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Congrats, Kimberly! You have been accepted to IMPERIA for the role of Astoria Malfoy (FC: Caitriona Balfe). Kimberly, we were absolutely blown away by your application! You’ve given Astoria so much depth and nuance, from her upbringing, to her unlikely friendship with Colin Creevey, to how you’ve handled her illness, we loved everything about your application and we can’t wait to see Astoria on the dash! Please send in your blog in the next 24 hours and be sure to take a look at our New Member Checklist. Welcome home, we’re so excited to have you join our family!

OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION

Name/Alias: kimberly Pronouns: she/they Timezone: est Age: 23 Triggers: [REDACTED] Contact (tumblr url/discord/etc.): [REDACTED] How did you find us? (if tumblr tags, please specify): the tags! i think just through searching “hp rp”

CHARACTER BASICS

Character Name (First M. Last): Astoria Céline Malfoy (neé Greengrass) Desired Face Claims (Please provide 2-3 options, stating preference): 1st choice — Caitriona Balfe, 2nd — Sarah Paulson Age & Date of Birth: 38, 1 january 1982 Species & Blood Status: wix, pureblood Gender & Pronouns: cisgender woman, she/her Occupation: Academic, Spell Inventor/Magical Theorist Allegiance: Neutral

Summarised Biography:

Cursed with a blood malediction that left her and her parents preoccupied with maintaining her health throughout early childhood, Astoria grew up without direction, without passion, and without much to do or think about other than staying alive. She did what she was told and completed what was asked of her by her parents: mostly swallowing thick potions that made her head spin and remaining in bed when all she wanted to do was tumble through the lush gardens of the Greengrass estate and scrape her knees like other children. As she grew older and defied Healers’ expectations — making it past 5, then 10, then 15 — Astoria grew weary of the half-life she’d been prescribed. She’d followed her sister Daphne into Slytherin because she didn’t know where else to go, but by her third year, most of her time at Hogwarts was spent in the company of Professor Flitwick and her friends in Charms club. It was there that she learned she was a talented witch in her own right. Formed an identity outside of being the sick girl everyone doted on. Quietly realized that her muggleborn classmates — despite what her pureblood indoctrination taught her — were fully-fledged human beings. To someone who didn’t grow up feeling trapped in the (sometimes socially constructed) confines of a blood illness, perhaps her time in Charms club wouldn’t seem so transformative. But for Astoria, it was everything.

Nowadays, Astoria is still defying life expectancy estimations and is perhaps best known for her marriage to Draco Malfoy. She is also a somewhat-renown spell inventor. Her Armour Charm — an augmented version of a Shield Charm that absorbs spells rather than refracting them (cutting back on accidental injuries to those outside a duel) and sustains itself without the caster having to repeat the spell — is a life-saving favourite among Aurors. With the political situation becoming more dire and her blood curse rearing its ugly head in new and exhausting ways, Astoria has cut back on publishing her research, as she is both protective of hers, her family’s privacy and wary of what others with nefarious motivations could do with her spells.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

Character Development Questions

You can answer these questions how ever you wish, it can be a straight-forward answer or a prompt to write a little freestyle verse, let your creative juices run wild! You can answer as many as your wish, however you must answer at least one more question excluding the mandatory question below.

Please answer this question it is mandatory:

How does your character feel about the current political situation? Click here for the timeline. Are they indifferent to, enraged by, or supportive of the no-contact statutes and the new department?

Astoria doesn’t hate Muggles. She can’t, knowing that muggles raised her best childhood friend — but she fears what they can do as a collective, what they will do if enough of them discover the existence of magic and decide it should be eradicated. When you’ve spent the amount of time on bed rest that Astoria has, you end up reading a lot, and Astoria has devoured quite a bit of information on the non-magical world. She’s followed Padma Patil’s research on Muggle technology development for years and has struck up a friendly relationship with the wix that mostly involves the exchange of questions on each other’s respective fields via owl or in-person, over tea.

She’s not vocal about any of it — partly because her sister is a member of the opposition, partly because the Malfoy family gets enough negative attention as is — but she supports the recent efforts of the Wizarding Reformist Party to prevent contact with Muggles and get ahead of their technological advances.

