Edgar Thorne | Slytherin | First Year

Basics:

Name: Edgar Thorne

DOB: 14th November 2010 (Scorpio)

Species: Human

Blood Status: Half-blood

Orientation: Heterosexual

House: Slytherin

School Year: First

Physical Description: Swarthy complexion, thick dark brown hair, dark brown eyes; for his first two or three years at Hogwarts, he’s below-average height and weight. In Muggle context, he's wearing a black t-shirt, a black tweed jacket and black jeans), but he’s most often seen in his school robes, even out of class hours.

Face claim: Devon Bostick (boy & teenager) / Javier Bardem (adult)

Father: Godric Goodwill Thorne (Pure-Blood, member of the Wizengamot, former Gryffindor)

Mother: Asra (surname unknown, Bedouin/Iranian Muggle)

Siblings: Victor, younger half-brother (Pure-Blood, possibly Squib)

Other Relatives: Hilda Devereux, stepmother (Pure-Blood, Squib)

Wand: 22,9 cm cherry wood and troll tail hair

Pet: None.
Patronus: n/a

Boggart: to be buried alive.

Likes: drumming, Hogwarts, the Dark Arts, duelling, exercise and mincemeat.

Dislikes: Feeling helpless, vulnerable; failing or not meeting his own high standards; being unrecognized or ignored; being regarded as inferior.

Strengths: Street smart; eagerness to prove himself as a skillful wizard.

Weaknesses: Poor social skills.

History/Background Story

The years before
No one would ever suspect that elderly Godric Thorne, a fatherly, respected member of the Wizengamot, with his braided white hair and long Celtic moustache, had long ago devoted himself to his work to avoid inextricable family issues.

Like it was the case among many Pure-Blood families, impoverished Godric’s marriage with noble Hilda Devereux had been arranged without much concern for the mutual appeal of the individuals involved. It was first and foremost an alliance designed to unite the prestige of two ancient families. If it was beneficial to both, the couple remained childless. Worse, Hilda being born a Squib, wished to live as a Muggle, among Muggles to spare her own self-esteem, and her husband had no choice but to follow suit. Their already lukewarm relationship became courteous at best as they slowly reached middle age. Godric's existence was dull and captured in a tangled web of old family ties.



The visit of an eccentric French wizard Godric had been at school with came like a gust of fresh air and disturbed the cobwebs for Godric, who was invited to spend a month in Marseille. Little did he know then that this short sojourn would be a life-changing event.

When his pétanque ball accidentally landed at the feet of a beautiful but crippled veiled refugee named Asra, there was no steering Godric away from her: she was alone, vulnerable and he was totally infatuated. He took her under his wing and decided to smuggle her back to England with them, no matter how unreasonable and risky that idea was. He had already taken arrangements to hide her in a hotel room he had rented for her. His family would never find out. "I don't know if I should blame you or admire you for finally catching up on the imprudence of your teenage years, Godric!" said his friend.

Months after their return, Asra was pregnant. Hiding that from the family was no longer possible. Surprisingly, it was Hilda who stood up to the rest of the family: further, she even offered to adopt the child since she was unable to bear her own. The family reluctantly agreed so that the family would finally have an heir, and little Edgar was born on a bleak mid-November day.

Early childhood
One would have expected that having two mothers would have made a child spoiled silly; it wasn't the case for Edgar. He was “the boy” to Hilda, who at least always made sure that his basic needs were properly seen to by Minnie, the family’s house-elf; Asra was independent and worked two jobs that kept her too busy.

Thus, mostly left to his own devices in terms of social interactions, Edgar inevitably disconnected himself from his relatives and from others in general, having learned that he didn’t really need them to exist.

Then Hilda took everyone by surprise and became pregnant. She gave birth to a sickly boy who was named Victor and became the center of an attention Edgar never got himself. Jealousy rammed his inner fortress, and he became a bully to his innocent rival who had immediately replaced him as the legitimate heir. Minnie was given the new task of keeping a constant eye on him whenever Hilda wasn’t by her precious son.

