Post by Astraia Yaxley on Feb 11, 2014 22:15:49 GMT -5
[presto]
SIXTEEN
FEMALE
SLYTHERIN
PUREBLOOD
HETEROSEXUAL
ADELAIDE KANE
ASTRAIA CHRYSEIS YAXLEY
 come one, come all, to see the show! pretty little purebloods, all on parade; take a gander, make a bid: this is your circus and they spin on your command. -:- “For most of my life I have been adored by fools and hated by people of good sense, and they all make up stories about me in which I am either a saint or a whore. But I am above these judgments, I am a Queen.” —philippa gregory, the other queen i refuse to be owned, bid on, captured and regulated like some pet, some possession. i am no possession and i will not allow anyone to rule me like a subject. my name and my blood are not my salvation. i am my own salvation. i will be my own queen. -:- meet astraia chryseis yaxley—yes, yaxley, as in second cousin to the malfoys and notts, and first cousin to the selwyns. one of the dark-haired purebloods, she doesn't look like a traditional yaxley, but this can be attributed to her dark-haired selwyn mother, eilona. the youngest of the four yaxleys, many murmur that astraia is lucky to exist. a fourth child in a pureblood family is rare; the heir, deucalion, was born first, with his sister amara a year behind. by that point, the yaxleys had one of each, but naturally, wanted to ensure they had a backup heir, and three years after amara, young nikolaos was born. this would be when most pureblood families stop; three is already nearing large, particularly in one of the sacred twenty-eight. however, two years later and another girl is born - one astraia chryseis. one can't help but wonder whether the gossip is true: that she was an accident, kept only because her existence was realised far too late for any method of removal to occur. the girl is pretty enough, if not the beauty her sister amara is, and apparently does well at school, though is not quite of the same standard as her brother deucalion, nor as charming as nikolaos. it appears, really, as if she is an afterthought, in every possible way. -:- my name is astraia chryseis yaxley, but i allow a few people to call me astra. not in the pureblood circle, seeing as i've been announced by my parents ever since i was a baby as astraia yaxley, but with my siblings, i am astra. it's a shorter spelling of my name—slightly different sound, though—and it means star, you see? so does astraia. sort of, anyway. astraia is a name from ancient greece; she was the goddess of justice, and the root of her name was aster, which meant star. the root of astra is also aster. as to how astra came about, well. kol and i had been arguing one day about me not having any nicknames; as the only one of us siblings without one, kol was adamant i should have one, whereas i was equally adamant that i would not have my name shorted to something tacky like ast or 'straia. amara intervened, suggesting astra, as it had the same meaning as my name—as children, we all had to learn the etymology of not only our own names, but also our siblings—and kol proceeded to inform me that he would call me that from then on. naturally, i was a bit concerned at the time, seeing as astraia had been my name for so long that i felt it was my truest possession, but it stuck, and i find it much easier now. a conversation i had with my eldest brother, duke, helped—he assuaged my fears about the loss of my name, telling me that astraia would always be my name, and that it didn't matter whether i was called astraia or astra, because the meaning was the same and that was what's important. originally, i thought he meant that they both meant star, but now i realise that he meant me. i am the meaning, and you cannot define me within the limits of astraia, or astra, or anything other than myself. i didn't grasp that then, but i know it now. speaking of names, i suppose i ought to bring up a few. first of all, my name. as i have mentioned, astraia is a goddess of justice and means star, but when combined with my middle name—chryseis, which means golden—my name literally translates to golden star. yaxley is just an ancient pureblood name, belonging to one of the sacred twenty-eight families. if i looked, i suppose the only meaning i would find would be those villages named yaxley somewhere in england, but despite my family's fascination with etymology, we are taught that it's not important for our surname, as our surname has a meaning beyond the actual words—it means purity of blood, high standing in society, elegance, finesse, quality, perfection, beauty, charm, coldness, composure; everything a fairytale queen has, but a princess does not. the names, though; as i said, knowing the etymology of not only our names, but our siblings', was compulsory. i called the firstborn duke, but that's simply a nickname amara gave him when she was younger. his name is deucalion neoptolemus yaxley; deucalion and neoptolemus are both characters in greek mythology. deucalion is a name belonging to sons of two prominent mythological characters; prometheus, the titan, had a son named deucalion, as did minos, king of crete. neoptolemus was the son of achilles. duke is twenty-two years old, an ex-slytherin. next born was my only sister, amara. amara's full name is amara alcyone yaxley; amara means eternally beautiful, or one who will be forever beautiful, which i think is fairly accurate for amara. she is very beautiful, and more than that, she knows how to accentuate the fact with her eye for detail. her middle name, alcyone, is the brightest star of the pleiades and means "queen who wards off evil [storms]". she's twenty-one years old. being only a year apart, i think they understand each other a lot better than kol and i could; i'm not saying that they're absolute enigmas to us, but they are the eldest and have been living in this family for longer than we have. the next sibling is kol. kol's name is actually nikolaos antares yaxley. amara's the one who coined his nickname as well; i'm not sure why we don't call