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[attr="class","ctopline"]I'm sitting on a citadel

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[attr="class","clyrics"]Making a point to waste my time[break]
I'm walking on clouds of white

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[attr="class","cbody"]Issa knew that it had been a long time ago that Anicka had offered her a job at the magazine if she wanted it. Merlin, it felt so long ago now. But it had been offered nonetheless. Of course, it had been offered back when leaving the estate was something that she did on very rare occasions and when she couldn’t imagine committing to a job when she had no idea if a bad day would leave her housebound, not wanting to even go outside, let alone out into London. It had just not been a good idea at all, so she hadn’t thought much of turning it down back then.
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But time had changed since then. She had changed. She was nowhere near the same person that she had been before all of this had happened. It wasn’t just some blip in her radar. It wasn’t something that she was capable of just getting past, like it was nothing. It was a big part of her life. The majority of her life had been spent in that house in Prague, and there was never going to be any way for her to get past that entirely. It was just impossible. But she could do her best to move forward. Her psychiatrist had diagnosed her with PTSD, not that there was any surprise in that. She had been prescribed medicine that did help. It didn’t do the trick entirely, but it helped. There were still some nights where she was riddled with insomnia or nightmares, but there were ways that she had learned that helped with that. She didn’t know why having chamomile tea right before she went to bed helped, but she found that it had.
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Bit by bit, things were getting a little easier. She knew that it wasn’t the result of any one thing. Everything that she did to try to move past what had been a good portion of her life helped. Whether it was the therapy, the medicine, or the little tricks that she had found. Whether it was being able to spend time with Ares, or the kids, or do other things that made her happy. It was getting easier and she was grateful for that. For a time, she truly had wondered if it was even possible to come back from this. It hadn’t really felt possible. And then Ares had been so distant, and she had just continued to feel like there was no way that she was going to manage to get through it—any of it. Somehow, they had.
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The epidemic had taken more from them, but she thought that they were doing their best to work past that as well. It was not easy on either of them. But she thought it was harder on Ares. She had lived a good portion of her life without magic. She was not happy to go back to that, but at least she was used to it. What she found the hardest to get used to was not having Ares in her head. She was so used to his Legilimency, so used to him knowing what she was thinking, and it was strange not to have that anymore.
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Of course, sometimes she didn’t feel like he needed to use Legilimency to know what she was thinking, but that was hardly the point. It was still something that she had found difficult to adjust to, for some silly reason. But she had every confidence that a cure would be found eventually. That was something that she was continuing to remain optimistic about. She needed to be. Eventually, they would figure it out. She had to think that they would. This would certainly not be their reality forever.
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Today had brought about different news from the Ministry, though. Nothing about the cure, instead about the registration. It hadn’t come as too much of a surprise to her. One didn’t have to be politically minded to know that the ICW had come with certain missions in mind, and getting rid of the registration had to have been on that list. It was only a matter of time, and apparently, they had decided that the time was now. It was undoing the work that Ares had done, that Anicka had done by killing the former Minister, and so she was worried about both of them today. She didn’t know why. There was likely no reason to worry, but she found herself worried nonetheless.
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Her relationship with Anicka had never gone back to the way it had been when she had returned and she had long since given up the hope that it would. She didn’t talk to her all that at all anymore, but she thought that it was worth coming in and seeing if she could finally take her up on that job. It felt like something that she was finally ready for. Issa had called to make sure that she didn’t have any meetings or that she wasn’t busy. Just showing up and expecting her to be free was obviously not something that she could do anymore.
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She didn’t know if Temperance had passed it along to her that she was coming or if she would be surprised but her appearance here. She hoped that it wouldn’t be too unpleasant of a surprise if it was, but there was no way to know these days. A knock and a push of the door later, and she was stepping into her office. “Hi. I hope you’re not too busy—” And she hoped that this wouldn’t prove to be horribly awkward either, but she thought it was definitely a possibility.
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[attr="class","cnotes"]945 ● @anicka ● outfit

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

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contemplating life

MAKING A POINT TO WASTE MY TIME

I'M WALKING ON CLOUDS OF WHITE

He hadn’t asked, which was frustrating, but she also knew that he didn’t have to. He didn’t have to ask her to step up. And to do this. And he didn’t have to tell her to teach their daughter to do it in her place. He didn’t have to tell her any of that. But she thought that she would have been at least a little easier going about it in the beginning if he would have pretended to ask. Instead he had told. And that was fine. She knew that he would have talked about it if she really wanted to. But she hadn’t wanted to. She had accepted her place, and her role. And so had Ella.

