Another Day, Another Drink

Sometimes Katrina-Carlotta just needed a drink, she was woman enough to admit that. It had been awhile since she'd last been to Satan's. Almost a full year, unless the witch was mistaken. The place didn't appear to have aged a day. Sipping on a glass of expensive wine, the woman hummed happily to herself. The European had opened her wine closet earlier that evening, only to find it completely devoid of the good stuff.

Huffing to herself, the woman had immediately floo called the only person who would have the guts to do such a thing. Marie Voisard and Katrina-Carlotta had been close for years. For all that they seemed similar in appearance, sharing not only a hair color but similar skin tones as well, the dark witches were far less alike than most would presume. If it weren't for the healthy respect that coursed between them, as well as their own usefulness to the other, they would have killed each other long ago. Well, that wasn't quite accurate, Marie would never kill someone with her own two hands if it could be avoided, and Katrina-Carlotta didn't go down easily. Still, despite it all, the two had ended up being what any normal person would call best friends.

"Marie," the Death Eater had snapped into her fireplace, "what happened to all my red?"

"Oops," the other dark witch had responded lightly, "I forgot to replace the bottles I took last night." They two woman were both well aware that Marie had not, indeed, forgotten.

"I better have twice the amount you took by morning or I am warding my cellar against you," Katrina-Carlotta had growled in reply, before breaking the connection. The younger witch always knew exactly what she could and couldn't get away with when it came to Katrina-Carlotta. And so, the dark witch had ended up at Satan's in her quest for a drink.

Spotting a familiar face striding through the door, the assassin allowed herself a smirk. It had been quite some time since she'd spoken to Aaron. Leaning back in her chair, the witch sat her glass down on the table before her. Raising her hand in a gesture that wasn't quite a wave, Katrina-Carlotta waited for the wizard to notice her. If he was anything like she remembered, it wouldn't be long.

It has been quite some time since Aaron had come to London. The streets seemed so foreign to him now, he used to walk them daily, but now things were changing. He had returned for two reasons: the first being that the Hogwarts Defense Against the Dark Arts Position had opened up and the second being the issue with the Department of Mystery. Both of which, he was very very interested in. He had been hesitant, at first, to apply for the Hogwarts Position. He had been to, and escaped, Azkaban but it had been under a fake name, a completely fabricated story, all to get inside. He shuddered at the thought of being there, it made him sick to his stomach.

He had simply vanished from existence for a few years, no one knew where he went, Marcheti's Wands was open one day and closed the next, he had paid for the building space to be open so it was still there, though the sign had been taken down, and it looked rather abandoned. When he made his visit everything was just as he had left it, though a wee bit dusty. He spent the afternoon unpacking and setting out a few of the things he had collected on his travels.

After a few hours, he grew bored, and he decided it would be nice to go out. The night air was frigid and he wore a very thick robe that he kept pulled over his head. It was lightly snowing out and he tried his darndest to keep the freezing air out of his face. After awhile he spotted a familiar sight, Satan's. He had never been much of a drinker, a lightweight, but he did enjoy the establishment. It was a nice place, plus, warm. Warmness was exactly what he was looking for.

Stepping inside, he pulled his hood back, and he swept the snowflake leftover from his robe. The place was not as busy as he remembered it, but still, it was packed enough. Walking to the bar, he ordered a drink, a scotch on the rocks. He leaned against the counter looking around the room when he spotted a familiar face, one he had not seen in quite some time. Smirking, he grabbed his glass and took a small sip, it burned his throat but he did not give away any signs of discomfort.

"Well, well," Aaron said as he walked to her table. He made himself at home, knowing full well what a dangerous witch she was, but he had never cared. He was more than capable of taking care of himself. "I do believe the first time we met it was in this very establishment. That seems so very long ago. You look evil as ever, still running "the show?" He grinned as he took another sip of his scotch, his head was already beginning to swim.

