Welcome to TB, an all levels Harry Potter roleplay with no word count. Our purpose is to go through the books with one exception: the addition of original characters and what changes that makes.
We accept all beings and creatures in the Harry Potter verse including ghosts, veela, muggles and even centaur.
We have many active events ongoing for both students and adults and many characters and locations around the world.
Come join us and discover how your character can grow and evolve in the world of Harry Potter.
Post by THALIA BURKE on Jan 16, 2024 7:37:58 GMT -5
September 2, 2024 (Monday)
Even though Thalia had known all along that she would end up in Slytherin, she still rejoiced to be here. So much green everywhere! The common room essentially being under the lake granted such mysterious atmosphere to the dungeon. Yesterday she had been too exhausted and her belly too full of food to explore after the feast. Today, however, she woke up early and felt excitement, akin to that of a Christmas morning, bubble in her chest. There were a few hours left until the first lessons of the term started.
The first-year quickly slid out of the bed and changed into her robes. Just in case she lost track of time, she took her school bag - wisely packed with parchment, quills, ink, and the textbooks for today's classes - so she could go straight to class after her explorations. She was about to head out when she noticed one of her dormmates was awake. Thalia paused.
"Sorry - did I wake you? I didn't mean to," she said somewhat sheepishly. "I'm Thalia Burke, by the way."
Post by NONA VASILIEVA on Jan 16, 2024 8:15:23 GMT -5
The concept of houses in school was a little odd to Nona, who had been expecting her whole life to one day go to Durmstrang. Supposedly the magic hat she'd been made to wear could determine things about her personality that even she wasn't fully aware of, which Nona was skeptical about. Her skepticism had been a mere backdrop to the awe she felt at being here, though - the castle was huge, far bigger than her baboushka's flat (then again, most things were) and even grander than her family's estate, which she hadn't really seen since she was a very little child. There wasn't much time to explore after the feast, though, since they were led immediately to their dorms. Nona tossed and turned a little, but eventually tiredness preceded over her desire to stay awake.
She woke up to the sound of movement. Nona went from asleep-to-awake very quickly, so she was upright and fully lucid by the time her dormmate realised she was awake. Her dormmate looked like she was ready to go to class already, even though they weren't starting for another...well, she assumed a few hours. Surely she hadn't slept in that much.
Nona watched, bemused, as the girl apologised for waking her. "It's okay," she said. I would have woken up soon enough anyway. It was a school day, after all. The girl introduced herself, and Nona repeated it in her mind - if they were going to be dormmates, she'd do well not to forget her name. "Nona," she greeted in return, and then, after a moment's consideration, "Nona Vasilieva." Her surname didn't carry much weight over here, she reminded herself. Her family had only ever resided in Russia. "Are you going to class already? It's early."
Post by THALIA BURKE on Jan 29, 2024 11:41:41 GMT -5
"Great to meet you, Nona," Thalia said automatically, good manners having been drilled into her since early childhood. "You're not British, are you?" The question didn't even need to be asked. There was a certain accent to the girl's speech, and the surname really gave it away. It was just difficult to place which of the Slavic countries the new acquaintance came from.
"I'm not going to class yet, no. Just heading out for some exploration. I figured I'd better take my books and things just in case I run late for class." She adjusted the strap of her bag which was already starting to chafe, and wondered if she should go ask Dad to put the Feather-Light Charm on it. Perhaps later; she was itching to have a look around the castle now. Having some company might make the experience more fun, though. "Would you like to come with me? We still have several hours until the first class..."
Post by NONA VASILIEVA on Jan 31, 2024 15:15:21 GMT -5
The girl was polite, saying it was great to meet her. A little less formal than nice, or a pleasure, or all the various phrases the English language bore - but it was polite. Nona pressed her lips into a thin smile, one that wasn't necessarily fake but didn't quite reach her eyes. The subsequent question, one of curiosity, came as a slight surprise. "No," said Nona. "Russian. But my English is good." She sat up a little straighter in her bed as she said this, ever-proud of how she had taught herself a language, before realising she looked rather silly sitting there in her night-clothes while Thalia was fully dressed. At least she wasn't wearing one of her more embarrassing pyjama sets.
