Note: this post contains character spoilers for Royal Affairs. For a less in-depth introduction to Hyacinthe van Clare, check out their introduction post.
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Like Asher and Trevelyan, Hyacinthe is one of the disapproved-of major characters, though they’re not as much of a firebrand as Trevelyan. When planning, I knew I wanted to show a Gallatin student from the Archambault perspective, and to show someone who represents several of the virtues that Gallatin espouses in Creme de la Creme. There were no particularly artistic or performing-related characters in Creme de la Creme, so it felt natural to include someone with that interest in Royal Affairs.
When I wrote Hyacinthe, it was always important to me to think about the gap between what they express and what’s going on in their head. Not only are they a little intimidated by the Royal Affairs MC and the gulf of power difference between them, they’ve also very much been educated into artifice. As a result, it’s hard for them to relax in general, and especially around the MC.
In Royal Affairs, Gallatin is sometimes different in tone to the way it is in Creme de la Creme, but trappings of the culture remain. So much of Gallatin’s education – certainly under some Headteachers – is about constructing a charming, gentle, unassuming persona that bends around others’ wishes. Obviously not every character buys into that, but with Hyacinthe I wanted to show someone who has made a great deal of effort to do this in a habitual way, and how it feels from the other side for the MC. A lot of their relationship with the MC is about Hyacinthe learning to treat them more like a peer, and although it doesn’t come naturally to them – they have a fairly shy, considered personality even without the education – their facade does slip from time to time, and they may slowly become more comfortable with informality.
Where for other characters I slipped into their storyline and tone with more ease, it took a little longer to feel out Hyacinthe. Because of the walls they put up in the ways they interact with others, it was almost as though they had a wall between themselves and me, in a strange way. (As a side note, this experience led me to put a lot more front-loaded work into future characters who have such a gap between how they behave and their internal life – I wanted to make sure I was really into characters’ heads before even starting to write.) It wasn’t until a scene in Chapter 9 that I felt I had a truly strong handle on them, and I ended up going back and retro-engineering a bunch of scenes in the light of that.
Related to that, writing Hyacinthe was an interesting experience; they’re one of the characters whom I added the most to after the first draft. Several testers mentioned that they didn’t feel they’d gotten to know Hyacinthe on an emotional level, and so I needed to take some careful, critical looks at how the Hyacinthe friendship and romance came across. I incorporated more emotional conversations, delved further into Hyacinthe’s personal ambitions, and allowed them – and pushed them to allow themselves – to be direct and honest in ways they hadn’t before. In doing that, I got to know the character much better, and enabled the MC to do the same.