This would be the first painting Admete had finished since her promotion. To say that she'd been busy would be to understate the problem, as her birds would attest to if they actually spoke more than once in their lives. Bit of language for them to repeat at the end, with everything from the bloody Opera to meetings to excited little students trying to wander off to who knew where.

Piece just needed a few more brushstrokes. She was in the middle of finishing up one thick red line when the door bell chimed. The brush jerked, sending red into the middle of a section of white, and she couldn't help but sigh. Pain to fix, that.

That brush she set on table, and she rubbed at a drying smudge of green on her cheek as she headed to the door. A blue-tipped brush, one end of which had been slipped down her shirt to wait at hand til she needed it, escaped her attention.

A peek through the glass in the door showed the familiar, currently reddened face of Edwin Glass, head of MAC, bane of thoughtless Aurors. From the look on his face, he'd either walked all the way from the Ministry or he'd just been yelling at someone. Maybe one of said Aurors.

Couldn't say that she wanted him to see the tiny mess that was her flat, but she couldn't just ignore him either. So she slid the door open as she let her wand slip into her hand. With any luck she didn't have paint in her hair.

How could it almost be the end of January already? It felt like it had been November only yesterday, and now one-twelfth of the year had slid by. Fortunately January refused to be quiet, and two nights before his well prepared, expertly briefed Department had been despatched to Godric's Hollow to deal with some unearthly fire in the cemetery. The body count had been ridiculous… well, until someone had reminded one of the less bright wizards on the team that some of them had previously been beneath the ground!

Still, it was an awful mess, and it wouldn't have been half as terrible had the Aurors kept on task. DMAC had experts in dealing with bewitched fire, they had developed spells for containing it over hundreds of years and a considerable amount of recent decade development too. Edwin's team did not go in to investigate crimes.

If he were to call into Brown's office on Level 2 the whole floor would be trying to eavesdrop on what he could say about the matter, and in any case it had been a long day. He'd only just finished shouting at Trading Standards on Level Five (there'd been quite the audience by the time he'd finished his lecture to Kaydn Hamilton about the shoddy inspection of a magical oven which had caused serious fire in a house flanked by Muggle abodes.) Often he despatched others to do that, but Hamilton was a twerp at the best of times, and he enjoyed a good rant.

"Brown." He greeted the witch who slid open the door. "I do hope I am not imposing." There was a pause for a beat, and he rephrased, "Or rather, I realise I am imposing, so this will only be brief."

Though as he took in her appearance (being careful to divert his gaze as far away from her delightful chest as he could), he wished he didn't have to be brief, and that he might nestle himself beside her once more.

Focus Edwin, focus!

"We have a small matter of the desecrated site of a national monument to discuss."

Admete was a proper MLE head now, as Edwin Glass had showed up to chastise her, all red-faced and irritable. She preferred his previous sort of red-faced exertions, if she was honest.

"We have a small matter of the desecrated site of a national monument to discuss."

That wasn't ringing any particular bells. Meant that Two and Three were apart on what was important, probably. "Come in, then." Didn't need him deafening half the street. She pulled the door open and stepped back to let him come inside.

"Sorry 'bout the mess. Was painting." There were painting supplies scattered everywhere in the entrance to her small flat, and she shoved a few of them together to clear off a space on a table before motioning for Edwin to sit down. At least there wasn't paint on everything.

Though there was, oh, oops. She turned away from Edwin for a moment and pulled the brush out from her chest to set it aside as well before she looked back to him, with just a tiny bit of a blush on her cheeks. Oops.

Edwin stepped up and into Admete's flat, his eyes taking in the scene of paints and canvas, and birds and furniture all in a small space. He saw what she meant now. There'd be a lot more room for such pursuits in a proper house, one would think her wages allowed for such.

She motioned for him to sit down, so he located a spot that seemed to be safe and sank down onto it, removing his hands from his coat pockets as he did, but not removing it, not expecting this trip to take long.

