Crotalus Head of House Speech on Crotalus Commons

Amelia Pierce

November 09, 2009 1:06 PM

Crotalus Head of House Speech by Amelia Pierce

Amelia lead her young charges through the school until they reached the corridor that contained a very specific painting. She stopped beside it and inclined her head toward its less than handsome subject. "This is Gunther the Zombie," she introduced him, as she had been introduced to him only the day before. "He guards the entrance to our Commons. To enter, you will need the password. Do not share it with anyone not in Crotalus. Only House members are allowed inside. Once you tell the password to Gunther, and he will allow you to pass."

She looked around to make sure they were all paying attention. "The password today is Sherlock." As she said the word, she turned to look at Gunther, and his portrait swung open on hinges as she finished saying it. "Follow me inside, please," she instructed and stepped over the couple of inches of wall that stood below the portrait, and into the room beyond.

There were a half dozen matching armchairs and couches, with maroon upholstery and silver trim. The carpet was gray and the walls were a tasteful shade of red that Amelia, for one, had been relieved to find was not as vibrant a hue as she might have feared when she heard the House colors were red and silver.

Once everyone had filed in and the portrait closed behind them, she tapped the bulletin board that stood beside the room's entrance. "The password changes about once every week. I recommend checking here before you leave in the morning to make sure you have the current one." She pointed out the relevant spot where Sherlock was currently being displayed. "If you forget the password, if you keep walking down the hall past Gunther, you'll see a door with my name on it. If I'm around, I'll let you in. If I'm not, my wards will let me know you're there, and I'll get to you as soon as I can."

The rest of the bulletin board was fairly empty. Amelia pointed to it anyway. "The other thing the board is used for is announcements and sign-up sheets. The Quidditch one, for example, will be up soon, and I encourage any and all of you to try out. First years are allowed on the team."

Moving away from the wall and bulletin board, Amelia took place in the middle of the room and stood up straighter, as befitted a more formal introduction. "I am Amelia Pierce, the matriarch of the Boston Pierces." Now even those less familiar with the New England families would know exactly who she was. "I am also the Quidditch Coach here at Sonora, and your Head of House."

"Curfew is at ten. Fighting and disrespect of your Housemates will not be tolerated. I am not afraid to dock points or give detentions no matter who your families are. Everyone is equal in this House." She frowned at them, hoping she looked stern beyond her thirty-three years. She had raised two teenagers by herself, so she knew the importance of a good stern look.

"That said, Crotalus will be your home for the next seven years. As long as you follow simple courtesies, we should have no problems. My office can be reached from the hall outside, or from that door right there," she pointed it out. "Anyone is welcome to stop by at any time to discuss any subject. I'll do my best to resolve any issues or problems you may have. Or, if you just want to talk to somebody about something, I can do that, too."

"If you don't feel comfortable speaking with me, your prefects are Jose Santoro - who is also our Head Boy this year - Lutece Anthony, and Laurel Cider. Your Quidditch Captain is Helena Layne."

She paused for another moment, then pointed toward the leftmost of two staircases. "Boys, your dorms are up there. Girls, you have the stairs to the right. Look for the door with your year number on it. Boys are not permitted up the girls stairs, and neither are the girls allowed in the boys corridor. Any attempt to ignore this rule will be met with forceful and magical eviction. As you have been duly warned, I will not accompany any student attempting such to the Hospital Wing. They will need to get there on their own."

"Does anyone have any questions?"\r\n
\r\n
\r\nOOC: You are now allowed to post anywhere on the site, though obviously, your character doesn't have access to the other common rooms. Please keep to the standard posting rules and minimum posting length (two paragraphs, each paragraph averaging around five sentences). Have fun and welcome to Sonora!

Subthreads:

Ah finally...sleep by Ira Stanwick

1 Amelia Pierce Crotalus Head of House Speech 20 Amelia Pierce 1 5

Ira Stanwick

November 09, 2009 11:31 PM

Ah finally...sleep by Ira Stanwick

Ira Stanwick was never so glad to stand up from a dinner table; he was exhausted and tired of the loudness of the hall. How could he stand that for the next seven years? Father would expect him to make the best of it and find some connections he could use in the real world like; he had while he had been in school. He had heard his Head of Houses’ surname many times in his life time but wasn’t sure if he could remember hearing her full name, at least he knew she was a pureblood.

He snorted once to the zombie painting and realized she had named him. How peculiar that was to Ira. He ran a hand through his short blonde hair as the walked into the common room. He didn’t listen to her speech he didn’t really care about the Quidditch team, why would a Stanwick want to join a silly team like that? But his ears picked up when she mentioned her family branch. The Boston Pierces he didn’t remember much about them but didn’t care, she was a pureblood and that’s all that mattered to Stanwicks.

Once her speech was over still snorting with laughter from the comments about boys and girls dorms he turned to make his way to the boys’ dorms. He needed to sleep the headache from the feast was becoming a pounding one and all he needed to do as sleep but before he could he bumped into someone.

‘Great just what I need.’ He thought as he turned to look at the person. Afraid to offend someone with pureblood he smiled and said. “My humblest apologies.”

0 Ira Stanwick Ah finally...sleep 0 Ira Stanwick 0 5

Raines Bradley

November 16, 2009 12:55 PM

Always a good thing to have. by Raines Bradley

It had taken a year of plotting and careful maneuvering on his part to manage it, but in the end, Raines Bradley had gotten his way.