Her views lie not in the belief of supremacy of Muggles over Wix or Wix over Muggles, but in the belief of careful separation. She supports the no-contact statutes in as far as they prevent Muggles from surveilling the magical population, but is content with the fact that Minister Granger’s version of the statute allows for muggleborn children to remain in contact with their families. She’s not wholeheartedly behind every measure that the Reformists support — or wholeheartedly behind any party, for that matter, because as an academic at heart she knows there’s always more than one solution to most problems.

Please choose at least one more question to answer, you may answer more if you wish:

How much does a 300 Galleons (approx. 1500 GBP) mean to your character? Do they view it as measly change, a month’s rent, or a great deal of money?

Astoria went from living a relatively expensive lifestyle (but still one that required her to say, check prices before making a purchase) to a grand and quite lavish lifestyle when she married into the Malfoy family. I think she has the vague idea that other people still budget their funds and worry about bills, but those experiences feel far away and foreign. 300 Galleons is now a drop in the cauldron to her.

Empty your character’s pockets. What do they carry on their person at all times, and why?

While not in a pocket per sae,Astoria’s wand (nine inches, willow, unicorn hair core, springy) never leaves her person. If she’s leaving home that day, she also carries whatever doses of potions she needs on hand for the day, along with those she needs for emergencies — fast-acting Pain Relief Potion, Blood Replenisher, Anti-Dizziness Draught. Chances are her husband and son have these things on hand as well — perks of being married to a potioneer. While she’s gotten better at taking these supplemental potions over the years, her reluctance to feel entirely reliant on them means she may suffer in silence through some of her symptoms in the name of feeling some semblance of control.

Once again, not in a pocket, but around her neck — a gleaming silver star pendant that has a compartment meant for poison but actually contains a mixture of styptic powder and crushed dittany in order to stop the bleeding if she gets a cut, because that’s the exact type of Dramatic Vintage Pureblood Jewelry Nonsense she loves.

With a childish persistence — because she wasn’t allowed to have candy growing up — Astoria always has a bag of some sort of sweets in her pocket. Frequently she has searches her person for a writing implement only to come back with a Sugar Quill.

FREESTYLE DISCUSSION

I. “the woman dies. she dies to provide a plot twist. she dies to develop the narrative.” — aoko matsuda

I originally started writing Astoria out of pure spite — it enraged and continues to enrage me that all we’re given about this woman is a few lines about her and an off-page (or off-stage, I guess, but Cursed Child is its own beast) death. It makes me mad that she is only defined by her role as a mother and wife to Scorpius and Draco, that she doesn’t get her own ambitions and a life of her own. The racist and sexist underpinnings of the blood malediction/Maledictus concept are par the course for JK but still, bad!

And while I can’t choose for Astoria to have this particular chronic illness and completely divorce it from those origins, I can at least eschew parts of it I don’t like and give a Astoria a rich and fulfilling life with a chronic/potentially terminal illness — not in spite of the blood curse, but because those of us with illnesses and disabilities are people with rich and fulfilling lives, wants, desires, and ambitions.

AN IMPORTANT NOTE: I try to be really careful about ableist language when I describe this blood malediction and its effects on Astoria’s life — I think that there is so much to explore regarding chronic illness and what, exactly, we constitute as ‘health’ — but I know that I can fall into the traps of my own internalized ableism. If there are terms or concepts here that make players uncomfortable and/or have harmful effects, let me know! I’m happy to make changes.

So anyway!

— origins of the blood malediction

I don’t have this fully worked out, but I think the Greengrass blood malediction stretches back a good ten generations to a very vindictive-in-her-righteous-cause-Muggleborn-witch cursing the family for their refusal to let her marry their son. It’s not limited to just the girls in the family, because I hate that, but it does affect at least one child per generation, so long as the family continues to marry exclusively purebloods — which they have continued to do, not knowing that their bigotry (though in some cases, real love!) is the reason for the curse’s spread. Astoria’s parents mistakenly believed that since the last few cases of the curse had cropped up in different branches of the Greengrass family — distant cousins living on the Continent — that their children would be spared.

— astoria’s symptoms and treatment

Since it’s a blood curse, I figure Astoria’s symptoms manifest as issues both with her blood and with her cardiovascular system at large. I’d compare it to haemophilia. Her blood itself is thin and cannot clot without healing spells and thickening potions, meaning that nosebleeds are frequent, bruising is easy, and bad cuts can be fatal. She’s at high risk for internal bleeding in her joints, and a big — though often unvoiced fear — of hers is a brain aneurysm that ruptures into a haemorrhage.

