personality

Positive Traits: determined, intelligent, serious, explorer

Negative Traits: aggressive, impatient, envious, melancholy

Quirks and Habits: -Kalevi’s wand is his most prized possession, and he is so determined to keep it safe that he never sets it down. It’s always in his hand or his pocket, and he sleeps with it next to him as well.
-To put it as simply as possible, he drinks. A lot. It went from bad to worse after being expelled from Durmstrang, and he feels like he can’t stop.
-He finds a lot of comfort in his religion, Finnish paganism, even if he knows it’s one that’s probably unfamiliar to most people. It’s been important to his family for ages, and it’s important to him, too.
-His favorite hobby is swimming. Any time it’s warm enough, and sometimes even when it’s not, he can often be found jumping into a lake--many times, without any clothes on.

Likes: swimming, vodka, sauna, his wand, cloudberries, Midsummer

Dislikes: nightmares, panic attacks, purebloods, Durmstrang, his little brother

Boggart: Felix Sørensen (the boy who falsely accused him)

Mirror of Erised: himself as an Auror, capturing Felix

Patronus: swan

history

On an island in a lake in Finland’s eastern provinces, near the city of Savonlinna, is a small village that is rarely marked on maps. This is because it is a wizarding village, protected simply yet strongly: if Muggle boats try to sail to it, the waves gently push them away, toward a different shore. The people in this village are much like non-magical Finns in many ways. They are tough country people who know how to hunt and fish and search for berries. But magic permeates the village, and every day you will hear charms pronounced and flying through the air. Its name is Lintusaari, “bird island,” and it is home to many families who have lived there for as long as anyone can remember.

Centuries ago, one Ritva Koivu lived in Lintusaari. Dissatisfied with the wand she had purchased in Norway for her own magical education, and living in a land with forests upon forests, she began to hunt for the wood and creatures needed to fashion a new wand for herself, out of the birch wood from her name and the magical creatures she found around her. And when her son, too, required a wand, she carved one for him as well, also from birch. Soon she was selling wands to many others in the village, setting herself apart by custom-making every wand she sold. Since then, no Koivu wand has ever been made before it has been ordered, requiring intense correspondence in order to make it perfect. It was never a way to make the Koivus rich, but it did give them a reputation for quality work. Ritva taught her son about her work, and it was passed down through generations, each wandmaker putting their own touch on the family’s business, each one with a birch wand in honor of their name.

Taisto and Pilvi Koivu had only one child. Perhaps it was out of a sense of obligation to their families, or perhaps they had just wanted a child and took the chance while they were together. Either way, Kalevi Armas Koivu was born on a still-frosty March day, already with bright blonde hair from the day he was born. As was the usual tradition in Lintusaari, they gave him a name perhaps hard to live up to: Kalevi, the hero, the mythical ancestor of all Finns, and Armas, love itself, after one of his grandfathers.

The name did not seem to faze young Kalevi, though, the boy being curious and adventurous. Lintusaari being small as it was, he had nobody exactly his age to play with, and his only cousin was eight years older and pretended to ignore him much of the time, when she wasn’t off at Durmstrang herself. He did not let this bother him, trailing after the older children sometimes, other times going off on his own little adventures. With blond hair like golden straw in the sun, he could always be found outdoors, exploring and teaching himself everything that he had nobody to teach him. He caught frogs and marveled at their sticky feet on his hand until they jumped away. He taught himself to swim in the lake one day by kicking more and more until he stayed afloat (although that might have just been a bit of magic that saved him). He made bows and arrows from sticks and string, and climbed trees to shoot them down at the bushes he’d decided were his targets. With this sort of childhood, it was only expected that he would be excited to go to Durmstrang. The prospect of learning the magic he’d spent his whole life watching was intriguing, and he waited anxiously for the day to come when he would get on that ship and begin the new adventure.

He swears that everything was perfectly fine before that day.

