Risky Business

You got the price tag

Tell me you're too much

Draco Malfoy was alone in the finest suite at the Fleur de Lis with a prostitute waiting on his ex-fiancee. That was what it looked like and that was what it was--sort of. He was not here to shag either of them...or watch them...or anything of the sort. Honora wanted a wand and he had become involved in seeing to the safe acquisition of said wand. It could not be registered and the Black Market offered limited options with unreliable cores. It was better to get a new unregistered conduit crafted. One that would actually fit the witch and be well suited the sort of work she tended to engage herself in.

Meeting here like this meant paying for the Gregorovitch's time double, but it protected against prying, curious eyes. Discretion was promised at the Fleur. So, it was worth it. Especially since it was not something he was keeping from Perenelle. She knew where he was. She knew what he was doing. She understood, he thought, why he had to do it. He had told her about his work with the Sanctuary, before the borders closed. He still owned safe houses in rural muggle areas where runaways were living. The houses were separated from his name by shell corporations, but they were his all the same. He could not say to Honora on this. He felt too strongly about righting the mess that the purebloods wanted to keep making. He had hated Durant's work camp, but he hated this new muggleborn slavery just as much. It was all just wrong---and it wasn't enough to just know it was wrong. He had to do something about it. And he did. He had helped runaways--and now he was doing this. He was going to keep doing the right things.

"I appreciate you taking this job," Draco said, lifting his eyes from his hands to the young girl. He wondered why she sold her body in a place like this when she was both a talented wandmaker and independently wealthy. The Gregorovitches had money. He knew this with certainty. Was the girl cut off? Did she do it just to spite her parents? He could understand the latter motivation. He wanted to spite his father. It was not a very mature feeling to have, but he had it. He hated Lucius--and Draco was quite frustrated knowing his mother was back living with that man. It made him want to spite the family patriarch all the more. Bastard. If Draco had it in him to kill someone, he would have killed Lucius. He just didn't have it in him. He just wasn't a murderer. 

"I am sure Honora will be here shortly," he added, feeling the tiniest bit awkward to be alone with a harlot in a brothel. He had bedded loads of women, but he had never paid for it. At least not in the traditional transactional way. Some liked to say that you always paid for, it was just a matter of how. He didn't really believe that. But he had the heart of a romantic. Somehow despite all the pain the man had known, he still believed in good things like love and happiness and treating others properly. 

@aurora
Honora Deirdre Carmody
538 • outfit, no necklace or wrist thing

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0

RISKY BUSINESS

I've got the price tag

Tell you I'm too much

This was something that she didn’t know if she had really understood at first. But when Draco Malfoy had first approached her, Rory was sure that she had heard him wrong. He didn’t want to pay her for her services at the hotel, he had just wanted to meet her at the hotel. And then he had talked to her about a wand. But not one for him. It was for a muggleborn witch that he knew. And Rory didn’t particularly care who it was for. She wasn’t going to build a custom wand without meeting the witch. Without talking to her. And without measuring her for herself.

There was an art to wandmaking, at least if you were doing it correctly, and she was willing to do it in secret, if the price was right. Rory knew that she was the protégé. She knew that her father was likely to one of these days have to see that she was far more skilled than her brother was. Because Nik did not have the patience. And he could not listen to the trees. He did not have a feel for the wood in his fingers, and that was necessary. If he was truly going to be good at it, he had to learn about the wands themselves.

He had to learn to speak the language with his fingers, and to feel what it was that they needed. She was a wandmaker. And not because she had been trained to be one. Because she had been born one. Aurora Gregorovitch was the next Gregorovitch wand maker. She was the one that would finally replace her grandfather, and make a name for herself in that way. And until she was old enough that people started taking her seriously, she thought that she would just have to continue doing what she was doing, and that was dealing in secrets.

It was amusing to her, that they were here. That she had them coming to her in this place. And something about the fact that they hadn’t come together made her more amused. He looked like he wanted to be just about anywhere else. And Rory couldn’t help but shake her head at him when he said that she appreciated it. “I appreciate you asking. I’m glad to do it.” And she was, not just for the money, because she was a Gregorovitch. She didn’t actually need the money. She was just glad to do it because it meant that people knew that she could.

She was watching him from the other side of the room, and she couldn’t help but laugh as he tried to speak to fill the silence, “Are you really as uncomfortable in here as you look, Lord Malfoy?” She didn’t think that it was all that awkward to sit in a room with a girl. She wasn’t going to try anything, she was a professional, at this as well as with the wands. She wasn’t going to jump him just because he was in this suite with her. That was rude. She assumed that the witch that they were waiting for would be here any moment, but Rory couldn’t help but chuckle at the fact that he looked so uncomfortable, and she had even put clothes on for them.