him nik or niko, but he's been kol for as long as i've been alive, and a good while before that too. nikolaos means victory of the people, and antares is the name of a star in the constellation scorpius; it literally means anti-ares or the rival of mars. kol's eighteen; two years older than me. i love all my siblings, but he's who i talk to the most, seeing as he is closest to my age. physically, i have my mother's colouring but my features are softer. less stately, she said once. amara, on the other hand, has all of mother's beauty and bone structure and fine features, but a lighter colouring, like my father's. my father comes from a traditionally blonde family. amara's the only one whose colouring is like father's, though duke's is lighter than mine or kol's. mother is a very refined person. it was her side of the family, the selwyns, where the prominence of the ancient greek names came from. of course, the yaxleys used them too—deucalion was suggested to my parents by my yaxley grandfather, in fact—but it was mother who suggested a fair few of the names. i am actually not sure if it was from her family, or just her; on hindsight, it may have been just her as her name is eilona and her brother's name is channing—neither of which sound especially greek to me. and considering my cousin, soraya, has a persian name, and that her siblings are cyrus, conan and serena, i find it even more doubtful that the intense names we have are selwyn family traditions, given how normal their names seem compared to deucalion neoptolemus. which means the names most likely are due only to a combination of mother's personal preference and my paternal grandfather's input. i was born on the fourth of october, 2008; six days before my cousin soraya turned one. i do not remember this, but i do know that i was announced to the pureblood community by my parents at a very early age—as families such as mine are wont to do—and then was not brought up again for a very long time. i spent my childhood with my siblings; namely, kol. whenever we interacted with extended family members was a fond memory; my cousins were the extent of the children i knew besides my own siblings, and i reveled in their presence. other than my first and second cousins, though, it was just my siblings and i. which is fine, because i love my siblings, but we are very different. or at least, the two sets of us are different from each other. there has always been an incredibly distinct line between amara and deucalion, and kol and me. for one, there's the age gap; three years of just deucalion and amara before kol was born, and then the whole six years between deucalion and i. it isn't just an age gap, though; kol and i have always had a different purpose than amara and deucalion in our parents' eyes, and thus, have had a different kind of childhood than they did. the thing is, deucalion is the heir to the yaxley family and all that entails, and amara is the beautiful little girl mother always dreamed of. ever since they were born, they've been cast in starring roles, whereas kol was the afterthought, the heir's understudy, born only as a back-up, and i'm just an accident, a girl not intended to be born. deucalion and amara understand each other in a way that kol and i won't ever be able to fully comprehend; not that we don't all love each other or anything—we do—but while it sometimes feels like we are one unit and the yaxley siblings have always been one, other times... it's like the space between us could span galaxies. it all comes back to one thing: amara and deucalion have led lives of people always expecting something of them, of everyone caring, of everyone watching and wanting them. kol and i... all we've ever wanted is to be wanted. and that will always be what binds me to kol, what amara and deucalion will never fully comprehend about us and we will never fully understand about them: kol and i have no idea what it would feel like to be wanted all your life, and amara and deucalion have no idea how it feels not to be. i think kol and i have it easiest, honestly; he's made something out of himself, turned into this person that everyone wants, and me? well, i don't care. i did when i was nine, finding out about it all for the first time, and when i was little, always wanting a smile or to impress my parents, you know? i just wanted their approval; i was a kid and i wanted to feel loved, appreciated. it never really happened, and now, well, now i just want to live for myself. so i do. i remember the first pureblood function i really attended. i was five, kol was seven, amara was ten and deucalion had just turned eleven the month before, and was preparing for hogwarts. father was bragging about deucalion—one hand clasped upon his shoulder the entire time—and all about his intelligence, his swift absorption of his tutor's teachings and the way father was certain he'd simply dominate on the quidditch pitch. mother had amara, singing praises to her beauty and elegance, requiring her to curtsey and twirl and smile prettily like some sort of doll, designed for my mother's delight. kol was dragged in next, because what use is a secondary heir if nobody knows them in the instance of the primary heir no longer being eligible? i remember my own introduction too—mother giving me a look that said curtsey, so i did, and father saying, "this is astraia, our youngest," and then a tight smile and dismissive nod and then disappearing to the corner, led by kol, as amara and deucalion were forced to remain behind and be the stars of the spotlight. i know it sounds like an awful introduction, but i didn't mind—i was happy to be introduced, even if it was reluctant and abrupt. kol took me over to the corner where all the other pureblood progeny—those not being tugged around like show ponies by their parents, at least—were gathered, and sat beside me. he pointed out to me people he thought may be of interest, whispering gossip and knowledge into my ear that made my eyes widen as often as they made me