Eleven-year-old Kalevi stepped on the ship to Durmstrang with a packed trunk, wearing a fur coat still a bit too big for him, with a birch wand tucked inside the pocket just like every other Koivu before him, personally made by his great-grandfather. He only wanted to learn to be a wizard--and yet, from the start, it was like a target was painted on his back, something that seemed to him to have no reason at all. And it did not help that at eleven he was still small and squeaky-voiced, and could barely defend himself against the older boys who were from important families and mocked him mercilessly. A half-blood, rural village kid who saw no problem with swimming naked or running barefoot on the cold grass? He never stood a chance. The castle quickly became nightmarish for Kalevi as he tried to avoid them, pretending not to hear the taunts or feel the bruises. He couldn’t wait to get home that first summer, catch a break, and start making a plan to get back at them.

But that didn’t turn out as he’d hoped, either. He arrived home to find that the familiar little house was no longer a sanctuary. His father was missing, and Kalevi had to search the whole village just to find him moved to a house on the far side of the village with some woman Kalevi had never met. And his usual spots in the house were replaced by one of the most obnoxious bar customers, Sauli Saarela, who he now had to call his stepfather. Where were the quiet, patient parents he knew? He had no desire whatsoever to add new parents to his life, and he went back to Norway with a scowl on his face and a tendency to cross his arms at all times. It didn’t improve the second summer he came back, either, with the news that he would have a new baby brother soon. Kalevi knew nothing about little brothers and did not want to ever learn, and he was having trouble deciding if he hated Durmstrang or home more. The third summer, at least, his father was single again, and he could get peace and quiet from the baby on his side of Lintusaari, even if the house was unfamiliar and didn’t feel like home. But he was frustrated to find that he was struggling to be able to read to distract himself, and the glasses he had to get to correct it did nothing for his self-confidence.

It was in his fourth year that things seemed to be getting better. He was taller, he was better at magic, and most of all, he had friends on his side. For reasons he might never understand, two best friends invited him into their circle: Felix Sorensen, Danish boy with a quick wit and a talent for pencil drawings, and Sebastian Mahler, German boy who somehow always seemed to be top of the class. It wasn’t long before the three did everything together. In fourth year, it was simply sharing all their favorite historical stories, being perhaps a bit nerdy but happy with it. In fifth year, it was the start of their partying days, Kalevi coming to terms with his bisexuality very suddenly as drinking games first made him kiss Felix, then spend some intense time in a supply closet with a boy in the year above him. Sixth year, too, was often spent sneaking out to the school’s more secluded areas with backpacks full of firewhiskey.

And in seventh year...

Durmstrang had made Kalevi cynical about many things, but he still believed in friendship--after all, who else had stuck by him? There was no reason to predict what would happen next. Never once had he seen a reason to think Felix would betray him.

Yet he did.

It was winter, the kind of depths of winter that made the northern lights dance at that latitude and the snow sparkle with those green lights. It seemed to be like any other night the three boys had gone out to drink in the snow, on the secluded areas of mountain where they could avoid detection and detention. Kalevi knew he had been terribly drunk that night, but he could still remember what happened as clearly as if it had happened five minutes ago. He’d been making some fireworks, shooting green sparks in the air, but his feet, clumsy with drink and cold, stumbled over a tree root. He had dropped his wand then, and before he knew it, Felix had picked it up, turning it over and examining it in his hands. Of course he expected his friend to toss it back. Why wouldn’t he? He would never have expected Felix to turn suddenly and cast a curse he’d never heard before in Sebastian’s direction, causing blood to spurt from the other boy’s shoulder, making him double over in pain. Kalevi could barely move for the horror, but it didn’t matter much as Felix hit him with a Full Body-Bind Curse, sending him all the way to the ground.

His brain worked too slowly, with all the shock then, to really understand what was going on, but he knew a Cruciatus Curse when he heard one. No! Not that, not with my wand! The screams would have given Kalevi nightmares forever on their own, but it got worse. After releasing Kalevi’s muscles, Felix threw the wand back in his direction and fled, the fur cape of his uniform flying out behind him. Kalevi did not dare touch the wand again, instead crawling over to Sebastian, who laid glassy-eyed in the snow as if he had seen a Dementor. He started pressing his own cape into Sebastian’s shoulder to try to stop the bleeding, no healing spells coming to his mind in his inebriated state. He stayed like that, terrified and confused, until the headmaster arrived and dragged him off by the arm.

