Crack the Whip

Zada was, by habit, an early riser. She had dressed in a silvery white silk dress with kimono sleeves and was cut to be pencil thin and form fitting. She wore a pair of beige heels. She looked as crisp and fresh and innocent this morning as she had been intimidating last night. But the innocence was the illusion.

She wanted to get back to London. She rather liked her life with Lorcan D'Eath now. He fit her well. No expectations, no commitments. Superficial affection and attention. And a clear understanding that it was all business. No matter how it looked to anyone else.

She could cook but preferred not to--not by hand anyway. She'd had Lorcan send a house elf in from the estate in London during the night, and the elf had busied himself with getting supplies for breakfast and making sure her silk dress was impeccably pressed for the morning. the elf had set the table in the contemporary dining room, making sure to follow Lorcan's edict that his tradition of putting one fresh red rose at her place at the table was maintained. It was a little detail, but one she liked.

The elf had placed out fine translucent china plates and covered them with silver cloches. Underneath each plate was eggs benedict with hollandaise sauce, slices of expertly grilled polenta, and a crystal dish of perfectly chilled fruit salad. Cups of Earl Grey were poured and set at each place, along with orange juice for Alex. Zada preferred that the house elf supply her with a morning cocktail--not just plain orange juice. She preferred a screwdriver.

The elf went into Alex's room and jumped up on the bed and picked up the extra bedpillow and promptly beaned him with it.

"You're late!" he announced sharply.

She sent the little house elf to go roust out Alex.

Alex had woken up from his slumber, when the elf had came into the room and hit him with the pillow. He woke up instantly, looking for a knife that was under his pillow. But noticed that this wasn't his room, then he remembered what had happened and got out of bed slowly, grabbing a nice black silk shirt as he nodded at the elf and went into the kitchen with a stale face.

Once reaching the kitchen table, he found Zada there but was more focused on the table with the food. " Morning? " It was different being here with her and the food was odd as well, his food was usually cooked over a firepit in the middle of the forest but this was a nice change. " Itadaki-masu " Which was something of Japanese custom to say before eatting, as he ate slowly and with manners in front of Zada. Once he was done, he would place his fork on the plate and took it to the sink and left it there.

He noticed a Rose in the middle of the table, he fingered it and noticed that it was quite beautiful. Turning to Zada, he would think of the things that have happened, and felt a little embarrassed to the Star name. " So were heading to London then? What for exactly " He was only curious of what he might learn from there.

"Good morning," Zada said. As they ate, he asked some excellent and expected questions. "Yes," she said. "We are heading to London. The Italian aurors will stop looking for you in a few hours. In the meantime, we need to head back to some place where we can start your training in relative safety and peace.

"You have potential or I would not have offered last night to help you. You do, thought, need to know what you have gotten yourself into. So--perhaps you need to know more about me. I am a potions master, and I trained in the dark arts in Russia after I left Beauxbatons. I am, if you want to use rather unflattering terms, a mercenary. I take care of all those nasty little problems that other dark arts practitioners do not want to dirty themselves with. And I get paid extremely well for the work I do. People call me when they want to obtain power or money or position. And that almost always involves some sort of killing. Its largely what I do. I kill. And I can afford anything I want. I have been the second in command to the former Minister of Magic, Gellert Grindelwald. And--at the moment, my partner and I are the second in command to the Death Eater movement in England.

"What you need to know is that if its skill you want, and the wealth and position to use it, then I'm the person you want. So, I presume your next question is what all this will cost you. Nothing. I don't need your money. What I expect is that you will take your instruction seriously. And I will demand nothing less than your loyalty. Traitors are dangerous and almost always need eliminating. I do not want that to be you. Now...is that something you can live with?"

Alex listened to her speak about her Profession, well it sounded very nice. Killing people for a living, to get power and money...it was different. But he couldn't say much about it, it was her way of life and he only nodded at her. Since she was being opened to him, which was very different, he didn't even know what to do. She killed people, and spoke to him about it, when he could go tell the aurors but he wouldn't. He was in too deep in trouble, and this is the first time someone said he had potential.

" I won't get scared away, or leave if that's what your asking. You have my loyalty, I swear on my honor. But since you shared your history, I might as well share my. My family is descendents of Warlords in Japan, the star name goes as far back, as the first Purebloods expect in Japan. We were brought magic by Merlin to use for betterment of Japan, but we used it to wage war for hundreds of years. He then cursed the three major families that held the most magical power, which one of them was my. We were given plagues, killed off and anyone that survived were branded with a mark " He brought his hand up to his face, and moved the hair out of his face to show her his Topaz eye that was his mark.

" My curse is that my Magic is really powerful, but it's almost uncontrollable. I killed three people in my second year at Hogwarts, because of a simple spell but it became to powerful to control. I also have been trained by my mother in the Ninja arts...so I suppose that it will be useful if I become a Mercenary in my future. Do you still want to train me, even knowing about the risks? knowing that I would follow you without question "

"I'm not afraid of much," Zada said. "Your lack of control would be expected, then. And someone needs to teach you how to reel it in. I have not trained in Japan, so there would be some cultural differences, but I did a great deal of training in Russia--in Siberia, and I hve found there are similar movements of magic in the Eastern European community. Some of it may be similar enough to serve our purposes. If not, I can make some connections to the Japanese wizarding communities to find you a fitful teacher. But you will need to learn to control things in the small things before you can control the mighty things.