It seemed her dormmate was planning to explore, which intrigued Nona. She had gotten a sense for the sheer size of the castle upon arrival, but with that size came thousands of little intricacies she'd spend the next seven years familiarising herself with. It wouldn't hurt to get a head-start. Thalia asked if she would like to join, and Nona nodded. "Okay. Just give me a second..." She shimmied out of bed and found her robes, which she'd tucked neatly away the night before, now embellished with green. Slytherin. It was starting to feel real. Nona got changed hurriedly, quickly brushing out her hair and tying it back. She glanced back to Thalia. "Where did you want to go first?" she asked, thinking about the enormity of the castle and feeling rather intimidated. She'd rather let her dormmate take the lead, at least for now.
Post by THALIA BURKE on Feb 13, 2024 5:19:34 GMT -5
"Oh, that's cool. You're the first Russian person I've met," Thalia confessed. In fact, she knew very few people from other countries. Her parents had international connections, of course, especially her mother who tried to stay in touch with mainland European purebloods. Being too young, Thalia rarely interacted with those guests. She waited for Nona to get changed and tried to remember facts about Russia and the Russian wizardkind she could use in their conversation.
It was pleasing to be the de facto guide of their little expedition. Although it was both of their first time at Hogwarts, Thalia had heard plenty of stories. Both of her parents had been Slytherins, so she felt she knew the common room and the dungeons just from hearing them describe the locations. "I was thinking we could go up to the basement level and see if we can find the kitchens, and maybe discover where the Hufflepuff common room is. I heard they're close to each other." She began walking toward the door again, slowly enough for Nona to catch up. "Lots of students sneak into the kitchens to get snacks. The house elves are glad to provide, and I don't think anyone gets punished for doing that - unless it's after curfew. It's just that we're not told where exactly the kitchens are, so we need to find them." Or ask older students for directions. Or, in Thalia's case, try to question her Father who worked at Hogwarts and certainly knew the location in question. She had a vague idea what to look for, although he never gave up all the details.
As they were passing the green-lit common room, she came up with a question. "Anyway, how did you end up attending Hogwarts? I thought everyone from Eastern and Northern Europe went to Durmstrang. Unless it's really really eastern part of Russia, in which case it might be closer to Xanadu."
Post by NONA VASILIEVA on Feb 22, 2024 16:16:00 GMT -5
Nona nodded, unsurprised. She expected she would be the first Russian person that many of her peers would have met. She wanted to say the same to them - that to her, they were the foreign ones - but it seemed strange to do that in their native country. In Russia, she was surrounded by a language that came more naturally to her than breathing. Here, though, it was a struggle to keep up. So much of her time was spent translating, whether it was trying to discern what someone was saying to her or studying a passage from a book.
As they left the dormitory, Nona glanced around with a thinly-concealed bewilderment at the common room around her. A few students were up and about already, flashes of green robes on much taller figures passing the two girls. Thalia explained her plan for exploration, and Nona nodded along, trying to keep up. Hufflepuff...that was one of the other houses, the yellow one. "Is it hidden?" she asked, in regards to the common room. "Like ours?" Nona kept her focus on striding in time with Thalia as the other girl provided some much-needed information on the layout of the dungeons. "You know a lot," Nona pointed out. "Did your family tell you about the school? Before you came?" Hogwarts was the only wizarding school in the UK, so it made sense that every witch and wizard native to the country would have attended. In this regard, Nona was at a disadvantage, and she planned to catch up as soon as she could.
It wasn't long before Thalia asked the question. Nona had rehearsed this diligently - at this point, she could recite it in her sleep. "I was meant to go to Durmstrang, yes. Then my baboushka got sick and I had to come to the UK. I live in Wales with my third cousin twice removed." She wasn't telling a lie, not really. And her life wasn't all that interesting, so she doubted Thalia would even want the full story. "I've never been to eastern Russia. Ostashkov, where I'm from, that's in the west. Not terribly far from Moscow, but still far." Moscow seemed to be the only place in Russia that garnered any sort of recognition, which Nona supposed made sense. She chewed on the inside of her lip, trying to think of a question to ask in return as they left the common room. "You were born here, I assume? What was it like?"
