⦅ G E N E R A L
Age:
Gender:
Sexual orientation:
Bisexual, prefers females
Ethnicity:
House:
Blood Status:
Abilities:
Charms and herbology. Lou would much rather spend her time messing around with friends than focusing on her schoolwork, although she excels enough in Charms to pawn off her homework to her classmates for spare change. Her main skill outside of that lies in her shrewd, business-like nature and quick reflexes.
Best Spell:
Incendio ( fire making spell )
⦅ A P P E A R A N C E
Lou comes in at a typical 5'7" for an eighteen year old, with a slim, rectangular body shape and more bone than skin. Her elfish features, in combination with her petite frame, make it hard for people to tell her age — she could probably pass for a fifth year or even a fourth year if she tried hard enough. The same goes for her voice, although it isn't as high pitched as you'd expect. She gives off an air of cool confidence around her peers, although this is sometimes just a front to avoid their scrutiny. Following along with the whims of her friend group, she usually wears accessorizes in the form of jewelry or trinkets, most commonly necklaces. She never keeps anything for more than a year, and is known to give her old jewelry away to classmates. She also applies a bit of light makeup every morning before class, but nothing that heavy.
⦅ P E R S O N A L I T Y
Lou, by nature, is a huge extrovert with a love for socializing and keeping up with current events in the school. She's initially friendly towards most people, and continues this behaviour towards them unless she's given a reason to act otherwise. Friends are often doted on, and things like small talk and casual interactions are both appreciated and encouraged. These traits are largely kept in check by her desire to fit in with the other Slytherin purebloods, however; she values their opinions greatly, and as a result, tends to keep her head down and go with the flow when they're around. This is a defense mechanism of sorts, that leads to her being a completely different person when she's around her friends. Sometimes, she'll even developing a cruel streak out of the blue. Most of this is just for show, but sometimes, it'll really rub off on her — for example, she gets a thrill out of physically attacking others now.
She's got a humorous side, although this can range anywhere from her teasing her friends to making a cruel joke about someone's blood purity. Lou finds herself lowkey disagreeing with her friends' opinions more often than she'd like to admit, but lets most things slide to avoid being ostracized; after five years at Hogwarts, she's too cynical and tired to fight against the general consensus anymore. The two most noticeably Slytherin traits she possesses are resourcefulness and cunning, although the former is much more prominent than the first. Lou has a knack for getting out of all sorts trouble, ranging from not doing her homework to avoiding being caught while sneaking outside the dorms at night. She also becomes very businesslike when doing anything serious, which is a sharp contrast to her usual friendly demeanor.
Lou is still known amongst the other seventh years as the girl who came from France, much to her annoyance, but now owes most of her renown to the group of friends she socializes with. Everyone in her inner circle is a pureblood, and a fanatical one, at that — if anyone is picking on the half bloods or mocking someone's ancestry, it's them. Only a few of them know about her lingering unease with the treatment of muggleborns, although they don't take it very seriously and see it more as a silly flaw of her's to poke fun at. Her immediate family regards both muggles and muggleborns with disdain, although that was a mindset they got into only after Voldemort came into power; they were more indifferent towards wizard muggle relations previously, seeing it as a complicated mess that should be handled by the Ministry alone. Muggleborns, to them, are inferior in comparison to purebloods, but are also somewhat pitiful at the same time — they don't necessarily believe that they should be killed, just that they should be treated as second class citizens. Some of her extended family back in France, on the other hand, still have a more open view on blood purity; about a quarter of her cousins are currently halfbloods.
⦅ H I S T O R Y
Lou hails from a long line of purebloods in France, the Bertrands, a family known for both their service in the government and their generosity towards others. They could be considered upper middle class, with her grandparents owning a large family estate in the countryside. Her parents weren't the type to flaunt their wealth with expensive jewelry and houses, however, unlike the rest of her family; they preferred to use their wealth and position to gain more power and influence amongst the other pureblood families instead. Lou was raised off of the estate, in a relatively normal household in Paris. This is where she picked up her sociable attitude as a child, being surrounded by politicians and their children all the time. She eventually attended Beauxbatons when she turned eleven like all the other magical children in the country, and continued to attend the school until her second year.
That was when the news of Voldemort's victory had first reached them. The atmosphere shifted in both the school overnight, a palpable tension suddenly in the air; her parents had picked her up the next day, knowing that the school would be shut down soon, or worse. Things weren't even much better back home; they never openly discussed anything in front of her, but she knew they were arguing about something behind closed doors. It was only a few weeks later that they announced to her that they'd be moving to Britain, and transferring her to the re-established Hogwarts. They wanted to pledge their allegiance to the new government as quickly as possible, to avoid possible backlash against their family for being late to join the cause. Besides, moving would also place them closer to the government's seat of power.
Her parents began working for the Ministry, hunting muggleborns for a living. Lou was sorted into Slytherin upon her arrival to the school, partially due to the pressure from her parents to get into it. They’d also instructed her to mingle and blend in with the others as much as she could, and stick with the other purebloods. She followed their advice; it wasn’t long before she became friends with a group of Slytherin supremacists that were willing to take her in. They all had one thing in common, anyway: their parents all worked for the Ministry. A year passed, and her younger sister was finally old enough to attend the school. Much to her embarrassment, however, she was sorted into Gryffindor, instead of Slytherin like she'd been expecting her to — it's been a sore point for her since. She doesn't do much to stop them from taunting her sibling, only stepping in when things get out of hand.
Years passed: Lou is in the seventh year now, and she’s been starting to have reservations about joining the Ministry like everyone else seems so intent on doing — she has no idea what else she'd do with her life, though. This uncertainty has recently caused her to stop focusing on her studies, with her preferring to have fun wherever she can and enjoy her last year at Hogwarts instead.
⦅ E X T R A
- Lou speaks both English and French fluently, although she still has a slight accent with the former.
- Her wand is 9' long, made of cypress wood with a dragon heartstring core.
- She owns a short-eared owl named Brie.
