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+------- Thread: Back to her Roots :: OPEN (/showthread.php?tid=1045)
Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Matilda Nordstrom - 05-01-2026
Hospital Wing Greenhouse #4
2 Sept 1922, 7:00am
2 Sept 1922, 7:00am
There was nothing better than coming back to Hogwarts and having no classes for a couple days. Arriving Friday night, then getting to sleep in the next day was the stuff of dreams. Granted, Matilda was up at the crack of dawn, but at least there were no classes.
Getting dressed was easy. Putting on the Hospital Wing uniform and her most comfortable boots, Tilly lifted her hair into a bun and left with her new leather bag slung over her shoulder. She could find the wing blindfolded at this point, having walked the route hundreds of times. Walking in, everything felt right. If Hogwarts was her home, the Wing was her safe space, specifically the Greenhouse.
Storing her things in the dressing room, Matilda went straight for the greenhouse with a skip in her step. Opening the door the humid air hit her in the face, making her instantly smile. Standing there, surrounded by her plants, she shut her eyes and breathed in the fresh air.
*sniff
Opening her eyes, nose screwed up, something smelled… wrong.
Well shit. Sighing, Matilda went to the workbench and looked around. The tools were all accounted for and put in their proper spots. The bins of fresh soil stocked below for easy access, all the soil nutrient potions looked full enough, some would need to be filled soon, but it would get her by for the next week or so.
Grabbing her favorite green canvas apron, Tilly pulled it on and looped it around her waist before tying it in a knot against her stomach. She added her favorite dragon hide gloves and a set of clippers to the front pouch and stored her wand in the sheath attached to her belt.
Next she looked at the list of ingredients that were needed to fill the apothecary stores… Annnnnd it was long. No worries, she had all day to complete the task. And about a hundred other tasks. Hopefully someone would come join her at some point, but if not, she would get it done by Monday.
It wasn’t lost on her that she was 100% hiding from a certain Russian. He wasn’t stupid though, he knew exactly where to find her if he wanted too. Matilda = plants. It was a simple equation. Working with the plants would give her a chance to think and come up with a plan, since her original was tossed out the window the second she saw him at the Gryffindor table.
Clipboard and parchment in hand, pencil at the ready, Tilly turned towards the plants to get an idea of where to start. There was a lot to do, as always on the first day back. Walking up and down the rows, she made notes on all the issues she found. Blight on the lavender, mites on the chamomile, the entire section of aloe had been over watered and was now rotting away, and the list went on and on.
One thing at a time, Tilly set her eyes on the aloe, also the source of the rancid smell, and got to work.
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Dragomir Zdravkova - 05-06-2026
Arms crossed, eyes trained on the staircase leading towards the girls' dorms, Drago sat on one of the couches with preternatural stillness. Waiting. For her. Planning to intercept her on her way to breakfast — so they could talk.
Because he didn't understand her. He didn't understand much of anything if he were being honest.
At first he had assumed her reluctance merely rooted in her grandmother's failure to inform her of their arrangement prior to their first meeting. It had still lingered when they'd met a week later, but he thought he had managed to smooth over the roughest of edges that day, settling her defiance into interest, if not acceptance.
But then he'd seen her yesterday. Different in every aspect, unlike anything he had come to know her as. Back to defiance, publicly. None of it aligned with the expectations he held for a pureblood girl he was to marry. None of it befitted a girl who was to carry the name Zdravkova, and it was a problem. However much she might fascinate him at times, poking at a soft spot he rarely remembered he possessed, there were lines he wouldn't allow to be crossed. Undermining his future and authority certainly fell into that category.
Dropping his gaze to his watch, Drago released a tense sigh. Seven-thirty. She couldn't be sleeping in this long, could she? Maybe she had slipped past when he'd been in the shower. And if he had to take a hard guess, she more than likely was somewhere where they had plants in this castle.
Unfortunately he had not the faintest clue where that might be, he had barely managed to find his way back up here after his run.