"Indeed it was," Katrina-Carlotta admitted smoothly, "and it has been quite a while. You simply must tell me where you disappeared off to, and what brought you back. Inquiring minds want to know." Chuckling slightly, the woman leaned forward to grab the stem of her wine glass between her fingers. Taking a deceptively delicate sip, the dark witch eyed the man before her speculatively. She hadn't dedicated too much thought to the wizard's disappearance. The man knew what he was doing, and how to take care of himself. If Katrina-Carlotta had heard something of the man being in trouble, she may have sent out a feeler or two out of curiosity, but there had been nothing but radio silence on Aaron Marcheti. Either way, he was clearly home now.

"You flatter me," the woman said with a laugh, head tipping back ever so slightly to expose the expanse of her neck. People so rarely used evil as an adjective, even around her. It was amusing and different. Accurate, too, by most standards. Taking another drink of the red liquid a shade rather reminiscent of freshly spilled blood, Katrina-Carlotta smiled.

She'd taken a trip herself, recently. Granted, hers had only been a few months, but the time away had been nice. The Lupin's had roped the woman into being Headmistress of Hogwarts for a majority of the school year prior to this one, and Katrina-Carlotta was convinced that she was still recovering from all that time she'd spent looking out for the wellbeing of young magic users. It had made sense at the time, of course. The school was under attack, and the Wizarding community needed someone that was capable of protecting their children. Still, the woman was rather glad to be free of it. She was no longer a fugitive in the British Isles, her case having been closed and hidden away. Still, the assassin had known that she could only hold the position for so long before her connections started to wonder if she was playing some kind of con, or had just gotten soft. Her complete pardon, as well as most of the British community completely forgetting there was anything overly dark about her in the first place, had shut them all up rather nicely.

"I suppose you could say I am still "running the show", as it were," the European admitted with a smirk. "The show has a terrible tendency of thinking that it can run itself," Katrina-Carlotta added, milking the figure of speech for all it was worth, "and it really, really can't."

Inquiring minds want to know, huh? He smirked and thought for a moment, did they want to know where he went, or did they want to know if he picked up any dark secrets along the way. The people he had associated himself with were not.... kind, to put it nicely. Some new him as the once leader of the Death Eaters, others knew him as someone who could get them whatever they wanted, and others knew him as a killer, while most of the general public only knew him as the smiling wand maker who was always happy to make them a wand no questions asked.

"Knowledge is where I vanished to and curiosity is why I returned," Beating around the bush, never answering directly, he loved to be a man of mystery. He sat back in his chair and he reached his hand out, his palm resting at the base of the glass and he ran his finger along the edge of the glass of scotch. "Curious times I dare say. Muggles seeing our world, "accidents" at the Ministry. You know, I heard rumors that squibs were even beginning to use magic. What better time to return than now?"

Of course he had ulterior motives. The idea that there was magic out there that would allow muggles to use magic intrigued him. They were weak minded and could be molded into something great, given the proper tutelage. That was, of course, if the rumors were true. He had to come back and see it for himself.

"When you have a group of backstabbers, murderers, dropouts, and spies I suppose you get what you pay for." He remembered the days when he had been in charge of the Death Eaters. He spent most of his time having them cause complete chaos for no reason at all. He was trying to distract from his side plots by sending the Death Eaters into the spotlight. He had even been working as a double agent for Jack Dyllan so that the Order could catch the leader of the Death Eaters. He almost laughed at the thought but he held back. "What brings you out this lovely evening? Enjoying the sights?"

"What better a time, indeed," the woman murmured softly. Aaron was being terribly cryptic, not that the witch was surprised. Katrina-Carlotta had met the man before, after all, and therefore could hardly have been expecting anything else. Still, while the reasons he'd given were almost certainly valid, the dark witch knew that they were only a piece of the puzzle. Likely a small one, at that. She would have to keep her eye on the wand maker. While the witch was far from expecting him to be one, anyone with Aaron's power and temperament automatically got themselves a one-way invitation to Katrina-Carlotta's threat list. Most of the members that had been a part of this non-physical list were dead, but there were those who received their place solely on talent and not any wrongdoing. Truthfully, most of the people she cared about could be found upon that list of names.

