Sienna Aurelie Linslee

Sienna Linslee is a French witch who is currently a potioneer at Slug and Jiggers Apothecary.

## Personality

Stubborn? Check. Go-getter? Check. Extremely protective in that kinda aggressive way where she really cares about people and wants to make sure they know it? Well…yeah. Sienna is a very passionate person. When she feels something, she immerses herself completely in the experience, since naturally life is the type of sport that requires you to go all in on something if you want to see anything come of it. Otherwise, it’s easier to stay home. But don’t mistake that for rash or ill-thought-out behavior (that’s for silly Gryffindors). Sienna’s rather protective about her thoughts and her heart, and even if she FEELS something with everything in her, she’ll probably keep it to herself. She’s the type of girl that likes to keep you guessing, but with enough persistence you can unravel her layers and unlock the core of who she is.

See, it’s not that Si acts like two different people or even that she likes to come off as shallow. It all boils down to insecurity. If she doesn’t KNOW you, then she just can’t trust you. It’s not personal, really, but she’s been burned enough times to know that most people don’t deserve to know who she is. If you can get close to her, if you can understand that she’s fundamentally a sweet girl who’s simply fallen victim to the times we live in, then you can get the full force of her loyalty and care. That can mean outspoken displays of affection, an extreme concern for your well-being, and an exposure to every ounce of her sharp wit and flirty disposition.

To those who don’t know her, Sienna seems easy enough to figure out. She knows how to keep your secrets (be they about embarrassing crushes or botched up spellwork), capable enough to deal with people and tricky potions, and perhaps rather demanding (hey, she has standards and you can always expect her to expect the best). She won’t accept what she considers less than perfect, and she’s quick to challenge the status quo if it isn’t suitable to her. That is…to an extent. This is perhaps the key to understanding why she may seem so shallow if you aren’t a lucky recipient of her trust. Sienna is, well, scared. She’s a muggleborn living in a very certain world, and she’s been out of her element since the day she received her invitation to Beauxbatons. She hasn’t been known to keep her cool in troubling situations, so she’s learned to stay out of them completely. So really, don’t be offended if she distances herself from you or refuses to assist. It’s her, not you. She’s scared, and used to feeling in-control, and therefore not-equipped to being the vulnerable one and relying on others for her safety. She may lash out, she will most likely shut down and close herself off. She’s stayed alive so far, hasn’t she? That’s not just due to her charming smile and pretty eyes – she’s learned how to identify and flee dangerous situations (not because of any great ability, you understand, but simply because one can’t be in danger if one never fully lets other people in on her secrets).

So, befriend her to an extent. It’s easy enough, she likes to be around people. Just…don’t expect sincerity from her. Not right away.

## History

Si was born in the French-language stronghold within Brussels (so don’t call her a Walloon!). The girl grew up completely ignorant and independent of the world of magic, owing of course to her Muggle parents. Her upbringing could be considered completely ordinary, barring one interesting detail (perhaps more interesting to us as observers than to little Sienna). You see, there have always been, and likely always will be, wizards that hate Muggles – even in the many years of peace that followed Harry Potter’s adventures. So Muggle-targeted magical violence is always a pervasive threat to those that unwittingly live near magical communities. Her mother appears to have been the unlucky random target of one such group of blood purists, as the woman was found dead in an alleyway, yet otherwise completely healthy and unmarked. Muggle police were baffled. Sienna, at age 2, was too young to understand death, especially those that occurred in suspicious circumstances, and the experience irrevocably changed the girl’s father forever.

(A note, here. The only definitive details of Sienna’s mother’s death are that a young mother was found dead in an alleyway, purse and skirt untouched, and that the woman was completely healthy and showed no markings of what might have killed her. Si’s mind filled in the rest of these unpleasant details after enough time spent in Beauxbatons and the wizarding world. Unfortunately, these will always remain unspoken speculations).

Her father was a good man, if not perhaps a little baffled as to how to raise a precocious young child on his own. He always seemed lost without his wife, often caught sitting despondently with her old things and a sad look in his eyes. Still, he always loved his daughter deeply and her care was always his first concern. The man was a rather famous dancer in Belgium, and often visited the great capitals of Europe to perform in all sorts of dancing (from ballroom to breakdancing and from ballet to capoeira). As a young girl, Sienna would often attend his performances and watch with pleasure (she has never seen her father happier than when he danced). He started to teach her from a young age, and those experiences represent perhaps the happiest times of her purely non-magic life.

Outside of the home, life was good. She was well-liked by her peers, admired for her pretty face, and set apart for her dancing. Sienna was never short of friends, or at least friendly faces, and she could enjoy the calm. It was here that she began to expect everything just so, where everything went her way and she felt like the queen of her little world. That never fully changed in her transition from Muggle to magic, although her world grew much bigger and she learned quickly that she was rather inconsequential in her new one.