Zada truly didn't fear much. She did not even fear death. In her job, she had learned that life was cheap. She believed it was best living well. She had leaned to live each day as if it were her last because, for a lot of the witches and wizards she'd known, they'd spent so much time living in the mundane that they were not prepared when their last day did come. She believed in doing what she wanted now--just in case there just happened to be no 'later' for her.

"I presume you will need clothing. You may make a list of what you want, or, I will arrange for an account for you so you can go an buy what you like for yourself once we get to London. Your choice. But once we get the immediate things taken care of, then we can get down to business."

Alex would only nod at her next set of words, and would grab a piece of paper as well as a Pen. He wrote down what he needed, which wasn't much really. The paper only held the words of Underwear, socks, any loose pants or shorts and black shirts. He wasn't one to get into fashion, he liked anything that he can use to fight without restricting his movement, so clothe was a easy task for him. He gave her the list that held the things he needed, and looked out the windows at the view of Paris.

" Then once we get those, then I will be ready to work without Question with you Zada. I thank you for this chance, are you ready to head to London? " He said in a unsure tone, he was stick new to talking to her. He had to trust her, and leave his training in her hands. He wondered what his mother would say, or better yet...what would Hitame do if she found out about this.

"I am. I can have your order filled immediately when we get back to London," Zada said. She got up and motioned for Alex. When they were ready, she ported them to London, to an even larger penthouse. This one was far more grand. And it had a full staff of servants and house elves.

"Welcome to London," Zada told him, wanting to be sure the boy could get his bearings. "For now, we will live here." A tall, thin, older butler came in.

"Ms. Forbes," he bowed. "We did not expect you today."

"All is well," she said. "This is Alex. He is my apprentice. Give him quarters and see to it that his needs are met. He will need most of everything. He's made a list of his clothing needs. See to it that the list is filled to his sizes. To his tastes."

"Then we are to treat him as the rest of the children, Ma'am?" he asked.

"No." she said. "Those are Lorcan's children. The responsibility of Star is mine, not Lorcan's. You will treat Star as such."

"Yes, Ma'am. Straight away, Ma'am. It shal be done." The butler looked at the boy. "Come. I will show you the house and your quarters. This way."

"Your lessons will start later," Zada said. "Once you have had time to settle in. You will meet the master of the house at dinner tonight. Take the morning for yourself and get acquainted with the house as you like."

Alex was taken to a another beautiful house, and now he was back in London. He didn't plan to come back until he started school, but went on if nothing had changed. A name had came up that he knew, but didn't say anything until he was address to be polite. Once Zada had told him to take the rest of the day off, he just followed the Butler to where he took him.

Looking around at the house, as they walked to the destination. He was awe by the beauty, but had wanted to ask something. " Excuse me sir, is there a Garden or Green house here? " He felt out of touch with nature at this moment, deciding that he wanted to tend to a garden to relax himself, he was knew to this. Now being the Apprentice to someone like Zada, she was much better then him and he will learn as much as he can from her, he will no fail her.

The butler started to lead Alex through the house and when he asked about the garden, the butler smiled.

"Indeed there is," he said. "Mr. D'Eath and Ms. Forbes are potions masters. They have a large greenhouse for their potions makings. Its easy to find. If you go out the glass doors in the living room and follow the stone path, you will find it. Be careful. Some of the plants are ill tempered and carnivorous, Master Star."

The penthouse was largely made of glass and was light and airy and very contemporary. Zada preferred clean, uncluttered, very Zen-like surroundings. She preferred white and light blue colors though, so it was a bit of twisted Zen. There were two floors and they were enchanted to be as large as they needed. There were sitting rooms, a large dining room, a small dining room, an exercise studio, a spa, gourmet kitchen, and more on the first floor. The second floor held lots of bedrooms with walk in closets and master baths. Zada's room, which she shared with Lorcan was at the end of the hallway behind handcarved white laquered double doors.

The relationship between Zada and Lorcan was unconventional. Well, really, everything about Zada was just a wee bit off kelter. But it worked for them. Business. Purely business. Well, almost.

"You are welcome to pick either of the first two bedrooms on the left or either of the first two bedrooms on the right," the butler told him. "We will be happy to provide you with any enchantments to make it fit your needs. Ms. Forbes desires you to be comfortable."

Listening to his warning about the ill tempered, and Carnivorous plants. Smirking at the plants acts, he wasn't scared of them but he was sure going to play with them. But that would be for a later time, maybe he would meet Lorcan D'EATH at a another time but he was working with Zada now.

As the butler spoke of his rooming arrangements, he would have some idea's of what he wanted. " Can I get a Pull up bar in the room, I need to work out and I'm taking the two on the right " He walked into one of the bedrooms on his right, and left it open for the butler. Looking back at the guy, he felt that he was there to make his every need important but he wasn't use to that. " Once that is done, you can take your leave and tell Zada that I will meet her later as planned " He went to find a desk, paper and a pen to write a letter to his mother of where he would be under his uncle orders, which he would need to lie about for now.