How Many Years Has It Been? ( Jack )

The streets of Knockturn Alley were quiet outside of the occasional cough from a sickly person on the street. Fog filled the ground creating an ominous atmosphere as the dim lights struggled to brighten the area below. Most of the lights in the buildings had shut off for the night and the rest were slowly going out as the late workers closed up shop. In a flash the smoke puffed as a man apparated into the streets and immediately fell to his knees. Gasping for air and clutching at his stomach the quiet scene from moments ago seemed to vanish.

Aaron Marcheti pushed on his ribs, keeping pressure on his wound, and he gasped at the pain. His hands trembling he reached into his tattered robes and pulled his wand out. Grimacing, he pointed his wand at the wound under his rib cage and he muttered an incantation, quickly the wound began to heal itself. Though it was healing the pain lingered for some time after it was healed. He was no medical expert but he knew how to treat himself in extreme situations. Who used a knife? It was so barbaric and unexpected that he had not seen it coming at all.

After a few moments, and wiping the blood onto his cloak, he looked around at Knockturn Alley. "Even after all these years," He mumbled to himself as he pushed to his feet, legs weak from the pain, but he dared not stumble over. "I still escape to Knockturn." He stumbled over to an empty alleyway and crashed hard against the wall to hold himself up. Reaching into his robe he felt around for the locket he had been trying to acquire for quite some time, but he felt nothing, and his heart skipped a beat. Forgetting the pain he panicked and felt around, feeling nothing, and then he let out an exasperated sigh and slammed the ball of his fist against the wall. He must have dropped it in the scuffle.

They knew who he was now and he would not be able to get back in so easily. All of that time wasted, all for nothing, nothing to show for it except a knife wound to the gut and probably a nice bounty on his head. He would not be returning to Egypt any time soon. A shame, really, the magical properties of a lot of the items in the country were outstanding so he guessed he did not come out completely empty handed.

Turning so that his back was against the wall he completely slid down to the ground and let his legs rest on the ground. He took a moment to look around at his former home, it hadn't changed a bit, it was still a rotten old shit hole with nothing worthwhile to show for it. He had once quite enjoyed the shadiness of the place, no one seemed to bother him, and he could get away with damn near anything he pleased. He laughed at the thought now but there was a time when he had lead the Death Eaters and no one had ever discovered it. What a pointless group they had been, he lead them to nothingness all to prove what a waste of time they truly were, he wondered if they were still around?

Years had passed since he had last visited England and so much had changed. He was once a prominent business owner, Marcheti's Wands, a respected individual in the Wizarding Community. Then one day, out of the blue, he left. Not a word to anyone, he just left, off to pursue other wizarding cultures in a bid for more power. Depending on one's perspective, he had been a complete failure, despite his thirst for knowledge he was never willing to sacrifice it all as the wizards of the past had. He considered himself an above average wizard of high intelligence but he was back to nothing now. A man whose name was merely a whisper of the past.

A man who would carve his name into the Wizarding World of England once again.

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A few days later Aaron found himself walking around the streets in the daytime. It was chilly out so he had his robe pulled tightly around his neck and no one paid him any mind. Part of him enjoyed not being bothered while the narcissist in him was angry not a single person recognized him. Of course it had been years since he had owned a shop and had been a large part of the wizarding world but he somehow thought he would still at least be slightly remembered. Unfortunately this was not the case.

Reaching into his pocket he pulled a crumbled piece of paper with a name on it. Jack Dyllan, the woman who he considered one of the only people in the world he somewhat trusted. Though they had not spoken in quite some time he hoped she would grant him an audience. He had sent her an owl and now he hoped she still lived in the same place and had received it. He turned down an alley and he approached an old and broken down building, the same place he used to summon those who wished to become a Death Eater, it had been abandoned for many a year and he still found it empty all these years later.

Pushing the door open he was met with dust and broken down furniture. Sunlight poured into a window which had been boarded up creating a lone ray of light that showed just how dusty the building was. Pulling out his wand he flicked it and an old broken chair was chopped up to resemble firewood, he then placed it in the fireplace, and he waved it again and a fire lit. He moved his wand in a few other motions and before long there were two chairs and a table situated neatly by the fire. Taking a seat he placed his wand gently on the table in front of him and he clasped his hands together neatly on the table.

“It has been quite some time,” Aaron stated when the red haired woman opened the door and walked into the shabby, run down, building. A smirk formed on his face and the shadows from the fire gave him quite an ominous look. “Surprised I am alive?”