@ lord malfoy + wandmaking client • 550 • aurora's outfit

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0

Risky Business

You got the price tag

Tell me you're too much

It was a risk to be here...but that was not what made him most uncomfortable. The fact that he was here without Nell unsettled him. Of course, it would be been weird for her to be here, too. Really any option was going to just weird. Especially since the fact he was going to be in a hotel room with a prostitute and Nora was conjuring some nerves, too. It was just a very odd situation for him. Nothing he had really experienced before prepared him for it. The nerves were not just about the setting and company. It was the crime, too. His uncle was back at the Ministry--back in the auror's office. It was quite reasonable to believe that Rodolphus would want to antagonize him with scrutiny from the MGLE. The man was a bastard and a total piece of shit.

Fear over being watched as a doubted Death Eater had been part of why he suggested this place as the venue for today's little meet-and-greet. He wished he could just get out. There was no out. There was never going to be an out. No matter what happened, no matter how the world changed, that cursed tattoo on his arm was not going anywhere. It would always be a visible indication of what he had been part of, what he had sworn to do. It didn't matter he had never managed to accomplish the worst of the tasks assigned to him. He still had blood on his hands. He had repaired the cabinet that brought the Death Eaters into Hogwarts. He might not have taken lives, but he'd still caused death. 

That all left a heavy weight of guilt on his shoulders and a fear of what he might be asked to do in the future. He had done what he had in his youth to protect his mother--and wouldn't he still have to do that? His father was not capable of protecting her. But he didn't even have magic. He could not really defend either himself or her from those who would do them harm who still had mastery over their wands. These were dangerous and unsettling times--and he did not know what the future would hold.

He could escape dark thoughts like those sometimes. In the classroom or in the lab or wrapped up with Nell in soft sheets. He could forget about the dangers that lurked not only in the shadows, but stood proudly in the light. Sometimes, it could feel like life was good and he was filled with hope...but the worry and depression that had plagued him for so many years could still creep back in without warning. Then, he would remember. He would remember everything and sometimes it was too much.

The witch called him on the discomfort he was projecting and he offered her a sad smile. "It isn't just here that I'm uncomfortable. It's the world...and please--don't call me that. Draco is fine. Much preferred, if you don't mind." he urged. The Malfoy was not sure that his answer would make any sense. He did not really feel like it was appropriate to unload the thoughts that weighed him down onto the young witch. 
 

Rory+Nora • 535 • outfit, no necklace or wrist thing

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0

[nospaces]

[attr="class","cbg"]

[attr="class","cbgtop"]

[attr="class","cimg"]

[attr="class","clbox"]

[attr="class","ctopline"]One with nobody to call

[attr="class","cscriptmud"]this city makes me feel so small

[attr="class","cline"]

[attr="class","clyrics"]A million people in this town[break]
But I could scream without a sound

[break][break]

[attr="class","cbody"]She had not thought seriously about getting a wand. Sure, it was something that she might have thought about in passing. Times when she missed her old wand, when she could very clearly remember the sound that it made when it had been snapped in half. There had been times when she had thought about what she would need to do to get herself a new wand, but she had always known that it wasn’t really worth the risk. It wasn’t like she could just walk into a shop and buy one—that was the sort of thing that she knew the Ministry had to be keeping an eye on. And while she knew there was certainly a black market for wands, Nora had no idea how to go about finding the right people to talk to.
[break][break]
But then she had made the mistake of going to Draco’s apartment, of borrowing his wand to work on the circuit board he’d been working on. In the short term, it had helped. It had reminded her that she was still capable of creating, of solving a problem, of doing her actual job. But then she had gone home. She had gone back to having no wand, to cleaning up after the Parkinsons, and it had been after that that she’d thought seriously about getting her hands on a wand.
[break][break]
But she knew that it was a risk. She knew that she would get anybody in trouble if they got caught. It was part of the reason why she hadn’t asked Alistair. He was her friend and he was a wandmaker. That made sense, for obvious reasons. But she just couldn’t ask him to make a wand for her. It wasn’t a fair thing to ask of a person. Instead, she had thought the best way of going about this would be asking if Draco knew anybody. Even if he was a Death Eater only in name and not in action, he still had access to the black market more than she ever could. If anyone knew where to go or who to look for, that she knew anyway, it would be him.
[break][break]
It had been a few weeks since she had heard from him, but that was fine. She hadn’t expected him to drop everything and find her a wand overnight. But when he’d written her earlier today and said he found someone to craft her a wand, she had been surprised. Nora thought that would be a fair bit more expensive than just some random wand—Draco had told her that the money she’d sent him had been enough, but she wasn’t sure if he had just been saying that to try to keep her from sending him more money.
[break][break]
Either way, she’d brought some more in her purse. Whether or not she would have to use it remained to be seen, but there was no good reason to walk into this situation without any money. Somehow, she thought that having to buy a witch’s company, in the eyes of the brothel, and also buy a custom wand, was a bit more than the money she’d already given Draco for her wand. She hadn’t thought that she would be getting a wand made for her, after all.
[break][break]
His letter had told her to tell the concierge that she was there to present herself to Lord Malfoy, and she knew the implications of that and what people were going to think, so she figured she would have to wear something more than just jeans and a sweater. Or less, she supposed. Depending on how she looked at it.
[break][break]
Once that obstacle had been contended with, she’d been on her way. She had managed to actually say the prompted sentence to the concierge with a straight face and had headed to the suite with the key. When she got there though, she didn’t know if she should knock or something to alert them to her coming in—not that she thought it likely that Draco was in bed with the witch. After a moment’s pause, she decided the turning of the key in the lock would be enough of an announcement. She didn’t want to be in this hallway for too long or she might be mistaken as a de Lis girl and not a client. So, she pushed the door to the suite open and slipped inside. “Hi,” she said, with a hurried smile, as she shut the door behind her.
[break][break]