(You must understand how drastically her life changed when she moved to France and began at Beauxbatons. In Brussels, she was the daughter of a famous dancer, ordinary in all the ways that counted, and special enough to warrant all kinds of lovely attention. In the wizarding world, she was at best yet another young witch being taught the mysteries of magic. For most, she had much catching-up to do on the everyday functions of the wizarding world that seemed like oddities to her. At worst, she was a representation of the taint that the muggleborn represented for those who considered magic and themselves pure. It was a new world with new politics, and she was taught the hard way that her best option was to appear inconspicuous.)

Sienna adjusted fairly well to this radical change, all things considered. Her father couldn’t help his concern, however, that the magical world was changing his daughter in his ways he could anticipate. Oh, her personality developed as he would expect. His daughter was outspoken, headstrong, and he noticed with chagrin that she took well to the concept of boys and dating. She seemed to have enough friends, but…no confidants. Very few people that were ever mentioned to him by name, and few names that remained consistent over the years. Si, on her part, seemed unconcerned with these realities. She knew practically every name in her year, smiled at anyone in a close vicinity, and took a special liking to Potions (which required every ounce of her patience and precision, but she rather liked the single-minded focus that potions required).

By her fifth year, Si had accepted a number of facts.

One, relationships come and go, but they seemed to go quickly for her. She’d dated enough at this point to know that she could have fun and pass time, but she hadn’t found what she wanted. That she was private enough and picky enough that she grew bored with the cookie-cutter, everyday type of boy Beauxbatons offered. That didn’t really matter, though. She had since become the closest of friends with Gus (who was spontaneous, charming, and captivating in all the right ways) and she needed nothing more than the bond that they had built.

Two, in this world it took skill and family to stand out, and Sienna didn’t seem to have much of either. Unlike her take on relationships, however, this was something she was unwilling to let go of. Si was unsatisfied with mediocrity, and as well as she hid it she wanted to stand out. Fame in itself didn’t interest her much, fortune she could do without…but she wanted to discover something that would change their world. She had already discovered her affinity for potions and was set on pursuing it as a career. Since fourth year, she had already ingratiated herself with the Potions Master of Beauxbatons and begun to experiment with mixing new ingredients and how to manipulate them into new potions. But she wanted to create some mindblowing potion that could make a real difference in people’s lives. Merlin only knows what that will be.

Three, people were both her best protection and her worst enemy. She may not have been top of her class, but Si was not unintelligent. She knew about the tensions that had rocked the wizarding world in the last decades and the rifts that had formed around blood status. She also knew her place at the bottom of the totem pole. Yes, yes, blood purists were such a small percentage of the population and most wizards accepted muggleborns without question. But it was hard to not think of oneself as small and insignificant when she heard about attacks on muggleborns, or little barbs directed her way, or how seamlessly integrated Gus was into society that she had to work so much harder to understand (let’s be clear though, Gus is the gift of her life and will hex whoever suggests she be jealous or ungrateful for him). Fact three was trickiest to reconcile in her mind, that her best protection in life would be the company of those who accepted her, but that her enemies could always be hidden among them. She still hasn’t worked it out completely.

At any rate, Sienna finished at Beauxbatons becoming an accomplished young lady who finally started to feel that perhaps the wizarding world could be her world too. Maybe she still responded to odd references with the occasional blank stare (honestly, Beedle the Bard was an odd one), but she understood the principles of magic, the politics of the world she lived in, and the mysteries of potion making and brewing. Moving to London felt like the natural move to make. She was ready to dive in as a fully-fledged, fully-educated adult to wow the world.

(Si is perhaps more confident in herself than is maybe fully deserved, but her attitude must be respected. She tried freelancing for a full year before she realized that experience was more important than she previously thought. In Diagon Alley, perhaps Potions appears more mundane than it did what with the repetitive demand for the same brews, but it’s helpful. She understands what people want now, what they look to solve or hide with their potions. She also understands herself better now, in that she doesn’t truly know what she wants. But that’s okay. In a way, she already has everything she needs. A loving father, close friends that she can rely on, and a job that engages her. What the future holds, what she TRULY desires…that will reveal itself in time).

Sienna has been increasingly on-edge with every nail-biting article published by The Daily Prophet. In particular, ever since the prison escape, she’s just…scared. She doesn’t know what’s happening, doesn’t care to know details, but she knows it could very well be her that shows up in the obituaries sometime soon. The past few years have forced her to reevaluate her role in society, whether she can ever truly accomplish all the great visions she has planned for as long as her status is precarious and her life potentially in danger. She’s starting to realize that the wizarding world can be as ugly as it can be exciting, and that there are risks to being “invited in.” Perhaps some extra reading is in order…her charmwork is a little rusty and one can never be too careful in this new world.