First instance of magic
But an unexpected compensation was the product of this tense situation: after one instance which involved his great uncle Henry and a pair of rabid snapping dentures when Edgar was nearly five, Hilda had scolded him for having struck his half-brother. Angry little Edgar saw the batty woman's tight bun suddenly undo itself on its own; her greying hair stood on end, charged with electric sparks that terrified her so much that she fainted. Edgar didn’t know how that could have happened, but he was pretty sure that he had been the cause; but no matter how hard he tried to repeat the experience, it didn’t happen again. But other incidents did start to occur from then on, all of them out of his control.

That was the last straw to Hilda. She decided that the time had come to take matters in her own hands.

When Edgar was seven, Asra took everyone by surprise with the decision to split up with Godric, fly back to Marseille, plane tickets and passport in hand, and take her son along with her. Once at the airport, someone from a local orphanage would take “the boy” in and from there, she’d be rid of both her shame and of the little troublemaker, and thus able to start a new life. They’d already left when Godric found out.

It took him much longer to retrieve them with the help of the Ministry, not in Marseille but in some Bedouin camp in Egypt, than to figure out that Hilda had been behind it all. Asra hadn’t needed much convincing that the British Isles’ climate wasn’t doing her any good, not to mention the Western way of life that had always remained foreign to her.

Sadly, Edgar alone was returned to his father several months later, after a bureaucratic battle with various organizations, both Muggle and wizarding; Asra was deceased, “from a heart attack”, it was officially reported, and her remains were never found. As suspicious as the death of his paramour had been, none of the investigations he requested led anywhere. The only one who possibly knew what had happened was Edgar, but he refused to talk about it, despite some indications that he had clearly dealt with some deeply traumatic event.

A bad boy
Alas, the undesired aftermath of that ordeal led Edgar to become even more uncontrollable than before. He'd escape from the family manor house and nice private elementary school ("perhaps he won't come back this time" would charitably pray an old aunt) to wander in the bad neighborhoods of York, meeting with Muggle teenage bums who’d teach him all kinds of things no parents would want their kids to learn. He even somehow managed to become their leader. Hilda made it clear that he would be sent out to St. Brutus' Centre for Incurably Criminal boys.

The only upside to this situation was that Edgar had taken up drumming with “his gang” – as much as a lone wolf cub like him could have a gang - and he was a natural at it. As a matter of fact, all tension around him was released whenever he played; he then behaved like a normal human being, one who could be likeable and could convey actual emotions that weren't a violent chaos or a confusing awkwardness. Music was literally magical to him.

The Day That Changed Everything (A short story)
It was a sunny summer day at the neighborhood small square park. Victor propped his cane against the swing’s posts and stretched out to snatch its chain to steady the old wooden plank before dropping on it. His friend, Timmy, helped him by holding the swing’s other chain. Although Timmy was six years old, weak little Victor, who was seven, looked younger than him, but in an odd way; something about his face – his eyes perhaps – looked older, far too wizened for someone so young.

“Oh no”, the boy muttered as Timmy had started giving his swing some momentum. Both boys had spotted another boy beelining toward them from the other end of the park. A big boy, at least by their standards. He approached them with a satisfied smirk, hands in the pockets of his worn black jeans, a bit of straw lazily tucked in between his teeth. He kicked Victor’s cane away to lean against the swing’s post in its stead.

“Better be careful with that, or you’ll fly away, and I’ll finally get rid of you”, he said.

“Go home, Edgar”, Victor replied, a tinge of worry in his voice.

“Giving me orders, are you, runt?” Edgar straightened and his hands left the confines of his pockets. The swing clumsily interrupted its momentum as Victor stammered:

“It isn’t what I meant. But… don’t you have drum practice?”

At that moment, before Edgar could think of an answer, a barn owl flew over and perched itself overhead, on the swing’s horizontal support bar, right above Victor’s head. It was carrying a yellowish letter bearing a purple wax seal in its beak.

“Wow!” Timmy said in awe. Victor, who had his neck crooked by the sight, jumped off the swing and staggered away to have a better look. Even Edgar was astonished, even if he feigned derision.

“That’s so odd”, Timmy remarked.

“Mom says crows sometimes steal shiny things… but I didn’t know owls stole letters. Whose mailbox does that come from?” Victor asked.

“Only one way to find out”, Edgar replied. He collected a rock and threw it at the owl who took flight over him with an indignant hoot.