A loud cluster of boys roughing each other up close by drew his attention, third-years by the look of it. Without preamble Drago walked up to them, ending their clownery by grabbing one of them by the scruff of his neck. "Where is Matilda," he asked gruffly, pinning them all down with his gaze in turn. Too stunned to speak, no one answered. "Nordstrom," he added. "Red hair, likes plants."
At last the one he was holding managed to stammer an answer. "Gr—greenhouse m—maybe? She does Hospital Wing duty uhm... Maybe she's the—"
Drago didn't let him finish, shoving him forward. "Show me way there."
Scrambling, the younger boy led the way out of the common room. Stoically, Drago followed. They made their way through the castle in silence, nervous looks thrown back at him once in a while that Drago didn't acknowledge. At last they halted before a door to a greenhouse, earning the boy a curt nod before he sprinted off into the other direction.
Drago stepped inside, immediately hit by humidity that crawled down his lungs and stuck to his skin. Already feeling stuffy inside his clothes he opened the top button of his shirt, refraining from rolling up his sleeves too.
It took a moment to find her in this unfamiliar sea of green, but he did. Footsteps dying, Drago came to stand a few paces away from where her hands were buried in dirt, clasping his behind his back. "Matilda," he announced himself. "Good morning. I would like to talk to you. Please."
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Matilda Nordstrom - 05-06-2026
“Matilda.” The deep voice cut through the humid quiet of the greenhouse, making her jolt in surprise before goosebumps rushed up both arms.
“Good morning. I would like to talk to you. Please.”
Of course he found her. Not that it was difficult. Ask anyone in the castle where Matilda Nordstrom was and nine times out of ten the answer would involve dirt, plants, or some form of dangerous vegetation. It had only been a matter of time before they ended up alone again. Not since Sweden.
Her hands stilled where they were buried in soil as she slowly looked up at him. He somehow looked even larger in the greenhouse space. So much taller than her, even with heeled boots. Broad shoulders, strength oozing off of him. She didn’t hate it… at all… Which was deeply irritating. Because she was supposed to be angry.
Not noticing his muscles. Not feeling her stomach betray her every single time he looked directly at her.
“You found me,” she said finally, forcing her voice to stay level and calm. “Though I suppose I make it rather easy. I’m usually here or in one of the other greenhouses.”
Turning back toward the rosemary she’d been working on, trying very hard to look focused and unaffected. Probably failing miserably. "This greenhouse needs the most immediate attention though, since it services the hospital wing.”
She knew perfectly well this was not what he had meant by talk, but easing into the conversation felt safer than running directly into whatever serious discussion had brought him here at seven in the morning.
The humid air suddenly felt too warm. The space too small.
Especially with him standing this close.
Matilda pulled off one glove, wiping dirt onto the front of her green apron before finally looking at him properly. Her blue eyes searched his face cautiously, trying to figure out which version of Dragomir Zdravkova had come to find her today.
Well... Not the one with dimples.
Her jaw tightened slightly. “If this is about yesterday,” she said carefully, “I already know I didn’t exactly behave like the ideal pureblood fiancée.” The title sounded wrong in her mouth. And somehow even stranger with him standing there listening to her say it.
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Dragomir Zdravkova - 05-09-2026
She jumped in surprise, just as she had the first time he’d found her lost in her care for plants. This time though the flustered air she’d held that day in Sweden was replaced with something more restrained — or nervous? Resigned? He couldn’t tell.
Her moods seemed to shift like the wind every time she saw him, swift and without warning, moved by an invisible force he didn’t understand.
By now he didn’t know which version to expect.
In a way, he had braced for offence. Stance wide, chest broad. Ready for attack. After all, she’d been unhappy with him yesterday, annoyed even, clearly vexed with his presence and everything he’d said and done. Openly rejecting their arrangement and their families’ will like it meant nothing. Shocking in her boldness, incomprehensible.
A push pin to his ego. His reputation and name.
But she didn’t react with irritation, not even evasion. Instead she turned to face him fully, searching his face before voicing exactly what had brought him here.
“If this is about yesterday, I already know I didn’t exactly behave like the ideal pureblood fiancée.