That wasn't really unusual - as his father's only son and his mother's favorite child, he usually did get his own way sooner or later. This time, though, he had really thought it was possible that David and Ellen Bradley would stand their ground. That one of his sisters would attend each of their old schools while he was tutored at home was one of the few agreements they'd ever come to - there were some disadvantages to having parents who, instead of merely tolerating the situation as most unhappily married couples did, actively despised each other - and they tended to not want to work out new ones once they figured something out. With a little help from Anna and their baby sister Emma, though, he had worked out a plan, and it had worked beautifully. Instead of languishing on the family estate for the next seven years while his sisters made social contacts and had lives, he was at Sonora Academy.

Since he was the son and nephew of Crotali and had figured out how to play up his parents' dislike of each other to get what he wanted by the age of six, it didn't surprise him that he was going to be at Sonora Academy as a Crotalus. It did, however, please him; Raines revered his mother and his uncle Charles, and both seemed to think that theirs was the only House worth being in. His Head of House was less satisfactory - he, Raines Bradley, was expected to spend the next seven years answerable to Amelia Pierce? It was a scandal! - but as much as his mother tried to prove the opposite, Raines knew he couldn't have everything.

He remained quiet through the introductory speech, failing to note aloud the impropriety of having female Quidditch captains and coaches, a Boston Pierce as Head of Crotalus, and a rule that just coincidentally kept them from discussing her inferior social status. Raines was a great believer in the power of words; knowing many of thm were her superiors was one thing, but as long as they couldn't acknowledge it for fear of others reporting back to her and causing trouble, she could remain in power. It was a good tactic; he thought he would have thought of it, in her position, and he didn't like that at all.

It wasn't, however, the time or place for saying anything. His mother had stressed the importance of getting the lay of the land and being sure of what people were like before he spoke to them here, and he was inclined to listen to his mother.

Raines straightened his robes automatically as the speech ended and they were dismissed to bed. Less regularly, he turned as he did this and managed, Merlin alone knew how, to bump straight into one of his new roommates. His face didn't begin to match his auburn hair, but it gave the idea serious consideration. Excellent beginning, Raines, Anna's voice seemed to say in his head. Really excellent job there.

Luckily, however, the other fellow seemed prepared to ignore that. Raines smiled briefly, short and businesslike as usual, and proffered his hand. "It is I who must apologize," he said formally, regretting his unimpressive voice, for the moment, even more than his unimpressive heigh. "Truly. I am Raines Bradley, of the Louisiana Bradleys."

It hardly occurred to him to notice that his accent, so carefully cultivated to be just like his mother's, suggested he was not from Louisiana, but Illinois. He had long since come to the conclusion that his first name, being the surname of one of Illinois' premier families, which had just celebrated the first wedding anniversary of its most famous daughter and was about to christen her first child, ought to explain the situation admirably.

0 Raines Bradley Always a good thing to have. 155 Raines Bradley 0 5

Ira

November 16, 2009 9:46 PM

Yes, yes it is. by Ira

The other boy apologized and then offered his hand as he introduced himself. He was a Louisiana Bradley eh? Ira thought trying to remember everything his mother and father had ever said about the Bradleys. They weren’t enemies nor were they close allies to the Stanwicks but it would never hurt for Ira to expand the Bradleys into the Stanwick inner circle.

Taking the boys hand into his Ira put on his best voice glad that the boy was not taller then him. “Ira Stanwick of the Seattle Stanwicks.” He shook the boys hand quickly before dropping it. “So it looks like we will be roommates for the next seven years, what do you think of all this so far?” He asked as he looked over the boy, he seemed to be a good pureblood.

He knew how to introduce himself and mother and father had not warned him to stay clear of that last name so he figured it was okay to speak to Raines. What an odd name for a boy, Raines. “May I inquire about your name, Raines, it’s a very unusual name.”

0 Ira Yes, yes it is. 0 Ira 0 5

Raines

November 18, 2009 12:47 PM

Glad you agree by Raines

Stanwick, Seattle. Raines committed the information to his memory by route. The name rang no bells, but if his mother didn't know all about them, her brother or his wife would. Another firm belief of Raines' was that his aunt and uncle knew everything about everyone; sometimes, that belief was so firm it bordered on paranoia.

He looked around the common room carefully one more time as he considered his answer to Ira's question. "Crotalus has a long reputation for respectability," he said. "I'm a legacy here - fifth member of the family. Mother always spoke very highly of her old House, so I expect most of our fellows to be people of quality."

That seemed like a diplomatic enough answer. He had not put the leadership down in case Ira or a listener, for some odd reason, supported it, he'd managed to establish that he was important in the Sonoran scheme of things in case his real-world status didn't impress, and he'd refrained from giving a concrete judgment of Ira himself or their Housemates. His main motive for that last, of course, was that he had still to make such a judgment.

When his name was pointed out, Raines couldn't help looking slightly embarrassed. He was proud of his family, to belong to it and to bear its name, but...Well, it wasn't really in the category of normal names, and there had been moments of his life when he'd wished his mother had been a little more straightforward about naming him after her brother. Charles was a fine name. So, for that matter, were Miles, John, and Luke, all of which were also found on her family tree. He'd have had no objection to being named Frank, either. A good, solid name, was Frank.

"It's my mother's maiden name," he explained. "I was meant to be her older brother's heir." His cousin Catherine, of course, had mucked that up eight years before he was ever born, but he couldn't fault his mother for trying. He just wished she'd thought to give him a middle name he could use once giving him the family name failed to secure him Charles' fortune, which he was now triply removed from by the existence of Catherine, her eminent baby, and her sister Isabel. "She was born Ellen Raines, of the Illinois Raineses. Her brother is Charles Raines."

0 Raines Glad you agree 0 Raines 0 5