It wasn’t as simple for her dcera. She knew that she had been angry with her otec. She knew that she had called him, and yelled at him, and she knew that they had eventually come to an agreement. She was allowed to continue her psychology classes, but she was to leave the hospital, and go to the Ministry with Anička. It was logical, and they both knew it. Eventually Ella had acquiesced that they were right. That this was something that she needed to do. If she was going to be Královna then she had to start working for the people.

Anička knew that her other children had questioned the move a little bit, but she trusted Ella to take care of what she wanted them to know. Not the truth. Not yet. There was an order of people that were going to have to be privy to that information, and she thought perhaps her own matka, and Malcolm were going to have to be at the top of it. Matylda, as well. That was going to go incredibly poorly… But they couldn’t discuss such things here at the office, and yet he was still smirking at her from her desktop screen as she read copy.

“Shouldn’t you be at work?”

His voice had her looking up at him out of the corner of her eye, and she shook her head a little bit as she finished reading. “I am at work.” Turning to face the screen directly she raised her eyebrows in a little bit of a challenge. “Shouldn’t you be at work, you know, running our country?”

“Our country now, huh?” His smirk was still there, but his eyes moved away from hers, and back down, “Z tohoto úhlu vidím přímo dolů šaty…”

Anička rolled her eyes at him but she didn’t bother to answer. She knew that, but that was not the point. “Did you have something that you actually wanted to talk to me about? Or what was the point of this phone call, Bratr…” There were plenty of reasons for him to call and check in, but Anička knew him well enough to know what he wanted. She knew him well enough to know the point of this little phone call.

“Slyšel jsem, co dnes ráno dělá Andromeda.” His voice was quiet enough that she actually focused on him. He was truly sorry.

“To je v pořádku.” At least she hoped that it was. She had been good, since that day in the Atrium. But she knew that she still couldn’t help but hurt a little bit. Even if she had known that Andromeda was going to do it the moment that Rabastan had asked Josef for guards.

His eyes were softer than normal, even through the screen as he shook his head, “Ne, to není. Jste naštvaná.” It didn’t take a genius to see that. Just someone that knew her well. “Kde je Kamil?” Anička knew what he was worried about, but no one had so much as spoken to her about that incident. The ICW had bigger things to worry about than her creating a bonfire out of the Minister for Magic.

“Mimo.” She had asked him to stand outside the door today. If there was any reason that she needed protecting, she wanted them both out there, watching the door. She could get out of here. She still had her magic. She had put them outside the door, and they had complied. She could still see them, through the glass wall at the other end of the room, she hadn’t tinted it with magic like she had taken to doing. She let everyone see that she was here today, and nowhere close to the Ministry.

“Chcete o tom mluvit?”

Did she? She thought that she might, but she didn’t think that she wanted to talk to him about it. Not like this. She didn’t really want to talk to anyone. Zyra, maybe. Maybe she needed to tall her psychologist. Andrew was dead. Dominick was dead. Aurora was dead. All because of muggles, or the war, or being a Death Eater.

“Kouříte.”

Anička shook her head a little bit and let the smoke waft away from where it had started to gather around her. She signed and looked up at him, “Ne, nechci o tom mluvit.” She couldn’t. Clearly, she couldn’t. Even thinking about it had caused her to literally start to go up in flames. “Slibuji. Jsem v pořádku.”

Josef didn’t look like he believed her in the least, but his words were cut off by the knock on the door. She had been focused on him, and she hadn’t even realized that they had let someone get to her door. In her door, she realized as the door swung open. Kamil and Vlasta had obviously thought that whomever it was posed no threat, and then she realized exactly whom it was. “Issa…”

“Tilie?” Josef’s voice cut across her thoughts from the computer screen and her eyes flicked back to him.

“Zavolám ti zpět.” A click of the mouse with her hand she watched the screen pop to blackness and she rose to her feet as the blonde entered the room. She shook her head at her words, she was busy, but she had been talking to her bratr while she was working, she had time for Issa. At least she thought that she did. Looking over at her clock she realized she still had about an hour before her next meeting, and the actual editor’s work she was doing could go home with her tonight. “That’s alright, please…” She extended her hand to the chairs in front of her desk before sinking back into her own. “You’re a surprise.” Temperance hadn’t mentioned it before she had left earlier, and she wondered if the intern sitting at her daughter’s desk had known just whom it was she was agreeing to a meeting with?