And again Drago felt confused.
“Then why didn’t you?”, he asked after a beat. Not accusatory, but inquiringly. For all that it sat uneasy on his chest — her strange behaviour — he still wanted to understand her reasonings. Instead of merely lecturing her on what he considered proper and appropriate, on what he expected.
On what his family would come to expect.
And yet, he couldn’t help but add, “You should not oppose me like this in public. It is bad for both of us. You can oppose me in private, if that is what you want.”
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Matilda Nordstrom - 05-09-2026
“You should not oppose me like this in public. It is bad for both of us. You can oppose me in private, if that is what you want.”
For reasons that would keep her up at night, his words made her blush. She knew he would be upset. Even angry. She wasn’t sure what to expect exactly, but wondered if this would be when his anger truly came out.
But he wasn’t yelling, or throwing things, or growling in anger.
“I understand what you're saying. And in retrospect I agree, but in the moment, when I’m being blindsided, it can be difficult.” She gave him a look, eyebrows raised. Telling him in her own way, that if people would just tell her what in the hell was going on, she might act in an appropriate manner.
“I feel like I owe you some honesty.” There was an edge to her voice. Nerves coming to the surface. He had infiltrated every corner of her world, and with that came an unavoidable look into the reality of who Matilda Nordstrom truly was.
“I suppose starting at the beginning makes the most sense.” Turning, she kept her hands busy, clipping dead leaves from a rosemary plant. Something she could have fixed in seconds with magic, but the repetitive motion helped keep her thoughts steady. And keeping her eyes away from Drago would make this a lot easier.
“I came to live with my grandparents when I was twelve. Before that… my life was very different. Then suddenly I was dropped into pureblood society and expected to understand rules no one had ever taught me. As you are well aware, there are a lot of rules and expectations in this world. I wasn’t a happy twelve year old, and my grandmother is a mean woman, so I didn’t take well to those rules and expectations. In fact I rebelled against them with everything I had, and paid the price.” Her hands shook briefly with the memory, before resuming their work.
The rosemary had long since lost any shape it once possessed. Realizing she was massacring the poor plant, Matilda finally lowered the clippers onto the table and turned toward him fully.
He was watching her.
And somehow that made this harder.
“As I mentioned before, my grandfather took me away from her eventually, but…” She lifted a hand, brushing escaped strands of hair back from her forehead, revealing the faint scar hidden near her hairline. “Not before some damage was done.”
Her voice remained calm, but a small tremor came through.
“I fainted from lack of food.” Thankfully magic had softened the scar. Most people never noticed it existed.
“Back then, I was a tiny thing, but apparently I was too fat.” The words tasted bitter and were so far from the truth. She was skin and bones when she came back to school after that horrible summer. “If I didn’t behave properly, meals became privileges instead of necessities. Tied to chairs for hours to work on posture. Locked in my room for days. My hand slapped with a ruler until it was red and welted if my hand shook while drinking tea.”
Her stomach twisted at the memory.
“When this arrangement was sprung on me…” she continued more quietly, “my first instinct was to fight it simply because it was her choice. I wanted to destroy it before it even had the chance to begin.”
A small pause.
“But my grandfather explained things. I understand why families do this. The logic of it, at least.”
She straightened, wiping dirt onto the front of her apron, suddenly restless beneath his gaze.
“I know how to behave when I need to. I know which fork to use, how to dance properly, how to host conversations and smile politely and play the part expected of me.” Her eyes flicked toward him briefly. “But that isn’t really me, Drago. It’s a mask I wear when I have to. I lived with my grandmother for one year, and most of that was at Hogwarts. Rewriting my entire personality isn’t easy to do in such a short amount of time. Especially under duress.”
Her gaze drifted away again, unfocused now.
“My parents did very little to raise me, so much of what I’ve become was survival, intuition and figuring things out on my own.” A faint shrug lifted one shoulder. Her childhood was not sunshine and roses, so talking about it stung. “I like cooking, baking, and gardening. I’m loud when I care about something. Opinionated and stubborn. A friend of mine once said my hair was red because God thought I needed a warning label.” She chuckled at how right that statement was. “This all probably sounds horrifying to a family like yours. So honestly, I’m not sure where this leaves us.”
