To Give The Devil His Due Playlist

Here's a few songs that I listen to while I'm writing and perfectly suit the tone of 'To Give The Devil His Due'. Listen and enjoy!

To Give The Devil His Due from Blue Wonderland on 8tracks Radio.

Chapter Nine: Let Us Sow the Seed of Discord

I'm back and raring to go! If you have read Chapter Eight, you will know exactly who Harmonia Tisiphone Black is- a Pureblood who is forced to flee from her home in Dijon, France (a nice little reference, that hopefully all you hardcore Harry Potter fans will know). She is the daughter of Orpheus Black and Electra Black (née Burke), sister to Deimos and Phobos Black. Harmonia is the only known survivor of the "massacre" at her home. An attack set about by French allies of the Order of the Phoenix. She has fled, via Portkey, to a unknown safe haven. She was always told if anyone in her family needed to escape, all they had to do was get to the Black family ring. 

Seeing as I am stickler for detail, and I like to show my readers what is going on in my mind and how I visualise things when I write. So, here's the type of clothing that I plan to have Harmonia wearing. It seems in the Harry Potter films, that elitist Pureblood families like the Malfoys and the Blacks are always impeccably dressed, either in a suit or formal dress. I noticed particularly that there seems to be no correlation in fashion in the Wizarding and Muggle worlds. At Hogwarts it's understandable that due to Half-Blood and Muggle-born exposure to Pureblood students, the trend is different. However, I'm focusing on the type of designs I saw in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Narcissa Malfoy's clothes were clearly a throwback to the Fifties and early Sixties, with the A-line skirts. Bellatrix Lestrange has more of a Victorian Gothic feel to her clothing, almost Steampunk in its finishing touches. So, I decided on having Harmonia's clothes to be distinct from these two eras. I chose more of a Twenties and Thirties, pre-war style- incorporating both the feminine and practical.

(The first photograph is from a brilliant artist on DeviantArt called Rachel Midgley aka Velven, you can check out her other works here.)

On another note, I don't know about you all, but I was sorely disappointed with the way the Harry Potter films portrayed Malfoy Manor. I liked the interiors, but exterior image was so weak. It blatantly looked CGIed and not how I thought it should look. Anyway, I found the perfect Malfoy manor and it is called Château de Challain-la-Potherie in the district of Maine-et-Loire in France. As JK Rowling stated on Pottermore, the Malfoys had roots in France. Armand Malfoy was the first Malfoy in Britain, c. 11th Century, arriving with the Norman Conquest. He was given land in Wiltshire because of his services to King William I. So, I thought it was fitting to have a French influenced architecture for Malfoy Manor.

More will feature in later posts about the interiors of Malfoy Manor! Hope you've enjoyed this image-overload! 

Chapter Eight: What's In a Name?

Obviously, as most people I have enlightened with a basic outline of my fic, To Give the Devil His Due, have noticed that names play a huge role in the foundation of the characters. Though the wonderful J.K. Rowling has supplied all names for all the canon characters within the fic, I will at some point have to give an alias to a certain someone (if you've read TGTDHD, you may be able to guess).

For this person, I have had to stick to the quasi-guidelines of the Pureblood genealogy, therefore there is not much of a choice with regards to their surname. With their given name, it is another matter entirely. It must have some sort of sophistication, references to Greek or Roman mythology and/or stars and constellations.

Therefore I chose a very similar name to the character at hand: HARMONIA. Harmonia was the daughter of the goddess Aphrodite and the god Ares. Harmonia was thus born through the culmination of love and war, fitting for my "anonymous" character as her alias has been made to save those she loves as she starts her journey into the battlefield between Light and Dark.

I then had to decide on a middle name, as it was a very common tradition in Pureblood families: TISIPHONE. Tisiphone was one of the Furies (Erinyes) and her name means "Avenger of Murder". Again there is a huge plot link with the name.

Finally, there had to be a blatant link with a famous Pureblood family, so I chose the House of BLACK. Through time the descendants of Isla Black (a blood traitor therefore her place on the tapestry was destroyed as she married a Muggle Bod Hitchens) became linked once again to Pureblood society.

HARMONIA TISIPHONE BLACK

View the family tree that I made branching from the original House of Black Tree, which you can view here.

This is the original Black Family Tree (see Isla Black in the top Right hand corner)

This is the crest of the House of Black, which will come into use in a couple chapters time.

Chapter Seven: The Blacks

Hello! Long time, no blog! Well, here's some more visual images for Chapter Seven of my fanfiction called 'To Give The Devil His Due'.There is very little description of the house now, but I thought, so that you can get a general gist of what I am visualising when I write, I will post a few pictures that are as close as I can get of how I imagine the place.

I know it's pretty mundane, but I love the work the art department of the Harry Potter movies put into putting massive amounts of details in their work. Here, for example, is an image of instructions for the Polyjuice Potion from the book Moste Potente Potions:

Here's an image of the woman in the painting a.k.a. Druella Black. You will understand after you've read Chapter Seven:

And finally, here's the image of the bird skull necklace:

Poster Heaven

Well here's a beautiful poster someone made for the fic. I think it's absolutely amazing. Tell me what you think of it.

Chapter Six: The Tapestry Room

Well, here's some visual images for Chapter Six of my fanfiction called 'To Give The Devil His Due'.There is very little description of the house now, but I thought, so that you can get a general gist of what I am visualising when I write, I will post a few pictures that are as close as I can get of how I imagine the place.

Here's the nymph tapestry, minus all the other nymphs (or maybe they're swimming about in the background instead)- Hylas and the Nymphs by John William Waterhouse:

Another Tapestry (Victoria & Albert Museum):

The briefly mentioned Conservatory:

Hmmmm....

Chapter Five: Aunt Muriel's Home

Well, I've perused the Internet in search of pictures that resemble certain rooms/settings in my fic. Though most are set in canon locations or non-fictional places it is easy to get a grasp of what the setting is like. However, we have yet to even see Aunt Muriel's home in Harry Potter, so this is what I thought:

The parlour that is both featured in Chapter Four and Five, it rather Victorian/Edwardian interior and the shot if from a french film called Coco Avant Chanel, nice sets, bad movie. Imagine it's darker, moonlight streaming through, Hermione on the couch surrounded by everyone, and Malfoy staring out the window behind.

Then there is the kitchen where the altercation between Draco and Ron take place, resulting in a fight in Chapter Five. Although, I didn't imagine the table to be as wide, I would suggest to picture a smaller table, yet I think this is roughly how I imagined the room, maybe a little different. This was a house in England called Burghley, very beautiful!

And finally the veranda, again from the movie, Coco Avant Chanel. Again imagine it's dark, moonlight, and minus the cluster of furniture, and the columns that aren't visible, but are there. This is where Ron gives Hermione the necklace, and where she and Draco have a little "talk".

And something I forgot to post a while back was an image of the Bag O' Nails pub in London that Hermione apparates to before meeting Draco in St. James's Park. And take note, this is not an actual picture of the real Bag O' Nails pub as I realised afterwards that there were not any alleyways beside it, and that it didn't seem gothic enough, so I came across this picture, instead.

Although this is the real Bag O' Nails, but you can see what I mean, it's not as imposing and dark as the other picture.