These symptoms have waxed and waned her entire life, with particular incidents that have brought her close to death; an accident falling from the garden wall at five, a wayward spell hitting her across the face in second-year DADA, giving birth to Scorpius. She doesn’t regret that last one — not at all — though it was five weeks after the birth before she was able to stand unassisted, and her Healer’s face when she said “I strongly advise you to not have any more children” haunts her to this day.

Then there come the potions — a barrage of them, to be taken at specific times of day, with extras if she’s bleeding externally or feeling pain in particular areas — that come with side effects like exhaustion, headaches, and nausea. She visits St. Mungo’s once every three months to ensure that the potions are working as intended and has learned to accept her Healers chastising her for the times she skips parts of the regimen or pushes herself too far physically.

II. “what’s the meanest you can be / to the one you claim to love?” accident prone by jawbreaker

It took Astoria almost a year at Hogwarts before she would speak up in class or acknowledge anyone with more than a handful of words — and each time she did her heartbeat would quicken, her face would flush. If she was called on by a professor and — Merlin forbid — got the answer wrong, her eyes would fill with tears, her gaze would shift to the floor, and she wouldn’t be able to breathe. One day, outside her second-year Transfiguration class, an annoying boy named Colin saw her heavy breathing and told her about panic attacks — Astoria’s irrational fear of social situations and new people now made sense.

That same annoying boy became her close friend not long after. It was a month into study sessions by the Black Lake that Astoria Greengrass learned that her Colin, the boy who kept a camera slung around his neck at all times and was so nice to her, was Colin Creevey, yes, that Colin Creevey, who was petrified by a Basilisk a year prior for being MUGGLEBORN. Astoria found that didn’t bother her very much. Sure, she never advertised that they were friends and didn’t freely associate with Colin in public places, but he understood her position or in the very least, didn’t protest it. She even got him to join Charms club — though she insisted that they enter and exit the classroom at different times and never spoke directly, his presence was a comforting balm.

Colin tried to get her to join up with the student resistance that was brewing in her third year — but Astoria knew she wasn’t the type to stir up such trouble. She couldn’t stand with the muggleborns and blood traitors no matter how right they were; she couldn’t risk losing her family. Unlike those in Dumbledore’s Army, Astoria didn’t see this conflict in terms of black and white, good vs. evil — there were plenty of others like her, struggling to find themselves in the midst of conflict, battling tradition and family expectations. She kept out of Umbridge’s way during that time. Kept out of her father’s way during that time — while he had no Dark Mark to speak of, his entrepreneurial hands passed cursed objects and ingredients for poisons to any Dark Lord-aligned wix who wanted them.

Her fourth year, she kept to the shadows — with Colin at her side, most days. For once, she appreciated his locquaciousness; they talked about anything but the war, even though they were really, honestly, talking about the war.

Her Hogwarts year during the reign of the Carrows is mostly a blur. Muggleborns weren’t allowed at Hogwarts anymore, and without her best friend, Astoria operated out of fear and depression, on autopilot, barely speaking or eating. She spent much of her time in the library, hiding from this new order and all the time regretting that she wasn’t brave enough to try and stop any of the violence levied against the non-Slytherin students, that she wasn’t more like Colin.

[DEATH TW] And then the Battle of Hogwarts came, and Pansy’s outburst had her escorted from the Great Hall before she could blink twice, and the last she saw of Colin Creevey was the boy’s face set in grim determination as he charged through the Hog’s Head with a gaggle of DA members. When she realized he’d snuck through to fight, Astoria nearly physically fought Daphne in order to go after him, only to see Daphne join the battle herself — this is a point of contention between the sisters that comes up occasionally.

With Colin’s death came the staggering realization that she was never as good a friend to him as he was to her. With Colin’s death comes regret sharper and more painful than all the injuries that sent her to St. Mungo’s. With Colin’s death comes a small resolve — that on the small chance she ever has children, she’ll teach them to embrace, covet, protect — they friendships they build with others. [END DEATH TW]

III. “teach your children well / your father’s hell did slowly go by” - crosby stills & nash

“I have a best mate,” Scorpius announces one night at dinner over his first Christmas break from Hogwarts. Astoria’s heart swells with affection; she suspected as much from his letters home, but the declaration — after eleven years spent fretting with Draco over whether their relative isolation from the rest of British Wizarding Society was going to affect Scorpius’ ability to make friends — is more than welcome. The extra-large bag of Honeyduke’s finest assortment of sweets she’d sent with him on the Hogwarts Express had done their job, indeed.

