the fleeting glance she’d got of him, he’d looked filthy. “Besides, if he didn’t his aunt or grandmama or someone would look after him. Or if he had no family, there are orphanages or things like that.” She’d read things like in Mr Dicken’s work. Workhouses might not be very nice but surely that boy had to have someone to look after him.
Gretchen thought for second. “But manners and being sensible don’t really cost money.” Even if the boy was so poor he couldn’t afford shoes, he should be able to at least use his eyes. “After all, it’s called common sense.” She wrinkled her nose again. “And even if his parents cant afford to teach him properly, Irvingly has that free school thing, and the teachers should definitely teach them some manners.”
Laurentia didn’t fully understand why a person simply had to have parents, but she immediately agreed with Gretchen that children didn’t just look after themselves. She certainly couldn’t, although she thought that Gretchen might be able to given that she was so very grown up and clever!
Her eyes went wide at the mention of the village she had never visited that she had heard was inhabited by nothing but muggles. She brought Peaches closer to Laurentia’s pony and said in a hushed voice, as though concerned she would be caught out even uttering the name:
“Have you been to Irvingly? Is there really a school, I didn’t think muggles were clever enough?”
“I’ve not actually been there, but I’ve heard stories- the school is free, run by the Countess of the Enchanted Forests of Scotland and Wales, and they let both magical and muggle children in.” She thought that was a bit silly- that way, the magical children wouldn’t be able to learn about magic. Not that they could actually do any, of course, but she was still taught magical history and things like that by her governess, but they couldn’t really do that if muggles were there too. “Muggles probably aren’t clever enough though, otherwise surely they’d have their own school like Hogwarts.” But definitely not as great- nothing could rival magic in her mind.
She patted Blossom a little. “I can’t imagine I’d ever really want to go there either- it must be very ramshackle like the frontier towns centuries ago in America.” Gretchen reasoned. She’d heard the first colonists had even resorted to cannibalism, which was something she never wanted to be within at least twenty miles of. “And besides, muggles can be vicious.” She added matter of factly. “Even muggleborns can’t be trusted- Seneca and I were very lucky to escape that evil man last year.” Well, luck hadn’t really been a factor. The man was very silly to first kidnap Lestranges, then to let them write after letting slip their location. Obviously muggle born children weren’t as clever as pureblooded ones, or he would have known not to.
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