Post by THALIA BURKE on Feb 29, 2024 11:42:28 GMT -5
"It is hidden, yes. The Gryffindor and Ravenclaw common rooms are hidden, too. Well, I think most older students know where all the common rooms are, but of course, nobody can get in without the password. Oh, and I think we're not supposed to visit other common rooms even if we do learn the password." Which, quite naturally, meant that Thalia was already burning with curiosity to slip into the other three common rooms. That might take months, if not years, but she was going to eventually see them all.
Thalia was elated to have her knowledge noted, and smiled proudly in response. "Yes, both of my parents attended Hogwarts and told me plenty about it. They also both worked here. Well, my mom did so years ago, and my dad still does. He's the Divination professor. It's an elective subject for older students, though, so he won't be teaching us - at least not for two more years," she babbled on happily, more than willing to share interesting facts about her family.
Nona's reasons for coming to the United Kingdom were somewhat upsetting. "Oh... I'm sorry about your baboushka..." She was almost sure that meant 'grandmother', but she wasn't going to ask and clarify just in case her dormmate didn't want to linger on the subject. Ostashkov was not a location she had ever heard of, and now she was beginning to worry about gaps in her linguistic and geographical understanding of the world. Moscow was a city name she recognized, at least.
Returning to a more familiar subject was a relief, but a short-lived one. "Yes, I was born here. It was..." She didn't know how to summarize it. "Well, there's been a long war recently, and it only ended when Scotland became independent. I think my parents protected me from learning too much about it, but it's been stressful for them and I could feel it. I do like it, though, and it's peaceful now." Uh-oh, that wasn't the best way to describe her country to someone who just recently moved here. Heading up the stairs to the basement level, she scrambled for a new topic. "How did you like it in Russia?"
Post by NONA VASILIEVA on Mar 6, 2024 15:40:30 GMT -5
"Really? We can't visit the other common rooms at all?" It seemed strange, to separate the students like that. Nona had been curious as to what the other houses' common rooms looked like...she supposed she may never know. "I wonder why." That was her placeholder sentence as she considered all the possible ways in which one could sneak into a place they weren't meant to be. She'd think on it more later.
Nona listened as Thalia rambled on about her family, not at all minding the attention being diverted towards her dorm-mate rather than her. She pottered along beside her, nodding along, raising a brow as Thalia mentioned that her father taught at the school. "That's cool." Divination was an interesting topic, though. "Is he a, er...seer?" she asked, knowing that those were the people who could read the future, or something close to it. It seemed strange to teach Divination if you didn't have some kind of 'sight'. Though she supposed all that mattered was understanding the material. Classes were about tests, after all, and you couldn't test someone on a vision or a prophecy. At least she didn't think you could.
Thalia expressed sympathy for Nona's baboushka, and Nona pursed her lips. "She's just sick. Old people get sick a lot." Her tone was not particularly hostile, more just matter-of-fact. It didn't even occur to her that the girl might not know what baboushka meant; to her, it was the only word to describe her baboushka. She knew grandmother, of course, but that wasn't the same. Anyway, she was happy to move swiftly on from the topic, with her practiced explanation out of the way and seemingly no follow-up questions from her companion, much to her pleasure.
The mention of the war was far more interesting. Nona listened, intrigued, as Thalia described growing up amidst it. "That's strange. I wonder why the war lasted so long." She knew of a war, but nothing specific - she'd been too busy coping with the sudden turnaround her life had taken to fully research the country she'd be moving to. "Maybe we'll learn about it, now that it's over." She was looking forward to more culture-focused classes, like History of Magic and Muggle Studies. Thalia asked what it was like in Russia, and Nona mulled it over as she walked. "It's...hard to describe somewhere you have always lived. My family lived there. I had friends there. It was probably the same as growing up here, but in a different language." She didn't know what else of note to remark on. Looking around, she saw the bright morning corridors of Hogwarts. "Where are we going?" she asked.
