Beaulieu

## Beaulieu Family

Originating in France but now located in England out of necessity, this family carries veela blood and has the fortune (or misfortune depending on how you view it) of birthing only daughters who possess captivating beauty.

### Site Lore

The Beaulieu family have been Veelas or part-Veelas for generations. While it usually was a point of pride within a family to have sons, none of the Beaulieu’s have given birth to a boy in decades. Their Veela blood is strong and their luck is good and so generation after generation beautiful full or part-Veelas have been born, always taking on their mother’s name so as to carry it on to the next generation. Colette Beaulieu was no different, the youngest of seven girls and a brilliant and enchanting student at Beauxbatons.

Upon graduation, she began her training as an Obliviator, quickly working her way up the ladder and entrancing all of her male colleagues. She was married at a young age to a colleague who was head over heels for her. They shared many happy years together and had four beautiful daughters but after a tragic case of dragon pox, Colette was left with her four girls on her own. While she grieved, she was determined that she’d never marry again. However, there was a local Muggle who ended up catching her attention. He was handsome but in a careless sort of way and he stumbled all over himself to talk to her whenever they bumped into each other at a shop nearby to her small flat. He was cute and charming yet slightly clumsy. It was still endearing to her and so she married Henri Charpentier without a worry in the world.

He was normal after all, what was there to worry about?

Shortly after their wedding, Colette told him about being a witch and Henri didn’t seem phased by it at all. He felt so lucky to have someone as beautiful as Colette and so it didn’t matter to him who she was or what she was as long as she had chosen him. Colette moved her daughters into Henri’s home and began the new phase of her life, giving birth to their only daughter Violette. Henri insisted that she carry his name, breaking the Beaulieu tradition. It was the first time that he got irritated about something and so Colette relented, figuring there were worse things than not sharing a name with her daughter. At least all five of her girls had a father figure, right?

*TW: Domestic abuse*

Margaux remembers the minute that her childhood began to fall apart. There were a lot of comments when she was a child about how beautiful she was and she drank in the attention, not thinking anything of it. However, as she aged and became more perceptive, Margaux started to recognize just how unwanted the attention her mother received was when just trying to do mundane things. The men who would stop her in the middle of the store and not stop talking to her, the ones who would follow them home continuing their catcalls, and the touches that were definitely unwelcome.

She learned early that it was a blessing and a curse to have Veela blood. Attention is great when you want it but sometimes it’s nice to be unnoticed.

When she was about eight, her stepfather started to become jealous. He started to ask where they were going and when they’d be back and who they’d be with. It was always phrased in a kind way but there was something about the undertone of it that gave her goosebumps, almost like he was waiting for her mother to disappoint him. Colette was beautiful and Henri knew it, but so did the rest of the world and there was the problem. Beauty was meant to be for your husband and no one else-- at least that was the comment that was snidely mentioned over meals or when someone lingered too long in conversation in the street.

Margaux watched as her mother became a smaller version of herself-- her clothes became understated and her hair was simply tied back. While the woman used to spend time and took pleasure in doing her makeup, she now left the house barefaced and with a meek goodbye. Colette keep tabs on where she was going and who she’d been with and reported those things back to Henri with remarkable accuracy but with every passing day, he asked for more and more evidence to support her story, as if she was spinning a web meant to entrap him or pull a cloth over his eyes.

Soon after that, the fighting began and Margaux stayed up at night, holding her sisters’ hands and waiting for it to be over, reassuring them that everything would be okay when she herself didn’t know if it would. At some point, she noticed the bruises on her mother’s arms and the way she looked over her shoulder more often than usual. Margaux did as she was told, she cared for her sisters, she kept her nose down, and she hoped that it would all be over soon.

After a particularly loud and explosive argument, just before Margaux’s 10th birthday, Colette packed up the girls and brought them to Perth where she had some distant family members who could help them set up a life there. She gave up her position as an Obliviator and became a simple shopkeeper instead, not giving her full name to anyone out of fear that Henri would find them and force them back to their small home in France; Colette was desperate to get away from the clutches of her husband and not afraid to make sacrifices for the safety and protection of herself and her daughters.

Instead of attending Beauxbatons as her mother had, Margaux was sent to Hogwarts, never hearing another word from her stepfather again and incredibly thankful for that.