Jack's days were almost returning to normal. There had been a lot of heat on her after her involvement with the Ilvermorny rescue. Though she firmly stood by her actions and fully believed she was bore much of the responsibility of those kids returning home, her time at work had become... complicated. She had stepped outside of protocol, exercised some of the lesser known liberties of the Unspeakables, and as a result, a lot of the higher-ups were now looking at her with scrutiny, trying to 'remind her of her place.'

It all made her very irked. But more than anything, it made her want to laugh. She had stepped out of bounds, barely, just toed a line while others jumped over the line - of course, they had Robert's approval to do so. She expedited the process and was getting her wrists smacked. If the point was to remind her that she wasn't a threat, they sure were showing how threatened they felt.

Regardless, she had taken a holiday, deciding a camping trip across the States might be a good idea for her and her wards. They even met up with Charlie and the family crammed into Jack's old car and tried to ignore the elephant in the room, er, car - that with just a quick owl, they could all be on their way to visiting Maximus Morrison.

Before that idea weighed too heavily on anyone's minds, however, an owl from the school caught them and revealed that the Lupins efforts had worked - Goose was accepted at Hogwarts. The trip concluded happily and work immediately was set about to prepare the young boy.

And then September came and he was gone. And Sunny was in school. And Jack had no intentions of hanging out with her dad at home who still seemed to have no intentions of finding his own place. So she went back to work.

Things were quick to take up her time. Between Quidditch practice, work at the Ministry, and her plans with the Knight's Watch, she found all thoughts of Ilvermorny beginning to fade. Her halfbrother had advised her to reclaim her lost trust by leaving it to those in charge - if they needed her, they would tell her, and have to trust her once again. In the meantime, why give them reason to doubt?

She was finding that she didn't work such long hours when she was forced into not doing her full job, though, which meant she had reclaimed some of her weekends. One particular Saturday was open enough that she planned to stop by Satan's and check in, maybe pop into Wheezes to say hello to sales staff, and go bug Kip.

Of course, all those plans vanished with a single owl.

She apparated off to Knockturn Alley and followed the instructions to the address, one hand gripping her wand while the other touched her pockets. She had foregone the usual knapsack full of goodies and had instead relied on her loose green jacket to carry all of her essentials. Let's just say... she was prepared for this to somehow be a set up.

No sooner had the door opened and light illuminated her face then she heard the voice of Aaron Marcheti. Her eyes shifted to adjust to the firelight and she closed the door behind her. She supposed the thing to do would be to cast charms, reveal if anyone else was there, check for tricks... but as dangerous as her alliance with Aaron Marcheti was, it was still an alliance of sorts. Besides, why set a tone of distrust when she fully trusted herself to escape any predicament she might find herself in.

Her eyes adjusted and her eyes found his face, whereupon a comfortable smirk had settled. Her face was still drawn into a look of alertness, eyebrows drawn together, mouth in a thin line.

And then it cracked into a wry grin of her own. "I'm always surprised to see you, Marcheti." She crossed and sat across from him, adjusting her jacket as she sat. "Been on holiday, then?"

"You could say that." He said slyly as she sat down across from him. He had always admired Jack for standing up for what she believed in, no matter the cost, even if he disagreed with what she fought for. She was, after all, a witch of great power and he would always respect that. Despite the rumors surrounding his rather dark past he only killed out of necessity, never for pleasure, though he would be lying if he said he did not enjoy a few of them.

"I would offer you a drink but...." He waved his hand around at the run down shack signifying its run down nature. "It has been quite some time since I have had tabs on you, how is the family?" It was a weird sort of sentence. Had she known he had kept tabs on her? How would she react to the knowledge that he had spied on her on the past? Of course, she probably knew, but he couldn't quite remember if they had spoken about it.

"How things have changed..... Do you remember when we were younger? Idealistic young witches and wizards who thought the world was ours to take. Now you, with your family, and me with.... well nothing. Don't you miss living life recklessly or have you become as soft as I think?"

A hand reached out to skim across the top of the table, watching dust trail behind her palm, the grains in the table no match for the callouses of her well-worn bludger-batting hands. Her eyes were now scanning the small building, taking in its cracks and crevices, wondering with her shrewd curiosity what other sorts of meetings and rendezvous had taken place here.

She smirked at his words, tempted to reveal that she could have eased his offer had she brought her knapsack, a flask of her own always prepared for such an occasion. She bit back the suggestion and saved her own alcoholic tendencies for herself, tilting her head to acquiesce to the dry circumstances.

She pursed her lips at his reference to keeping watch of her. Jack's half-brother had been kind enough to employ wards to protect her family, but she could not stand to be warded on her own. It keep her away from the thrill of danger she so desperately need to function. She had felt the heat of stares, had heard a footstep one too many and had always assumed it to be that of her enemies. Interesting to know that on an occasion or two, the lack of privacy was attributed to an ally as well.