“No! Stop it!” Victor protested uselessly, as by then, the owl had already dropped the letter at Edgar’s feet before flying away. A second rock fell from the swarthy boy’s hand. He picked it up to take a closer look at it: the seal bore an aristocratic coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter H.

“Woah, whoever was supposed to get this, I’m keeping it if it’s full of money or something. Finder, kee-” Edgar began, interrupting himself as he flipped the envelope over. It read, in beautiful, ample handwriting:

“Mr Edgar Thorne
Leighton Square
York, England”

“What does it say? You can’t keep it”, Victor protested.

“Want to bet I can? It’s for me.”

“Liar.”

In other circumstances, Victor would never have dared speak up to his older half-brother like that. But now, Edgar was visibly too stirred to bother with him. The ephemeral immunity it procured was new and exciting.

As a response, Edgar wickedly held the letter to Victor’s face.

“Here, see for yourself.”

“You know I can’t read loopy writing yet.”

“Then shut up and leave me alone.”

Edgar didn’t want to open the letter in the presence of two nagging kids, so he turned around and found an old willow to climb in, to their surprise and relief. Even if it would take some time before they’d know what the letter was about, for once, their encounter with Edgar had not been concluded in bruises and tears. That was a first.

Surrounded by the ancient tree’s gnarled limbs and delicate foliage, Edgar finally broke the seal and unfolded a thick two-page letter made of the same yellowish parchment. He read:

“Dear Mr Thorne,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment. Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.
Yours Sincerely…”

Edgar looked up from the enclosed list that mentioned a collection of unbelievable objects such as spell books, cauldrons, quills and wands. Down below, the two small boys had resumed their little game.

“Is this some kind of sick joke?” he wondered. His stepmother had already enrolled him at St Brutus’ Secure Centre for Incurably Criminal Boys, of course, against his father’s will. Could she be so mean as to play such a dumb prank on him, just to provoke him into wreaking more havoc?

Once again, there was only one way to find out, and this time it wouldn’t involve any rock throwing… not yet at least. His father would tell him what this was about. Edgar furiously climbed down the tree and jumped off too quickly, stumbled, and ran off, ignoring the pesky calls of Victor and his friend.



“It’s all this batty old stepmother’s fault. And father’s, too. They should have told me that I was a wizard”, he thought inwardly at dinner that night, despite his excitement. Everything looked normal on the outside: the family sat quietly and was busy eating Hilda’s bland diet food served by Minnie (everyone had to share Hilda’s dietary limitations). Edgar was idly forking a steamed broccoli stem under the woman’s disapproving stare. She seemed to make a point of honor that nothing, absolutely nothing, had changed.

“He should have told me before”, Edgar reflected on, looking at his father who exchanged a discrete but proud look with him. “How can he stand it all? Her? This dull life? Perhaps he likes it. Perhaps it’s me. I’ve always felt different, that I didn’t belong. Now, I finally know why.”

He noisily dropped his fork in his plate on purpose and said:

“Father?”

“Be quiet and eat”, Hilda intervened. The children weren’t allowed to talk at the table unless when being addressed to. But Godric put out an appeasing hand to her and, too surprised to react, Hilda looked down to her food which seemed to have a sudden sour taste to her.

“What is it, Edgar?”

“So, I won’t have to go to St Brutus after all, right?”

“Of course not. You’ve been registered to Hogwarts years ago.”

And the elder’s usually kind grey eyes stared intently at his wife in a way that clearly meant: “Don’t say anything”. Edgar grinned, so relieved that he stabbed at his broccoli and stuffed it in his mouth. Godric’s eyes then focused on him as he spoke:

“Now, son, being a wizard is one thing; becoming a skilled one is another. It means you’ve got years of hard, dedicated work ahead of you. Further, you’ll have to behave. There must be no more fighting, skiving, or slacking from now on. Hogwarts is strict in terms of discipline, and for once, I can guarantee that you won’t want to get yourself expelled. Have I made myself clear?”

“Yeah, sure”, Edgar attempted to reply in a light, careless tone that failed miserably under the gaze of his father. Somehow the man suddenly had become more imposing than before, now that Edgar knew he was a wizard.

A new chapter is ready to begin.

To be continued...





(This backstory is based and adapted from a novel in progress by Edgar's typist).