[attr="class","cnotes"]749 ● @ no i do not work here ● outfit

[attr="class","cred"]MADE BY VEL OF WW + ADOX 2.0

[googlefont=Dancing Script]
[newclass=.cbg]width:400px;background:#262626;padding:30px;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cbgtop]width:400px;height:120px;text-align:left;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cimg]float:left;width:100px;height:100px;padding:10px;border:1px #aaa solid;[/newclass]
[newclass=.clbox]float:right;height:100px;margin:15px 5px auto auto;text-align:justify;width:257px;[/newclass]
[newclass=.ctopline]font-size:9px;letter-spacing:2px;text-transform:uppercase;font-family:verdana;color:#aaa;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cscriptmud]font-size:23px;margin-top:-3px;font-family:Dancing Script;color:#6f1c1c;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cscriptmud span]color:#ccc;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cline]height:1px;background-color:#888;margin:3px auto;[/newclass]
[newclass=.clyrics]font-size:8px;letter-spacing:1px;text-transform:uppercase;text-align:justify;font-family:verdana;color:#999;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cbody]font-family:verdana;color:#999;font-size:10px;text-align:justify;line-height:14px;letter-spacing:0.5px;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cnotes]font-size:9px;letter-spacing:1px;text-align:center;opacity:0.8;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cred]text-align:center;font-size:6pt;color:rgb(132, 132, 132);letter-spacing:1px;font-family:verdana;[/newclass]
[newclass=.cred a]color:rgb(132, 132, 132);font-size:6pt;letter-spacing:1px;font-family:verdana;[/newclass]

RISKY BUSINESS

I'VE GOT THE PRICE TAG

TELL YOU I'M TOO MUCH

Wandmaking was an art. It was a skill, yes, but it was an art, and it was what she truly wanted to do with her life. Working here, in the de Lis, this was for amusement more than it was for anything else. It was because she wanted to have her own money. Because she didn’t want Serenity controlling her every move. And it was because she liked dealing in secrets. Satisfied men often told their secrets when they least meant to, and that was a very advantageous position to be in. Rory liked secrets. She liked the power that came with them.

When you had control of the secrets, you had control of the world, and she didn’t want to control the entire world. Just her own. And just the people in it. There was nothing that she wanted more than to be master of herself. Her mother’s influence was one that she could not deny, but the Italian witch could not exert her influence here, and that was what had driven her to this place. To the fact that she wanted to do something more, to be something more. Before she became a great.

And she truly believed that she could. That she could use being a Gregorovitch to become one of the greats. There were a lot of women wandmakers out there, but no one had the clout that her grandfather had. That Ollivander had had. She knew. Aurora knew how their society worked. IF she were truly going to rise, and be one of the greats, she was going to have to do it on her name alone, and not her first name. She was going to have to use being what she was, use being who she was, to get herself ahead.

There was a reason that she was a Slytherin, after all.

But she wasn’t looking to trade in secrets here. She didn’t care who this witch was, or who she was in relation to the man that had asked her to be here tonight. The man that was paying quite a handsome sum of money for a wand that was not his. Was he trying to right all of the wrongs of the world with his pocketbook? Rory didn’t know all that much about the Malfoy, but she did know that even he was not that well off. There was no one that was that well off. You couldn’t buy the world.

You could only seek to control it.

That had been the mindset that had killed quite a few men. Her grandfather included. But there was one advantage to that… She was no man.

“Draco…” She accepted the use of his first name with grace. Something that she was much more comfortable with anyway. There was no sense that anyone was better than anyone else. He knew her name, he had known it all along. And not the name that came with this place, but her actual name. He had come looking for her. Not the other way around. “You’re right, of course. The world is a complicated place. But it is ever changing…” That she did believe. That power was never absolute, even the strongest power.

When the door opened behind her, she looked over her shoulder at the woman that entered and immediately started assessing what she could already tell about her. Average height. Slim build. Pretty enough, but that was irrelevant towards her wand. She nodded in greeting to the woman, but her eyes drifted back to the Malfoy, to Draco. Draco. He would, she assumed, make proper introductions.

@ draco + client • 600 • aurora's outfit

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0