giggle. he was my constant companion that night—as he'd been all my life, really—but even at five, i couldn't miss all the longing glances the rest of the children were shooting him. the thing about my brother is that even though he's never felt wanted by our parents, except for as a potential replacement for deucalion, he's learned how to make himself wanted by others. while amara and deucalion got cast in their roles from birth and had a niche to mould themselves into, kol and i carved thrones out of the shadows. even at seven, kol was charismatic, charming and everyone wanted him to be with them for the night, but he stayed in the corner with me. i remember, after the fiftieth glance from some smirking and increasingly incredulous girl, turning to kol and asking him why he wasn't sitting out there with all his friends, and wondering whether he liked them or not. i remember him turning to me, giving me the crooked half-smirk he had perfected at four, and leaning down and pressing a kiss to my forehead. "i like them," he'd said, laughter in his voice, "but i like you more. i always will." i know i will always remember that moment, because that's the first time i have ever felt wanted. the first time i had ever felt that if i wasn't there, someone's life would have to be redefined. it's not as important to me now, but it was earth-shattering then. i guess it could be considered pathetic that my best friend has always been my brother, but i don't think it is. he understands me best in the world, and he always knows exactly what i need to hear, like letting me know that he would choose me over his friends; over anyone, really. and he's the one person who's ever made me feel wanted without wanting anything in return, and i know he is someone i will never lose, so of course i trust him more than anyone else. and i think that's the thing that amara and deucalion understand the most about kol and i, because it's the one thing that we have in common; kol and i are bound together by the same thing they are—an undying trust and understanding that comes from being siblings, but more than that, from sharing the darkest thing about oneself. growing up, i'd often felt slightly uncomfortable, like my life was a big picture and there was a detail that escaped me, something i was missing that would change the whole image once i knew. i'd always felt slightly separate from my siblings when my parents were interacting with us, as if there was some sort of disassociation going on. when i was younger, i was always the last one for everything, the last thought of, the final piece of the puzzle—if the puzzle didn't fit the piece, that is, and the piece was just crammed in as best as possible, like a rushed job. but those were just feelings and suspicions, things i had put down to my own inadequacy and the fact that i wasn't as pretty as amara or as accomplished as duke; things that i could be determined to try and change about myself—all i wanted was to impress them, after all, make my parents proud and pleased with me. that didn't make it hurt any less that i was always ranked last in the chart of my parents' feelings, but i have always been determined. it wasn't until i was a bit older that i heard the gossip for the first time: that i was never supposed to exist. i was nine years old the day i heard; it was nearing the christmas holidays, so kol, amara and duke would be coming home soon, but until then, it was just me. i had been wandering around the gardens of some pureblood function when i'd happened upon a few older purebloods talking. i normally wouldn't have paid any attention but there was nobody around that i wished to talk to and besides, i had heard my surname. i listened in as they gossiped, talking about how sad it was for 'the girl', and the utter shame she must be feeling, and it took a moment for me to register they were speaking about me. "what happened?" one had voiced my thoughts, only in her twenties and evidently younger than the rest. her question earned her the knowing gaze of a lady i recognised from one of the sacred twenty-eight families—an aunt-in-law, perhaps?—who then followed up with, "oh, haven't you heard? i thought everybody knew." she paused—for dramatic effect, i assume—as i bit my lip, conflicted about whether my irritation at her condescending attitude—obviously not everyone knew, if both the young woman and myself were in the dark—was more provoking than my desire to know what she was on about, but she resumed speaking before i could make up my mind. "you know the yaxleys? how they have four children—a positively indecent number—but nobody really knows anything about the fourth?" the younger one looked puzzled, but nodded, while i felt something bloom in my chest; something suffocating about the thought that i wasn't imagining it all, that my parents truly did cover me up, pretend like i wasn't there. but then came the real bomb, the sentence that made me realise quite how indesirable i was, how utterly incapable of being wanted i was: "it's because she was never supposed to be born." i was completely frozen. it felt like ice was settling on my skin, penetrating to the bone and trying to find the cracks. oblivious to how earth-shattering this declaration was for me, the woman continued. "the third, nikolaos, was the last needed—the replacement heir, if you will. i was in school with eilona, and believe you me, that child would not be alive today had they realised her pregnancy earlier. as it was, they realised it at the same time we all did, and can you imagine the shame of losing a child, be it purposeful or accidental? and the yaxleys are a very image-driven family at the end of the day. they could not bear the shame." i was finding it hard to breathe by this point, wishing desperately for any way that these words would not be true, any form of relief, like my cousin soraya or one of my siblings or anything, but nobody came. then the younger woman said, "that's awful for the girl," and the older woman responded