He caught Admete yanking a paintbrush from between her breasts without having a chance to look away to be modest. But the moment she looked round he purposely averted his gaze, pretending he'd not seen it all, or was even remotely jealous of the brush.

"Godric's Hollow." Edwin spoke firmly, reaching into his coat and producing some photographs of the scene taken by the restoration team. He reached them up to Admete and folded one hand over the other in his lap when she had taken them to examine.

"Your aurors were trying to do my Department's job, again. Caused an unholy mess to the graveyard, you know, the one where people visit to pay their respects to the Potters and remember the losses of our people in the last war?" He looked displeased, and sounded no better.

Admete frowned slightly as she took the pictures. Classic Two/Three spat, or sounded like. Also her problem now.  She forced herself to take a long, solid look at the images. Bit of a mess, yes. And while she expected the Aurors hadn't been perfect, judgment wasn't something she'd rush.

"The graveyard. I''m familiar." She managed to keep her voice mostly neutral, and she handed the pictures back  to Edwin before sitting down herself. "Go on."

She leaned forward, attentive, her elbows resting on her knees. There was a tiny scrap of paint on her knuckles and she pressed a fingernail against it to scrape it off.

Brown was seemingly uninformed, too busy painting or was pretending to be oblivious like the whole auror corps. Then here he was, making house calls working overtime.

"An enchanted fire broke out, and your aurors were pulling up consecrated ground to try and put it out." Edwin explained grumpily. "It was a good job we got there in time before they started cremating bodies with their carelessness. Do you realise how difficult it is to identify and then rebury bodies - how upset families get?"

The volume of his voice crescendoed and his face came ever redder at the thought.
"Once again Level 2 think they can act for us all."

And there Glass was pontificating once again. He did have the knack for it. Admete flicked her wand and a pair of cups, accompanied by a small pitcher, floated their way over to the side table next to Glass.

"So they Dawlished it up putting out a fire and you want me to practice my yelling on the Auror Corps?" She raised one very, very careful eyebrow, but otherwise kept her expression flat and very calm. It didn't help that his face had hit the color of Auror robes by this time.

Her expression softened slightly. "And I've dealt with bodies before. Not going to forget it."

One of the glasses floated over to her hand as she stretched it forward. "What kind of fire, exactly?" It wasn't the usual sort of Auror stuff but there should have been a bit of training. Less it was really obscure. "They should know better." Probably.  Maybe.

"So they Dawlished it up putting out a fire and you want me to practice my yelling on the Auror Corps?"

"If you don't, I will." Edwin replied curtly.

"I am still waiting for the final report to give details like that." The portly, red-faced wizard replied, a little more calmly in voice and shuffled his shoulders. "Thankfully it was something that could eventually be controlled, but not your average fire by any stretch of the imagination. It was contained into a vacuum by my team which did eventually sap out a considerable force of it, but entirely enchanted, nonetheless."

He gestured his hands to illustrate containment and his expression attempted to convey that this took great skill.
"We have specialists in fighting fires within my Department, and an investigation is underway back at the site. If you wanted to inspect matters, this could be arranged." Edwin tugged at his collar and pursed his lips to give a little sigh.

"I just need you, Madam Brown, to ensure your Department know the boundaries of their responsibilities, hmm?" Don't look at her there.... His eyes quickly averted from the bosom that had kept him somewhat entertained when he had invited Admete to dinner at his house the other week.

"That is all." He added, eyes not able to stop themselves returning for a moment before meeting her face with as firm expression as he could manage when distracted by a woman's figure.

"I'll do it. They've built up a resistance to you yelling." The threat of a smile quirked up the corners of Admete's mouth, then quickly dissipated as Glass continued on. She tapped a hand on her knee in thought.