Kalevi did not cry when he was brought before the council of professors to consider his case. He did not cry when they brought in Felix, who wove a tale of how Kalevi had been so horrible that he had to run away before he could be cursed as well. He did not cry when they took his wand and performed Priori Incantatem, watching the echo of the curses puff from the wand’s end. He told the truth, of course, but there were only two of them who could say what had happened at the mountain, Sebastian in no state to give any testimony. They could not prove who had cast the curse--but it was Felix and the rich family and the innocent wand against Kalevi and the blood traitors and the wand that had been used for it all.

He did not cry when they pronounced him guilty enough to be expelled, nor when they broke his wand in two, nor when he sat outside the castle doors with his trunk to wait for his mother to collect him. He did not cry when he arrived in Lintusaari, and he did not cry in front of his little brother, who was staring at him with wide and confused eyes. But as soon as they set the trunk in his room and closed the door, he started sobbing as if the tears were being ripped out of him.

The trial was the worst thing he could ever imagine, standing before a Ministry that was not his own, having to relive the terrible night once more, knowing that it was still only his word against Felix’s. That the evidence would not be enough to bring Felix to justice. That when the court was dismissed, with neither of them to face prison, Felix would finish his studies and move on to whatever career his family had planned for him, while Kalevi would be left with nothing.

For weeks Kalevi sat in his room, eating barely anything and sleeping far too much, leaving only to visit his grandparents at the bar, now that he was overage and could purchase whatever drink he liked from them. He wasn’t sure exactly what made him write the letter, the spring day that he got up, went to his desk, and grabbed a quill and parchment. He wrote furiously in English, not even stopping to correct any possible mistakes before he tied the letter to an owl’s leg and directed it to Hogwarts in Scotland. He nearly forgot about it the next day, moping in his bed once more, but the next morning after that, he awoke to the tapping of an owl’s foot against his window. He untied the letter and unrolled the parchment, his heart in his throat. After reading the Dear Kalevi Armas Koivu, his eyes jumped straight to the We will review your case and you will receive a letter with our decision in the coming months. He knew he shouldn’t get his hopes up, but he tucked the letter safely in his desk, went back to bed, and waited. They couldn’t prove I did it. They couldn’t. Please, please…

When the letter finally came, he felt as if the weight of a boulder had fallen off his shoulders. A new chance. A fresh start. A chance that he could finish school, restore his reputation, get back to where he was meant to be at eighteen years old--and perhaps, somehow, find out what Felix’s motivation had been. And maybe, someday, justice.

Ilmari Koivu was old, but he was willing to make a new wand for the suddenly revitalized boy. One with a phoenix feather, symbol of rebirth, for one more try at success.

roleplayer

RP Alias: Kasia
Pronouns: she/her
Hogwarts House: Ravenclaw
Other Characters: NADEZHDA KAREVA , SKYLAR REID , ISOBEL LINWOOD , MIA-ROSE LINWOOD , EMIL ZALEWSKI , KATRIN TYRELL , LYUBOV KAREVA , SAMANTHA BANKS , ZOË VALERIA , RUE HOWARD , PADMA JOSHI , DANICA LLEWELLYN , DAMIAN BELANGER , GRETA ROWLE , KATARZYNA DĄBROWSKA
Roleplay example:
Skylar wasn't entirely sure why he should care about this year's feast. He hadn't been given a prefect's badge to show off, not that he'd ever expected it. He still didn't have an older brother sitting at the Slytherin table. Even the one face that he'd found himself searching for without thinking about it--Dio's--was nowhere to be seen, and Skylar wondered if maybe the Slytherin boy had decided to drop out. It was something he'd thought about himself, except that he knew the professional Quidditch leagues didn't exactly want players who didn't have the discipline to finish their exams.

Secretly, he hoped Dio was here after all.

But, as usual, he was staring over at the Slytherin table while stuck with the Hufflepuffs. The Head Girl this year was a Hufflepuff, which was nice, but Skylar thought it might mean that she'd crack down on shenanigans in the common room. Two of the Llewellyn triplets were having a strangely affectionate sisterly moment, and Skylar looked over toward the green table yet again, looking for hair the same shade of red as his, trying to remember the last time he'd had one of Morgan's comforting hugs.

He wondered if, in the buzz of the arrival of the Durmstrang students, if he could just snag some food from the table and head to his dorm right away. It wouldn't be the first time he'd left a gathering he really didn't want to be at...