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Dragomir Zdravkova - 05-10-2026
“I understand what you're saying. And in retrospect I agree, but in the moment, when I’m being blindsided, it can be difficult.”
He both understood, and didn’t.
What her grandparents had done, their lack of preparation, twice, was reason enough to feel aggravated. He could see that. That made sense. To have those emotions take control however, bursting forth with vigour and unrestraint, that was foreign.
His entire life had been one continuous lesson on how to hide away every ounce of emotion. To keep a stoic exterior, no matter what. Always composed, always controlled, never readable.
Readability meant predictability. Predictability meant danger.
It was how all of them operated — in public at all times, occasionally within their own system. Everyone had feelings, thoughts, and opinions that didn’t align with what was expected of them. Drago was no stranger to this. Yet duty persevered. Unity persevered.
Control persevered.
Her brows raised and she gave him a meaningful look that he couldn’t decipher. Saying nothing, Drago kept his eyes on her, not hard, not soft. But open when she offered her honesty.
And the moment she began to tell her story, the grip of his clasped hands tightened, molars clenching.
He had heard a similar story before. He had witnessed it. Liliya.
He anticipated the path of Matilda’s words before they left her mouth, but still they pulled at something in his chest, worsened by the tremble of her hands, the heaviness of her tone.
Pureblood education was strict. It was demanding and unforgiving. His own father was an example of just how brutal it was. Nadežda was another one. He knew how punishing it could get — he had the scars to prove it and he had carried his cousin through the halls of Durmstrang more often than he could count.
Drago knew how to endure. He knew how to redirect and absorb punishment meant for others.
What he didn’t know was how to stand in the face of someone’s suffering that couldn’t be undone. Listening to her speak, watching her grasp for composure like this, slowly swelled a knot of anger in his guts, prickling under his skin.
Not for her. Not even for Allegra.
But for Bertram.
For the one person tasked to protect and who had failed to do so. More than once. And right from the start. It made it hard to keep his emotions locked within, expression hardening.
“When this arrangement was sprung on me…my first instinct was to fight it simply because it was her choice. I wanted to destroy it before it even had the chance to begin.”
It made sense, he understood. And it made sense now how emotional control was not instinctual as it was to him. That too, he had witnessed in his cousin too many times to remember.
“I know how to behave when I need to. I know which fork to use, how to dance properly, how to host conversations and smile politely and play the part expected of me.”
Her gaze flicked to his and a brief pinch of shame pricked his stomach.
“But that isn’t really me, Drago. It’s a mask I wear when I have to. I lived with my grandmother for one year, and most of that was at Hogwarts. Rewriting my entire personality isn’t easy to do in such a short amount of time. Especially under duress.”
And then it twisted sideways, drawing the faintest hint of pain through his eyes. His chest hollowed out a little the longer she went on, and for a moment he remained motionless when she finished, standing in the wake of her words like a cracked statue.
At last, he moved.
Unclasping his hands from behind his back, Drago took a step closer, reaching for the hand still hidden within her glove. Carefully he slid the leather off, taking her hand in his with a gentle grasp. Thumb running a slow path over her knuckles he looked down at it for a moment, almost pensive.
Setting his jaw, he lifted his gaze to hers. “I do not ask you to rewrite your personality, Matilda,” he began, tone firm but not harsh, eyes soft. “I am sorry this has been done to you, you should not have had to endure this. I understand.” He paused for a beat, dropping his eyes to their hands before looking back up. “I only ask you to give me a chance. And I ask you to not dismiss this arrangement." Another beat of silence and his voice dropped into something more gentle. "If you would like, we can try to get to know each other better. We do not have to be strangers."
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Matilda Nordstrom - 05-11-2026
When the last of her words left her mouth, he moved.
