HITCHENS, Pavo E. O.

   Character's Legal Name: Pavo Eridanus Orion Hitchens

   Age: 16, Sixth Year

   Hogwarts House: Slytherin

   Blood Type:  About 7/8. So halfblood, but he’ll tell you it’s pure.

   Species: Monster.
   

Pavo overall has a rather haughty appearance. His most noticeable features are his prominent cheekbones, sharp jaw and chin, and thick black hair that curls away from his forehead. The striking look is completed with pale skin and grey eyes that in idleness are unexpressive, but are sometimes lit with unnerving intensity. He's not too tall but thin in an elegant way, with long legs and a sort of grace about his movements. On the surface he might be said to have careless but strange good looks, but if enough time is spent with him it becomes apparent that there’s something unsettling about his manner. His behaviour is a little too careless, his eyes a little too cold, and the rest of him is a tightly coiled wire waiting to spring.

   

While his grandfather would frustratedly (and frustratingly, for Pavo) assert that what his grandson seeks most of all is acceptance from a world he sees himself as excluded from, this might perhaps be taken rather skeptically by most others, since normalcy and mediocrity seem to be the things Pavo abhors above all else. Indeed, his main concerns are securing recognition and awe, if not respect, though Maximus is right in his assessment that it is the sources he seeks them from that are most troubling. Pavo revels in taking up the position of outsider in relation to his family, scorning the acceptance they would offer him in favour of being part of something bigger than them, aligning more closely with his own interests than the philanthropic goodwill of his parents or noble rationalism of his grandfather. He regards himself as a pureblood, a genius and a revolutionary, better than them and everyone else, superior in aims and intellect to the misguided general population.

His prejudice and narcissism are untempered elements central to his perception of the world and himself. His actions are thus often viewed as callous or even cruel by others, and his skewed sense of importance and priority means that he demonstrates little remorse for his behaviour. Above all, he is stubborn beyond reason or belief- some (his grandfather) might even call him pig-headed. He refuses to let anyone direct his choices or set him straight- his arrogance is his biggest weakness and his strongest characteristic. The only person who has been successful at convincing him to reconsider any decisions is his sister, whose aptitude and enthusiasm for similarly dark areas of magic and innate understanding get through to him. He trusts her above anyone else, seeing her more as his shadow or the other side of his brain than a separate person.

Pavo’s redeeming traits are perhaps his affection- loyalty, even- for his sister, his absolute confidence and his unshakeable, even ruthless, determination. Beyond that, there is little to endear him to others in a close human way. However, his intelligence, arrogance, and the danger he suggests grant him an air of charisma that he often exploits. There is something about him that seems to command attention or fear from his peers, if not always respect. He firmly believes in his own superiority and is not easily shaken from courses of action. This, coupled with a disturbing lack of empathy for others makes him a rather tricky friend and a dangerous foe. He likes to feel powerful, respected, feared. He wants his abilities recognised and his name exalted.

Though most would not hesitate to call him unpleasant, the more vicious, ruthless side of his personality has yet to properly display itself, as thus far he has mostly been limited to relatively harmless altercations and small acts of casual cruelty- possibly because he has lacked the means to wreak further havoc. Now that that obstacle has ceased to exist, he looks forward to shattering the limits placed before him, and there is no telling what he might do.
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      Early Years:

Delphinus and Vela Hitchens’ first child was 6 when the thought of expanding their family properly occurred to them, never giving much consideration to it before. Pavo was a belated second child after his brother Petro, followed all too quickly by Aludra not even a year later. The two were raised as twins and Pavo cannot remember a time in his life when his sister was not in it. The mere months that separated their births proved no obstacle; in the frequent absences of their globe-trotting parents, amidst the household staff that populated their home, they were each other’s most constant presence even after the births of their younger three siblings over the years.

They grew up privileged and coddled despite the frequent long absences of their parents, who might be called flighty in their parenting methods. Vela and Delphinus sometimes took their children with them on their travels, but more often left them to their own devices under the care of others. For the first few years of his life, their time was split between France and England, with Pavo and his siblings attended by nannies and house elves. The most consistent adult presence in his life was his grandfather, who moved in with them sometime around Pavo’s 6th birthday. Maximus’ approach to discipline was more ironclad than his son and he had more of a hand in Pavo’s upbringing than his parents ever did. He attempted to, at least. But Pavo demonstrated a bull-headed obstinacy and artful cunning from a young age that led him into frequent clashes with his grandfather when his inevitable disobedience was discovered. More often, he was secretive in his endeavours, but never possessing much natural subtlety, he was often an unruly and aggressive child, who was overly ambitious and rather unkind in his many schemes.

He established a dynamic with his sister early on wherein she would be the brains of their operations while he would lead the charge and it’s one they have stuck to over the years. Their parents saw this connection as something to be upheld, perhaps seeing in the company provided by the children for each other a substitute for the authority of a mother and father, and only encouraged it over the years. While Aludra occasionally extended this company to their younger siblings Pavo held little interest for their duller preoccupations, his arrogance setting him apart from the rest of them.