with an airy, "oh, i suppose so," but i was screaming internally, agreeing with the younger woman entirely. i'd always felt vaguely unnecessary, but i had always put it down to my young age, seeing as the older my siblings were, the more loved they seemed to be; but in that moment, i realised it wasn't down to their age, it was due to their purpose, and i was always going to be the least loved or wanted because i was the only one who lacked a purpose—worse than that, i was a burden. it was a heartbreaking conclusion for a lonely nine year old to come to, especially when all my closest companions were off in a boarding school far away that i couldn't attend for two years. it took the month until my siblings were back for me to sort of sift through it all myself; i told kol, of course, and he was really angry—i've always thought he should be a gryffindor, despite his green tie—but i refused to let him do anything about it. in that month, i realised a few things about myself and my life; one, i couldn't do anything about it. there was literally no point in striving for a purpose that i could only try to find in my parents, because i was never going to find one. two, this was nobody's fight; all my life, kol had backed me up and been my best friend, and he was the boy who knew better than to wear his heart on his sleeve but was always very in tune with his heart and his feelings and i know he'd have done anything to protect me, but this didn't have anything to do with him, and there was nothing he could do, anyway. three, it didn't matter that i didn't have my parents supporting me like they were meant to, because i had myself, and that's all i needed. i was always looking for someone to believe in me, and that was when i realised that i could believe in myself. so that's what i did. i stopped waiting for some sort of validation that was never going to come and just started to live for me. i became more independent; that became synonymous with alone for a while, but soraya wasn't at hogwarts yet either, so i always had her, as well as my other cousins and second cousins. i spent a lot of time developing as a person, i guess. i had been able to ride a horse for a while, but i really got into it then, exploring wiltshire and the land around us. i dabbled in a lot of things. i distinctly remember one pureblood function when i was nine and a half, or so—it was the easter holidays, and the siblings were back in town for a while. i was still on the outskirts more often than in the centre of the crowd, but it wasn't due to any sort of shyness anymore; rather, a sense of not finding anyone particularly interesting. all of a sudden, i was accompanied by a boy; he reflected my pose, leaning against the wall and raising an eyebrow at most of the people there. even shy of ten, i could tell he was beautiful. he had blonde curls and the kind of jawline that made amara's eyes widen when she caught a glimpse of him. i was nine, though, and for all my appreciation of beauty, wasn't planning on waxing poetic about some boy who was barely a teenager. it didn't matter in the end; he opened his mouth, lips twisted into a beautifully amused smirk, and an impressive amount of caustic wit fell out. within minutes, i had made my first real unrelated friend: his name was kieran bass, and he's still my go-to backup in most times of need for sarcasm and when i need a friend who isn't my family. he's four years older than i am—a year younger than amara—but his sister's only the year above me, and he's always been very good at not treating me like a child. it is due to him that i am no longer bored at boring functions i am forced to attend, and for all his ridiculousness, i love him a lot. by the time i started hogwarts, duke was in his seventh year, amara in her sixth and kol in his third, with all of them as slytherins. i was sorted into slytherin alongside ella, my second cousin. the hat didn't really seem to know where to put me; i have always been very determined, and i've learned to hold my own, which could have thrust me into either gryffindor or slytherin. it went for slytherin in the end, obviously, and i'm not sure what the deciding factor was, but i like slytherin. it suits me well enough; soraya was always the queen b of slytherin—well, amara in the senior years, really—but i never wanted that. i was the sarcasm to soraya's sweetness, the slight toughness to amara's cool beauty. i don't trust easily and i don't have an overflowing abundance of friends. it's just not who i am. i've always preferred people who are older, i guess, and then in my year, everyone always seems to be all friended up, and i wouldn't have a clue how to break into that. i do have some friends—generally those with a healthy appreciation for wit, or learning. i seem very high maintenance, i know, but it's not hard to make me care. which is sort of why i seem so high maintenance, i guess—if i broadcasted it to the world, i'd just end up hurt all the time. this is easier. it's not conscious, exactly; i just find myself holding people at arm's length for a while. i know that i seem like such a cliché—poor little rich girl, right? and when i was little, i honestly would have traded it all for some parents who hugged me and took care of me and legitimately seemed to love me. i'm older now, and i gave up on that; i'd still trade it in for anyone i loved. in a heartbeat. i would do anything for the people i love; i'm not very good at being some pureblood daughter or anything of the sort, but i can always try to be the best at being astraia, and astraia loves her friends and family, and takes care of them too. that's a truth i settled on when i was eleven; i would do anything for the people i loved. i respect myself a lot, and i would fight for myself, but i would fight for anyone i loved too. i care a lot; it's just finding people willing to try let me in and work their way into my heart that i have trouble with. JANE SEVENTEEN GMT+12 |
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