“Oh, that’s wonderful, Scorpius, who is it?” Astoria shoots a warning look at her parents-in-law, silently daring them to speak out against whoever her son had chosen as his first real friend—

“Albus Potter,” her son replies happily, and Lucius makes a sound that suspiciously sounds like choking. “And his cousin Rose is pretty nice, too.”

Astoria laughs out loud, and her worries for her son’s future — that he’ll grow up as lonely as his mother and father were, that he’ll struggle to be viewed as anything but a Dark wizard by the rest of society — ease up all at once.

WANTED PLOTS

DAPHNE

Going off of what Tee has written about Astoria in her application — I’m really fascinated by this idea that they don’t get along, because I’ve never seen an RP or read a fic where Astoria and Daphne weren’t thick as thieves, or at least kind to one another. The notion that Daphne resents Astoria’s status as coveted child whereas I think Astoria would find it laughable that someone would envy the attention she’s gotten for having an illness is super compelling, and I want to explore that more! Do they reconcile? Does Astoria say or do something that reflects poorly on Daphne’s political career? Are there tears and drama? Very excited to see how this relationship goes.

DRACO

Whether their feelings for each other skew more platonic or romantic that’s something for me and Nicky to work out, but I find it very difficult to think that Astoria would marry and have a child with someone she didn’t trust implicitly. I like to think that Astoria started corresponding with (read: harassing) Draco for his potions expertise when she suspected the new Healers assigned to her case weren’t quite up to snuff — and just never really stopped. I also think Draco doesn’t treat her with pity or kid gloves, and they have an honesty and rapport with each other that Astoria hasn’t been able to cultivate with anyone else. And obviously, they agree that while most parents think their child is the most wonderful and most brilliant in the world, Scorpius actually is the most wonderful and most brilliant child in the world, so that’s good.

TALOS / PURITANS

Astoria’s motivations for studying magical theory and spell creation don’t stem from some deep-seated desire to revolutionize the wixen world, or even to help people, really. She’s not much of a do-gooder, she’s just smart enough to see the gaps in the spellwork canon or where existing things can be improved. The thrill is in the discovery — and in the attention she gets from the discovery, okay?! sue her — and the creation of something new. Her work is mostly in Charms and Transfiguration, and her spells aren’t meant to be dangerous. But she can’t control what happens with her spells after they’re published in research journals — not who uses them, who they use them on, what they use them for.

I’d be interested in seeing whether Talos or the Puritans would be interested in recruiting her for her expertise — Talos, because she could coax out the correct incantations for weaving magic and technology into a synchronous form, and the Puritans, because their bid for power and wish to overthrow the Ministry could rely on spells that the DMLE is unable to block or counteract. She’d be more easily persuaded to join Talos, whereas the Puritans would need to threaten or otherwise coerce her into providing them some choice hexes and curses — either route is really interesting to me.

DRAGON POX

While her blood malediction doesn’t directly affect her immune system, catching an illness that could exacerbate her risk of internal or external bleeding is a cause for concern.

HAVING ADULT FRIENDS

I can drum up as many childhood friendships for Astoria as I want but it doesn’t quite scratch the itch of wanting friends for her in her adult life. Any fellow academic types want to take up the mantle? Bonus points if they’re not who Astoria would have associated with in her youth/vice versa, extra bonus points if they’re able to put up with just how stubborn — and kind of judgmental — she can be.

WRITING SAMPLE

[REDACTED]

CONCEPT

playlist — enter astoria

i. nobody - mitski

ii. instrumental - dodie

iii. past life - maggie rogers

iv. some unholy war (down tempo) - amy winehouse

v. nothing arrived - villagers

vi. une minute - pomme

vii. (they long to be) close to you - carpenters

viii. from the morning - nick drake

ix. april come she will - simon & garfunkel

x. sari - the westerlies

xi. these days - nico

listen here!

ANYTHING ELSE?

“The sickness inside you could last forever, becoming more of itself while you become less. But if you begin to accept your illness, or even to love it, you worry that you might want to keep it around.” — anne boyer, ‘the undying: a meditation on modern illness’

Thanks for getting through this whole thing!!! <3

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