When the time came, Pavo and his sister both chose to attend Hogwarts rather than be separated, though for Lula Durmstrang had been a tempting alternative. While Beauxbatons had been a consideration and Maximus had also touted Ilvermorny as an option, Pavo shunned the internationalist outlook of his family in favour of a return to tradition and familiarity for reasons both his grandfather and parents would not comprehend until more dangerous wheels had later been set in motion.


   Hogwarts Years:

Pavo had displayed signs of magic early on and began honing his theoretical knowledge under the watchful eye of a very well-qualified tutor. He could then be said to have entered the school in an advantageous position for the experimental social and intellectual opportunities of the First Year. For someone who wasn’t friendly or sociable by nature he took to Hogwarts life very well, doing well in those classes that held his interest, and gathering a group of casual acquaintances drawn to his air of privilege and unfailing confidence. His closest companion in school as at home was his sister, in whose company he could be frequently seen when not in class or in the common room. The two Hitchens siblings at times seemed to exist in a bubble separate from the rest of the world although they made no effort to isolate themselves from it. While Aludra was happy to focus on her studies for the most part, Pavo wasn’t an infrequent face where trouble was to be found. But he had begun to develop a more skillful cunning, which often allowed him to escape official punishment even as it further strengthened his reputation as one of those kids not to be trifled with.

He had quickly realised, however, that the aims he held for himself went beyond classes, beyond Hogwarts and its halls to a more lasting, more impressive legacy. Having surrounded himself with the most privileged of students, the purebloods and the otherwise excellent, he’d begun to form very solid ideas of the kind of company he saw as worth keeping, and the types of people who were desirable and worthwhile and those who were not. The tumult that followed, the attacks on the school and the troubles with the muggle world only cemented these prejudices as the years passed, feeding the seed of beliefs about himself and his family that earlier research and discoveries had planted in his mind until they'd bloomed into something uglier and harder to dislodge.

It was sometime during his Fourth Year that it became clear to his grandfather and siblings, at least, that what had previously been a stubborn tendency for thoughtlessness and self-importance had evolved into something darker and less easily tolerated. Maximus was the first to sense the danger but failed to curtail it though he tried, as he always had, to reign his grandson in.

--

“Do you know what they call us, in England? Do you, grandfather? What they think about us even after all these years?” Pavo’s voice was intense, leaning forward across the table to speak intently at Maximus, who simply raised an eyebrow and continued perusing his paper.

“Blood traitor filth!”  Pavo exclaimed, slamming a hand onto the table. Maximus showed no reaction, though Lyra and Pliny started at the sudden noise, their forks clattering to their plates.

“Our blood is just as good as theirs. We’ve got Black blood, Fawley blood, Burke blood. What gives them the right to call us that?”

“Bastard blood,” Maximus cut in sharply, looking up from his paper and fixing a liquid grey eye on his grandson. “Traitor blood. Muggle blood.”

“Pure blood.” Pavo insisted, stubbornly.

“And an impure name.” Their grandfather returned icily from across the room, flicking through the broadsheet in his hands.

The two younger children sat at the table wide eyed, transfixed by the exchange between grandfather and grandson. It was not the first time Pavo had disagreed with the Hitchens patriarch, nor was it the first time it had happened over breakfast. But the ideas he was espousing were a new development of late, something that left his siblings and his parents bemused and uncertain. Even their grandfather, usually so stoic, showed signs of disquietude beneath the unimpressed demeanour. It might have registered as concern, had Maximus been inclined to tenderness.

“I’ll not suffer insult, grandfather.”

Slowly, Maximus lowered The Daily Prophet onto the table and steepled his fingers. He fixed Pavo with a look that chilled his wiser siblings to the core.

“An insult, you think? Father subscribed to the same ignorant beliefs, and it only birthed tragedy. You are a foolish young boy thirsting after an empty glory and such misguided fantasies will be our downfall. I’ll not hear any of them in this house. And this-“ his grandfather’s voice took on a dark tone that seemed to bridge the gap between grandfather and grandson, matching Pavo’s dangerous intensity word for word,  “-will be the end of the matter.”

--

It wasn’t. Pavo only learned to sidestep his grandfather’s orders and his keen eyes as he grew more and more disenchanted with his family’s reluctance (as he saw it) to restore their line to what he believes is its former glory and seize what so clearly awaited them. For Maximus, it had become clear that the indulgent tolerance with which his son and daughter-in-law had hitherto handled their second oldest was no longer a suitable approach. But by then, with Pavo's opinions even more firmly cemented and his age too quickly advancing for any belated attempts at direction, even Maximus was unable to do much more than keep a keen, watchful eye on his wayward grandson. With no proof of misbehaviour, there was nothing even the wise old man could do.