"The inspection, too." Get a damn good idea of what she was yelling about.  Just how obscure this fire was, for one. And something beside Glass' thoughts on it. "They should remember your specialists, with the head-butting. Can look into that." Might be time for large a reminder there, boundaries of responsibilities as he'd said. See if they'd stepped on toes with the Werewolf wing again.

She looked down into her glass and reached for the pitcher. No point drinking air. And it gave her something to focus on besides that quick dart of his eyes. "Thanks for bringing it up. I'll let you know what I find."

"Thank you." Edwin replied a little more tersely than he had intended. His irritation was lessening, and he leaned forwards, planting his elbows just above his knees and his face into his palms where he rubbed his face and let out a deep sigh.

"Welcome to an insight into Department Headship," he explained with a frown, "only I'm usually drinking something stronger when another Department knocks on my door." He explained, putting the palms of his hands together before his nose in a prayer and then curling his fingers over to clear his face again, eyes staring off to one side of her bosom.

"That's all, anyhow, I'll - were you painting when I arrived?" Mid-sentence he'd stopped and reconsidered leaving.

"Need to buy more drinks, then. Haven't had much time to shop."  The flat seemed pretty bare when she looked about. Even the half-finished painting didn't do much to fill out the small room. Needed to look for a large one, true. One where she wouldn't hear every rustle of a feather from the bedroom.

One with a larger bedroom, might be nice. Space for company. Insights.

She glanced over to the splatter of paint. "Painting? Yes. Haven't had a chance for much of it lately."  The clink of ice against glass as she set her cup down, and then she stood. Stretched her arms about behind her head, and walked over to the easel. It was light, easy to move.

Still creaked on the floor a little though. She turned it so Glass could see it clearly.

She moved so very gracefully, undoubtedly years of training with the wand, on beams, on tightropes or whatever else those aurors used to develop their cat-like balance. It was a pity their brains were often not as sharp as their wands. He couldn't help but watch her move.

The canvas was turned to face him and he blinked in surprise. He had not seen Brown's art before, and he was all of a sudden at a loss as to how to describe things, or formulate a response. His half-open mouth opened a little further and then snapped shut.

"I see." He managed, which was ever so amazingly insightful, but his expression rendered genuine surprise at her quiet talent away from the office. "And you haven't had much chance for this lately?" He asked prising his eyes from the canvas to her and then back again, lifting himself from his seat to draw closer.

"I'd say give up the day job, only someone's got to wrangle those crimson-robed idiots." He explained, shaking his head and admiring the painting.

"Is this a hobby from childhood, or something more recent?" He asked politely.

Admete wasn't used to anyone showing an interest in her art. Possibly because she didn't usually show anyone her art. It was nice though, bit flattering. She smiled. "Not quite that far back. Been doing it a while. When I have time for it." Never enough, but so much else to do.

The painting was as abstract as usual, with the most recent addition to it being lines of red crossing a background mottled with white, green, and gold. It almost seemed some sort of strange field, though as Edwin drew closer he would see small details that drew the eye, swirls and intricate patterns hidden within the texture of the paint itself.

Edwin could not profess to knowing a whole lot about art, especially not the more abstract stuff. But he was polite enough to a colleague and friend about things.

"Do you ever animate them, or are they more a Muggle style?" He asked, "I have a friend who paints magical portraits, but you have to talk to those to teach them things." He was peering more closely at the brushstrokes, "Not sure your style would suit that, but even without magic it seems to move before your eyes."

Either that or it really had been a long day.

"Touch of animation only." Admete swirled her fingers about in the air, following the  curves of color in the art. "But that's the last step."

She frowned a little and leaned in towards the painting, considering  the daubs of color. "Few more hours on this before it'll be ready. Might take weeks to get that in." Longer, if work kept up. She looked back to Edwin. "There's a few finished pieces around if you'd want to see them, but I'd hate to hold you up. Merlin knows you must be swamped."

That didn't stop her from motioning towards a section of shelves near the back of the flat.