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“Z tohoto úhlu vidím přímo dolů šaty…” - From this angle I can see right down your dress.
“Slyšel jsem, co dnes ráno dělá Andromeda.” - I heard what Andromeda did this morning.
“To je v pořádku.” - It's fine.
“Ne, to není. Jste naštvaná.” - No, it's not. You're upset.
“Kde je Kamil?” - Where is Kamil?
“Mimo.” - Outside
“Chcete o tom mluvit?” - Do you want to talk about it?
“Kouříte.” - You're smoking.
“Ne, nechci o tom mluvit.” - No, I don't want to talk about it.
“Slibuji. Jsem v pořádku.” - I promise. I'm fine.
“Zavolám ti zpět.” - I'll call you back

@ i didn't expect to see you • 1111 • anička's outfit

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0

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[attr="class","ctopline"]I'M SITTING ON A CITADEL

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[attr="class","clyrics"]MAKING A POINT TO WASTE MY TIME[break]
I'M WALKING ON CLOUDS OF WHITE

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[attr="class","cbody"]This was progress. Or at least, she wanted to think that it was. She wanted to think that getting a job was a step in the right direction, but she wasn’t entirely sure how it was going to go. For the most part, since she had gotten back, she had been at home. It wasn’t that she was a complete recluse that never left the house or anything like that. After spending years locked in a house, coming home to freedom only to never leave the house sounded… awful, actually. But there was no denying how hard it was to be in the presence of so much open space sometimes. It was not always an easy thing to do. More often than not, the space proved to be incredibly overwhelming. The diagnosis of PTSD had not been a surprise to her. After everything that she had been through, after the bouts of insomnia, or night terrors, she supposed having a title on it helped. It helped to know just what she was contending with.
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The diagnosis of agoraphobia was one that she had anticipated less, but she knew that it was part of the reason why she was home as much as she was. Far more than the average person was, anyway, though she did her best to get out when she could. She knew that she couldn’t be a complete homebody without worrying Ares, so she did the necessities. Sometimes it was harder, other days were a little bit easier. There were days when she was glad that Ares was at work and couldn’t see how long it took her to convince herself to leave the house—how long it took for her to build up to it.
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But she had been talking in therapy a lot about moving forward, about tiny steps that could be made in order to make some kind of progress and a step in the right direction. Getting a job was one of those steps. Issa knew that it would probably be hard to find a job that she would be comfortable with, that would work with her and the baggage that came along with her, and then she remembered that Anicka had offered her a job. A long time ago, of course. Back when they were still trying to mend their relationship, which she had since given up on. She knew that there was a chance that the offer was now off of the table. She would understand it if it was. But she thought that she had to give it a try. Even trying to get a job was a pretty good step in the direction of progress. Right?
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She thought so, anyway. It meant getting out of the house and going into London, of all places. If she could accomplish that, then she could deem this day a success even if Anicka did not want her to have the job. If she actually got the job, then even better. There was even a chance that the work could be done partially from home, which she thought would help on those days when leaving the house felt like an impossible task. It was something that she thought that Anicka would at least understand, more than some stranger as her boss would.
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She knew that it could be a bad idea too. Her relationship with Anicka had never been the same after she’d returned. After everything that had happened, she supposed she couldn’t blame her, but it had been difficult nonetheless. Over time, it had grown easier to focus on the good things. To focus on her relationship with Ares, on Orion, on Clary, on the other parts of her life that were good. That helped her more forward, that helped her feel like she was actually capable of having a normal life. It was good to focus on that.
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But today was about taking a step further in that direction, and she knew there was a chance that it would backfire completely. It was still something that she had to try. “Oh, I’m sorry—I… called. I figured they’d told you.” She hesitated in the doorway. “I can go.” If she didn’t know that she was coming, there was a chance that she didn’t want to see her at all. Issa figured that even being given a ‘meeting,’ of sorts, had meant that Anicka was all right with seeing her, but if she hadn’t known that she was coming… that was not necessarily the case.
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[attr="class","cnotes"]753 ● @ anicka ● outfit

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

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contemplating life

MAKING A POINT TO WASTE MY TIME

I'M WALKING ON CLOUDS OF WHITE

Today of all days was just not the time that she wanted to deal with much of anything. She didn’t want Josef checking on her. She didn’t want interns filling the empty slots with meetings without asking. She didn’t want to talk to people. Because clearly talking to people wasn’t doing her a whole lot of good. She had started to ignite just thinking about the things that she didn’t want to talk about. And there were so many things. There were so many things on her mind. So many things that she didn’t know how they were going to handle. That she was going to handle. Because she was the unstable one.