Pavo was shrewd enough to put as much distance between himself and the one assertive member of his family as possible, minimizing the time spent in the same vicinity as Maximus when he wasn't away at school. He took to spending his winters and summers wherever his grandfather wasn't- Britain, mostly- remaining at home while the rest of the family traipsed around the globe and retreated to the continent- accompanied, as always, by his sister. Their holidays were quiet, solitary, filled with research and studying (Lula) and the drawing up of plans to achieve these previously unspoken aims (Pavo). For all intents and purposes, nothing had changed and the Hitchens' closeness was not at all out of the ordinary. But they slowly began to direct this uncanny understanding and ambitious intensity towards more concrete aims, though their preoccupations, even more slowly (and largely imperceptibly to the two of them), began to diverge.

The end of their last year coincided with one of their parents’ extended trips, and the Hitchens kids left Hogwarts straight after their exams, whisked off via portkey to see their parents off before they were scattered for the summer- Lyra to America with Leo and Faith, Pliny with Maximus to Albania, Lux to Bulgaria with Delphinus and Vela, and Pavo and Aludra to France with Opiuchus. Opiuchus’ library was almost as extensive as their grandfather’s, and not nearly as carefully censored or well-protected. They took every advantage of their uncle’s free-spirited ways to further their own dark leanings- or, as Aludra would correct, “to maintain balance”. But Pavo wasn’t interested in maintaining balance. His aptitude for dark spells of all persuasions was honed with the help of his uncle and the accompaniment of his sister, an education they took to with far more dedication and rigour than they’d displayed at Hogwarts. It seemed to come naturally to them, which only fanned the flames of this interest.

The Ilvermorny catastrophe was an unmitigated blessing for Pavo and his sister, who’d missed the train due to their early departure, and who spent the summer enjoying warmer European climes while their classmates awaited saving. But it also provided an opportunity for them to remain with their uncle for a while longer, convincing their parents that being tutored for the first term would be a better safer alternative to returning to a school that was still reeling from the events of that summer, and students and staff who wouldn’t have recovered sufficiently from their ordeal. It had never been hard to convince Vela and Delphinus to indulge what they saw as their children’s dedication to schooling. And Maximus, for his part, perhaps saw this removal from the increasingly problematic school environment as potentially having a moderating effect on Pavo, far from his usual company and usual concerns. On all parts, this underestimation was more naïve than even Pavo could have hoped.

Taking their fill of whatever knowledge their uncle had to offer, Pavo and his sister have returned to Hogwarts for the Spring Term to rejoin their classmates in preparing for NEWTs/OWLs. They come back to a slowly regenerating PA, with the Dark Followers scattered and in need of direction. And Pavo has the perfect candidate for the job. He’s since taken up the mantle of leader, which he thinks becomes him very well indeed.

   After Hogwarts: -
   

Other People

Significant Other/s: -

Children: -

Mother:
Vela Amelie Bonaccord l 48 l Beauxbatons

Father:
Delphinus Marius Hitchens l 50 l Beauxbatons

Siblings:
Petronius “Petro” Cepheus Hitchens l 22 l older brother l Ravenclaw
Aludra "Lula" Pyxis Bootes Hitchens l 15 l Irish twin l Ravenclaw
Plinius “Pliny” Eduardus Hitchens l 14 l younger brother l Ravenclaw
Lyra Phecda Hitchens l 13 l younger sister l Slytherin
Lux Rosalind Hitchens l 3 l younger sister

Other Family Members:
Maximus Antores Hitchens l 87 l paternal grandfather l Ilvermorny
Fausta Vulpecula Hitchens nee Fawley l 84 l paternal grandmother l Ravenclaw

Opiuchus Thomas Hitchens l 51 l paternal uncle
*Svetlana Hampton-Hitchens l 32 l paternal aunt by marriage

Antlia Isla Hitchens l 46 l paternal aunt (missing presumed dead)

Leo Eridanus Hitchens l 46 l paternal uncle
*Faith Hitchens nee Cardinale l 38 l paternal aunt by marriage
Volans Hitchens l 17 l paternal cousin
Alexia Hitchens l 14 l paternal cousin
Gus Hitchens l 5 l paternal cousin

Family History: Ostensibly descendants of Iola Hitchens, a disowned Black some generations ago. This tenuous link that has been upheld over the generations has now come back to bite them hard.

Important Friends: Dark Followers. Not friends but disciples.

Does your character look up to anyone? He respects the Dark Lords to precede him but like any misguided megalomaniac, believes none measure up to himself. He might feel something close to admiration for his sister, but more accurately she’s the only person he has ever really perceived as an equal.

Does your character particularly dislike anyone? Muggles. Mudbloods. Squibs. Half-breeds. Potter’s Army. The Order of the Phoenix. Gryffindors. Aurors. Professors. His grandfather. Any authority figures that attempt to curtail his plans and ambitions.

   What should we call you: Alyssa

   RP Experience: -

   How you found us: -

   Main Character (we'll PM you on this account): Let’s go with Sim.