"What sights?" the woman joked, glancing around the barely-lit establishment. Lip curling a little, Katrina-Carlotta reached for her drink once more. Hand half-way to its destination, the witch paused, and violently jerked her wrist backwards. The joint cracked sickeningly. It was habit, at this point. Ever since she was a little girl, the European had regularly cracked her joints. Years and years ago, now, someone had made an offhand comment about the violent jerks used to release the pressure being far more intimidating than the gentle stretches that could accomplish the same. Katrina-Carlotta had made a point to do so more often, ever since that day. Besides, the sudden motions made a far more satisfying noise.

Fingertips finally brushing the side of their destination, the witch cupped her palm around the curved bottom of the liquid-holding part of the drinking receptacle. Lifting the wine bottle with her right hand, Katrina-Carlotta allowed a few measured splashes to make their way into her glass. Setting the bottle back down, the wine made its way to her lips.

"The wine, I'm ashamed to say," Katrina-Carlotta admitted, not sounding ashamed in the slightest. "A friend of mine finished off all of my good red. Yourself?"

He wondered, for a moment, how many men had sat across from this woman and been cowering in fear. Begging for their lives while she reveled in taking theirs. She was a dangerous woman, someone who killed not out of need, but because she liked it. Aaron had never been that way, in fact, he would take steps to avoid killing if he could. It did not always work out that way, but, he was not afraid to get his hands dirty either. Even through all of that, he felt on edge as he sat across from her. Not from fear, no, but from the idea that she might try and come after him. It was a fickle game he was playing.

"I was hoping I would find someone interesting to talk to," his hand grabbed the cup of scotch and he lifted it to take another drink. It had been a few moments and he felt like he was ready for another. It did not burn his throat as badly as the first few drinks, and he realized he was almost finished with it. He did not want to lose himself to the alcohol. "Then, my wish came true, and there you were! Someone interesting."

"I am a little disappointed, though. All the while I was gone, not a single person tried to kill me. I am not an arrogant man by any means, but, you couldn't even send one? Maybe I am just good at escaping. A dangerous trait, being able to vanish without a trace, with someone of my... close relationship with a certain group, no?"

"I'm pleased that I could help quench that particular need of yours," Katrina-Carlotta replied smoothly, "boredom is such a terrible thing." It really was. While there were many, many things that the dark witch disliked, a lack of anything interesting to do was very high on that list. People tended to die in very painful ways when the assassin got bored. At the very least, Katrina-Carlotta was lucky enough to have friends and associates who always had some person they'd like six feet under. Marie, for one, never had a list shorter than five names, all organized by how badly she needed them dead and how much she wanted them to hurt first. Alright, so perhaps it wasn't all that strange that the two foreign women were close.

Katrina-Carlotta chucked then, tilting her head to the side in a gesture that would have looked innocent if one wasn't aware of just how much blood the woman had on her hands. "Send someone after you?" she queried, right eyebrow inching upwards ever so slightly. "No, no, if I ever were to decide to kill you I'd hardly allow someone else to do it. Really, Mr. Marcheti, I'm almost offended. I'd kill you myself, of course, I know you far too well to allow anyone else the honor. Besides, you'd probably go through at least a few of my underlings before one of them got lucky. And that would be a terrible waste, would it not?"

The assassin smiled, gesture filled with amusement but empty of joy. She had no reason to kill the man, not yet at least, but the idea that she would allow someone else to do was laughable. After all, the woman had never shied away from bloodshed, and she really couldn't afford to so unthinkingly toss around the lives of her minions. Aaron was not a man who would go down easily, that was certain.