"They're safe, thank you," she said, her eyebrow arching, as though that was all he needed to know. With Max now gone in the States, she felt the great burden of her wards' care more keenly than before, even if it had always been assumed she was the protector of the home. Somehow, the solitude had increased her obligation, and Sunny and Goose had rapidly become points of worry rather than sources of joy.

To put it simply, Jack was beginning to suspect she was not up to the job of raising them, and would hate for anyone to know it.

She tilted her head. "You've got me wrong on two counts, Marcheti. I was never idealistic, much. And you know I haven't become soft. You don't need a watchdog to tell you that." She squinted. "And you? Have you tossed away your ambitions and decided to become an explorer instead?"

Ah, there it was, the fire he had come to love from within her. Unfortunately, one did not get to decide when they had become soft or weak. Whether she liked it or not her priorities had been compromised by children. This made her weak, soft, and not nearly as daring as he knew she wished to be. Maybe she did believe she could still live as recklessly as she once had without becoming a burden on those who considered her a source of safety...... but she was wrong.

"My ambition remains but surely goes misinterpreted by those curious enough to guess at my plans, as usual." He leaned back in his chair and his right hand went to his left forearm. The mark on his arm burned greatly and it took everything in his power not to scream out in pain, but it would pass, it always did. "A mistake great wizards often make is thinking that the power they seek was placed somewhere near them for their convenience. No one considers that maybe, just maybe, true power is a vast distance away. I have simply been searching for what I want in a different location."

As the pain in his arm subsided he leaned forward again wanting to bring to light the true reasoning for his meeting with Jack today. "Do you know that muggles believe that the pyramids were built by other muggle slaves. Laughable. In this day in age architects cannot build a structure that can last for more than a century and yet they believe these monuments were built by savages so many thousands of years ago." He chuckled at the thought before continuing on.

"In truth, as I am sure you have guessed, these were created by Wizards. Powerful wizards thousands of years ago. Before even Merlin himself these were built but their wards and protections wore off. Ancient magic, forgotten magic, and I believe the secret to this magic can be found within those "tombs"."

Aaron lifted his left sleeve and plopped his arm on the table. What she would find was a grotesque cut in his arm with black ooze. His veins were pulsating and it was obvious it was spreading. "I thought I had found the power I have been seeking for so long. I tracked down an old wizard familiar with the ancient magic of Egypt and he pointed me in the direction of an artifact located in one of these tombs. Unfortunately.... it was cursed. This is going to kill me, there is no doubt about that, unless I can find the counter curse. I need your help."

"I don't think anyone is dumb enough to even attempt to guess," she quipped, her lips still curled into a good-natured smirk. It had been quite a long time since her wit had been spent on someone who could keep up. She didn't have a sophisticated brain, she knew, but it was one forged in experience, and her experience had not always been so wholesome. People these days seemed either completely relative with morality, or firmly decided. There was no room for the greys, anymore, those who had adapted to understand that morality probably did not exist, and only justice could be striven for, nothing else.

She didn't know what Aaron believed. She suspected one day she would care more. But now, free of her obligation as the leader of the Order and of her antagonism towards him as Dark Lord, she could simply enjoy the fruits of their complicated philosophies , rather than strive to define them.

"Maybe you're just discounting how laaaazy wizards can be," she said, drawling her words to further enjoy the conversation. Of course, she was listening. But she wouldn't be Jack Dyllan if she didn't make her jokes.

Her eyebrows lifted at his introduction to the topic. Curious. She wondered if Aaron Marcheti knew she was a muggleborn, and one of those despicable sorts who often ended up spending portions of her life amongst nonmagical folk. If his information on her was worth the confidence he placed in the tails he had placed, surely he knew. But perhaps he did. Perhaps one of his philosophies on that front meant they were destined to be at odds.

"Savages," she repeated. "Interesting choice of word for those who were bought and sold. I might apply the term to their masters."

Yes, at odds indeed.

But he wasn't here to argue the morality of slavery she was sure.

He flopped his arm onto the table like he might throw a particular slab of meat, and it had certainly been mangled enough to earn the comparison. Jack had never been particularly squeamish, and her life experience had not allowed for an aversion to blood and guts. In fact, she found herself oddly compelled by the wound, unique as it was, and she leaned forward, eyes squinting. She might have uttered an "oooh" in interest had the affliction not been one that surely caused her companion some sort of pain.

"I'm not a spell creator, nor am I much of a magical academic," she admitted, eyes still on the wound. "But I know some people who are. If they can't figure it out... well, if they can't figure it out, then you might want to take a real vacation."