That wasn’t a secret of any kind. She was the one that was not great at keeping it together, and it wasn’t that she didn’t understand the choice. Because she did. But that didn’t make it an easier pill to swallow. Her relationships with the men in her life were all complicated. They were all clouded by so many outside factors. And yet, even through how Andrew had treated her, even through the thirty years of abuse, and torment, she cared for him. It hasn’t entirely been his fault. Really, she didn’t know how much of it was him and how much of it was her monstrous otec.

Caring about Andrew didn’t just go away. And she knew that there was more to it than him being the father of some of her children. It was the way that he had died. Burned alive… There was something about that, something that just never sat right with her. It was a personal offense, in a way, that her husband had been burned alive. Fire was a part of her very being. The blood in her veins boiled more than it flowed. And losing Andrew like that, Ares coming home smelling of smoke, blackened with soot, ash in his hair… Anička had not handled that well.

Muggles has killed her younger brother less than a month later, for his watch and the money in his wallet. England was full of things that she would have rather forgotten. Memories that she didn’t need, but that she couldn’t escape. And nothing felt right anymore. She didn’t want to talk about it. She didn’t want to talk to Josef when he could see right through her. She didn’t want to talk to Malcolm when she was upset about Andrew. Talking to her Matka was never an option and talking to Zyra was something that she didn’t really have time for in the middle of the day.

She needed to run. That was honestly what she needed more than anything. To go home, and change her clothes, and run. Laps around the property, maybe the length of the county with the way that she was feeling right now. Her guards weren’t likely to like that very much. But she couldn’t just take off in the middle of the day anyway. She had things to do, meetings to attend to. And while Anička was giving the Ministry of Magic a large berth today, that didn’t stop the work from needing to be done. It simply meant that she was doing it in a different place.

Her conversation with her bratr was cut short when she saw who was standing in the door. If it would have been one of the girls, even her husband, she wouldn’t have shied away from leaving him on the screen. She wasn’t hiding the fact that she was in contact with Josef. He was the Král, and she was the Foreign Delegate. They were more than siblings. They were more than just family of any form. They were running a country. Their otec country. Their dědeček country. It had been their home, and their country, since the 19th century.

Looking after it was their legacy. Was their children’s legacy.

Temperance had left earlier, and she had left an intern covering her desk. Which was fine, that was normal procedure around here, but it was not Remington, and it seemed as though Remington was the only one that she actually liked. The Slytherin girl had been offered a position here as soon as she graduated on Saturday. Working for Kate Yaxley in the same capacity that Temperance worked for her. With, hopefully, the same intent. To one day be set to take over that position. Anička didn’t expect Kate to stay forever. She was the kind of witch that started her own magazine, in time. Not the kind that worked for someone else forever. And when she was ready for that, Anička rather thought that she would like to have Remington trained and ready to go.

But none of those witches were the one standing in her doorway. Anička hadn’t seen or heard from Issadora since Ares had told her not to send baby clothes over a year ago now. She had never met the little girl that they had had. She hadn’t seen Orion since the day that Ares and Issa had gotten married. Once upon a time life could have been so different. But there was no mistaking the paths that they were on now. The ones that had taken them so very far apart. That had pushed them further and further from who they might have had the chance to be once upon a time.

“My daughter had rehearsal I believe; the interns are relatively useless when it comes to relaying information. But please…” She nodded to the chair in front of her desk again as she retook her own. “I don’t have anything apart from you, apparently, scheduled right now. Come in.” Anička didn’t even really mean that how it sounded, it was simply that her days were ridiculously scheduled. And having an hour with nothing was surprising to say the least. Filling it with Issa was a strange turn of events, given the warning that she received the last time she tried to contact her. But things changed. Anička knew that all too well.

@ don't hover, come in • 1009 • anička's outfit

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0