Life And Death

Only Lead To Love And Regret
There Is No Prophecy
@attie

The department, depending on where you were, tended to be fairly silent. Some may even have said eerily so. For Lorelei the noise level was inconsequential when the other hand focused on the contents which were what kept her interests. The 'Brain Room' was naturally intriguing if somewhat offputting, and naturally no one had stepped within the room which lay forever sealed shut to them. Today, her rota had assigned her to The Veil alongside Lady Athena, and she was procrastinating slightly before walking inside. The Witch had recently come back to the department after Lady Andromeda had ousted Lord Wentzell as the Minister, and she hadn't had the chance so far to catch a word with her.

Everyone was assigned at least one person to work with when it came to the room of Death, for it's sole feature was lethal to any who dared to try and study it alone. They'd lost a few workers that way in the years which she had worked there. The only telling sign of their consequent passing to the other side usually something that they dropped, or a recent scuff in the thin blanket of dust that graced the dais. The crumbling archway itself seemed to be resilient against the stuff but that was fairly self explanatory. She'd have been a liar if she didn't see the dark, forbidding beauty in the artifact... but she wasn't idiotic enough to attempt the room by herself.

All it took was one second too long in looking at it before things started going sour. Before it's thrall ensnared the viewer and led them closer... and closer... until they walked through the tattered black curtain to the other side. The whispering's were only audible once you went closer to the sunken part of the room, so naturally no one went closer unless they had another with them. Otherwise it was unnaturally cold and silent. As if the place didn't actually exist. It made regular talking sound like obnoxious yelling, before The Veil swallowed it...

Yes, all in all she found it utterly fascinating. It wouldn't have been the first time she had entertained the idea of smuggling her brother in just to push him through it, but she reminded herself that it was a thought that would never come to fruition. No matter how much he pissed her off. A pair of footsteps came towards her and the doors span again, making her sigh. Turning around, she smiled at the advancing blonde before looking for the door that had recently spun away. She wondered for a moment whether a pleasantry of 'It's nice to see you again' would be taken as a slight against her for coming back to the department before dismissing the idea altogether."Lady Athena," She greeted the older Witch, "I hope you're well?"

OH, how she loves the latter.

When it came down to it, this was all Ares's fault. 

She had told him numerous times that they were alienating the Sacred Twenty-Eight, she had told him that they needed to do something about it, but it had been construed as her being 'jealous' of the halfblood that her brother was parading about. Athena had only laughed at that, finding the insinuation (although somewhat true) to be rather ridiculous. She had been so fed up with Ares that the majority of the obsession had faded slightly; honestly, the amount of time that she had spent warning him about this inevitable issue was enough for Athena to want to smack him upside the head. Really, she was feeling more of a sibling rivalry than anything else, but she was sure that would likely fade if (and when) he decided to worm his way back into her good graces. She was never that harsh with Ares, not like she was with other people. She gave him chance after chance to prove himself as something more than a man motivated by sex— which was, of course, the only way she could understand him marrying two halfbloods within his lifetime. That didn't mean that her brother had really succeeded to prove himself as of late, but Athena was sure that, at some point, he would pull his head out of his ass and start making sense.

It would likely take a while. He was probably still wounded from the Ministry take over, especially after he had only held his position for a little over a year. Honestly, Athena was a bit frustrated at how easily Lady Lestrange had done it, and she did wish her the best in keeping office. As long as power was in the right hands it didn't need to be her hands. She was still going to dally in politics, of course. She wasn't an idiot, she wasn't getting rid of everything that she was capable of. She needed to remember to send a letter to the witch congratulating her... Despite the soreness of the loss she was still wanting to keep the relative peace. She had tried so hard to get her brother to win over the native purebloods, but the witch had managed to do so with a simple party. It was impressive, to say the least. She could admit that. At first, she was furious. She had felt hot anger to know that someone had so easily pushed her aside, how she was fired from a job that she had enjoyed. She had been allowed to stay at the Ministry, but people knew now, they knew how easily she had lost her position. She couldn't be too mad, though, as the women in charge... They were smart enough to stay in charge. But she hated how quickly it had all happened, how much sense it all made.

At least she still had the Department of Mysteries. At least she could still dally in everything that she wanted to, at least she could retreat to the sublevels of the Ministry and refuse to come out until the next coup— or until they forget everything that had happened. The other Unspeakables had been a bit wary, at first, when she had arrived. But Lady Zabini had been kind, and the others had been... absent. She liked that; she didn't do friends. Of course, she did have to deal with coworkers, which was a bit trying at times. She had been scheduled in the room of Death, today, and although that was, quite frankly, her area of expertise, she had been placed with Lorelai Sykes. She wasn't familiar with the witch, not really, but she did recognize that this was going to be very, very interesting; this was the first time that she had been in the room since she had left the department.

Attie had gotten into the office that morning with a rather bleak outlook, but it had very brightly changed when she realized where she would be working for the day. She had smiled, patted down her cloak, and then strode eagerly towards the room, satisfied with the clinking of her heels against the ground. "Ms. Sykes," she said briskly, taking a glance around the room. This was just as exciting as she remembered it. The swish of the veil, the silence of the room... She really did love it. "I am, thank you. And how are you?"

Lorelei had- once upon a time- worked in earnest for the sole purpose of working up through the ranks tp achieve either the Head of Department job or somewhere closer to the Minister... where the real magic seemed to happen. But much had transpired since then; she and her ideals had grown up and taken stock of things. Close to the Minister was where the stress to turn her prematurely grey was all the while her seat being stable until someone decided an upheavel. Case in point; Ares' staff and family. Lady Athena had come back to the position of the Head for the Department of Mysteries before Lorelei could take a good look at what the title might entail... but she was far from bitter. If anything she was just glad a woman was running the Department as the Wozards tended to make rash decisions without careful logic. And it meant she could still continue learning without the pressure of supervising everyone else as well.

Alex usually had a withering look to give whenever the subject was brought up as he had taken it into his mind that his sibling had little and less ambition when it came to her career. Truthfully he couldn't have been more wrong. She had published successful books, had kept a strong working history with no blips- unlike him- and was waiting for opportunity to come knocking on the door she had built. In came her best card to play; patience. Lorelei had almost endless reserves of patience while her brother seemed almost devoid of any. A trait he had taken from their mother. Like her father she knew when to sit and bide her time and when to strike; for Alex... if striking first didn't work them he'd keep going until the thing struck back harder or he wore it down. Arguably the main reason she did anything for him besides family obligation; the man could be insufferable. How his friend Adrian put up with him she couldn't be rightly sure yet she had witnessed it first hand whn she had met him not a month past. A striking man, captivating. And handsome enough to make her brother look like a gormless fish with the personality of a boot.

This room called to her, even when she  was in the Atrium and far away from the beckoning whispers constantly filtering through The Veil. A sound that should have risen the hairs on the back of her neck and sent a chill down to the base of her spine served to soothe her mind and thoughts instead. Had it not been the Department policy she'd have visited the room far more often even just to sit and think. The unnatural cold didn't bother her... it just added to the atmosphere. It was as if the room were in constant limbo, waiting for the pin to drop so that noise could resume the void it had left. It was almost a contradiction of itself. As if it were waiting for something big... yet also as calm and peaceful as if it had all it needed. She'd have discussed her thoughts on the matter with others yet her colleagues were never the most sociable and she was sworn to secrecy from outsiders- an oath she took extremely seriously. Maybe even too seriously, yet she didn't think it to be so.

"I'm doing well, thank you. Glad I get to be back in here today, really... it's truly just a fascinating phenomenon. I never grow tired of it."