She didn’t retreat when he stepped closer. Her heart beat faster with each step he took. No words were spoken as he removed her glove and took her hand in his. Goosebumps rose instantly along her arms with every slow pass of his thumb over her knuckles.
“I do not ask you to rewrite your personality, Matilda.”
His eyes found hers. Brown flecked with gold. Looking at them from a distance, they were dark, but upclose, when she looked into them, they held warmth. Up this close she could make out every small detail in them. There was no anger. When this arrangement was explained to her, one of her biggest worries was that he would be a volatile man, but there was no aggression in his eyes.
“I am sorry this has been done to you. You should not have had to endure this. I understand.” Her story wasn’t exactly a secret among the people closest to her. The shift between first and second year had been impossible to miss. The high heels, the posture, the tight hair, the way she second guessed everything and trusted no one. But hearing him acknowledge that it had been wrong, made her chest tighten with more emotions than she was ready for.
“I only ask you to give me a chance. And I ask you not to dismiss this arrangement.”
It was a huge ask. Terrifyingly massive.
Matilda drew in a shaky breath, her gaze dropping briefly to their joined hands as her fingers curled around his. His hand was so much larger than hers, but somehow they fit together. That frightened her almost as much as the rest of this.
He was standing so close now that she could feel the warmth radiating from him. It hit here then, with him standing so close, taking up so much of her space. She felt safe. Safer than she had in years.
“If you would like, we can try to get to know each other better. We do not have to be strangers.”
She liked that idea far more than she should. The chemistry between them was impossible to ignore now. Not when he touched her like she might break. Not when standing here with him felt more natural than it should.
The tension left her body all at once, shoulders sagging. The tension and emotions she had been bottling up since the party was released. Before she could second guess herself, Matilda stepped closer, her forehead resting lightly against his chest.
Inhaling deeply she smelled something woodsy, cedar, something warm that was distinctly him.
And when she exhaled, it felt like releasing weeks worth of fear, anger, resentment, and exhaustion.
Matilda swallowed hard, fingers tightening slightly around his hand. “I’m scared,” she admitted finally, the words quiet in the still air of the greenhouse.
A small pause. “I don’t know how to do this.”
Every instinct she had screamed that this was dangerous. But standing here in his arms, with his hand wrapped around hers so carefully, Matilda realized something far more frightening.
She wanted to trust him. She took a step back, so she could see his face again. “If I agree to do this. Get to know you, accept the… arrangement. We need to go slow.”
For better or worse, they were in this together.
RE: Back to her Roots :: OPEN - Dragomir Zdravkova - 05-12-2026
Matilda sagged as though his words had somehow broken a dam, forehead coming to rest against his chest with the weight of all her emotions.
Stiffening, Drago grew impossibly stiller, breath stuck in his throat for the split second it took to process what was happening. This was the closest she had ever been to him, shrinking the distance on her own volition, crossing through an invisible wall. For a moment he didn’t know what to do with it, stuck in place where he stood, speechless.
It was the last thing he had expected.
His heart stumbled into a strangely unrhythmic beat, just as confused as his mind was. Unsure of why this felt invasive. He was familiar with being an anchor for others — his cousin, his sisters. It was what he did naturally. Protect and comfort. He didn't know why it froze him motionless now.
Before he knew what to say, Matilda’s fingers around his tightened and she broke the short stretch of silence herself.
“I’m scared.”
The quiet defeat in her voice finally regained him the ability to breathe, wedging into one of the cracks she had formed.
“I don’t know how to do this.”
Her sudden drop of armour, the vulnerability it took to trust him with this was far off from what she’d let him see of her so far. He had witnessed a softer side before, but never like this, never so unguarded. It pulled on an instinctual thread rooted to his core, and tied something into place.
When she stepped back, gaze lifting to his, Drago’s own guard had lowered, face softened.
“If I agree to do this. Get to know you, accept the… arrangement. We need to go slow.”
He could do slow. It was better than ‘no’. A beat passed. “Okay.” Another beat and then the hint of a smile began to pull on his lips, a little bit of mischief in his eyes. “How slow?” His hand still hadn’t let go of hers.