It was amazing how much more organized things had become after just a few short months.  Lexus Dale had proven to be a godsend, keeping the office in Bristol fashion and taking on many of the mundane tasks that Jonas had always struggled to keep up with.  His new assistant worked hard enough during the week that he had firmly told her to take weekends off, which in some ways was a godsend in and of itself.  After nearly a year of living on his own and almost a decade of self-employment prior to that, getting used to having another person around during the day was more trying than Jonas had expected.

Weekends had become an opportunity for him to get out of the office.  The private investigator had taken to spending Sunday mornings in the local coffee shop just a few streets over, near to the entrance of Diagon Alley.  Though he still had yet to master the precise local dialect that would allow him to order any sort of caffeinated beverage with ease, the coffeehouse was quiet and the other patrons generally left him alone, allowing him to breeze through his reading as he tackled the more tedious parts of his research.

This particular Sunday, the coffeehouse was more crowded than usual.  A light drizzle outside had driven passerby off the pavement and indoors, and Jonas had had to search for longer than usual to find a table.  He had finally captured one near the window, which had been wholly subsumed by the notes, papers, and photocopies that made up his version of the Ministry case file. 

With the entirely Muggle crowd about, Jonas didn't make much of an effort to keep his notes out of the public eye, but for once his mind was only half on his reading.  It was hard not to let other thoughts creep their way in - ancient wizards with seemingly endless bags of gold, excuses that could be made for the upcoming moon phase, the nearly present holidays and what exactly he was supposed to do about them.  His wand, too, had unfortunately been nagging at his thoughts.  With its recent unreliability, the private investigator had no idea if he could magic his way out of a jam if trouble struck.

Making a face at himself, Jonas took another sip of his coffee and then set the ceramic cup back on its saucer.  There was no point in thinking about it; either he would or he wouldn't.  Mentally shoving the excess thoughts aside, he picked up a new stack of papers and began to thumb through them, his feet kicked up on the chair opposite.

Book in hand Dante entered the coffee shop which was more crowded then usual on a Sunday afternoon.  Ordering his usual beverage he tried not to allow the fact that he had yet to get his morning caffeine fix effect his mood.  It was growing close to the holiday season which meant crowded shops would probably be more likely, and people would be more likely to seek a break from December’s chill in the various coffee shops and cafes.  The month of December was not really among his favorite.

Turning he noticed a familiar form once scouring over something that he was sure would look extremely curious to the average Muggle patron.  Taking a sip of the steaming liquid he considered leaving the other man to his work for a moment.  Last time they’d spoken Jonas had been on the hunt for some Egyptian artifact and was obviously less then willing to have it end up in the hands of the Ministry.  The researcher in him had been curious from the beginning.  Artifacts from the ancient world tended to posses an old magic that wasn’t always readily accessibly to a modern world.

Crossing the shop he resisted grumbling as one of the employees almost plowed into him while carrying empty cups back to the kitchen area to be washed.  Work had been less peaceful as of late.  Candice Stevenson was insisting on sending him baked goods on a fairly regular basis which didn’t go unnoticed by the rest of his department.  He wasn’t one to beat around the bush, but the thought of possibly upsetting her by asking her to stop wasn’t exactly something he fancied experiencing.  At least the complete home cooked meal had been delivered after everyone had left for the evening just as he was about to request takeaway from the Leaky Cauldron.

Stopping at Jonas’ table he cleared his throat before he spoke hoping to not give him as big as start as he had on their last meeting.  Glancing at the various papers he said with a slight smirk, “And they call me a workaholic.  How’s the trail for missing Egyptian relics?”

The throat-clearing preamble was forewarning enough.  Jonas glanced up at the noise, his eyes flickering to the man standing over him.  He regarded Dante for the barest of instants, and then flashed the other man a warm smile, shuffling his papers back into a pile as he returned both feet to the floor.

"Ward," he greeted the wizard cheerfully.  Running into the Unspeakable again was hardly surprising; the coffee shop was close enough to the Ministry that it was probably convenient for the other man on his way home from work.  Jonas couldn't exactly say that he minded the distraction, either.  Dante Ward had always been easy enough to get along with, if a little curt, and the private investigator wasn't too proud to admit that his advice had been invaluable.

"Alright then?  The trail's doing fair enough," he replied, nudging out the chair across from him in an invitation for the other man to sit.  "Ran it to its end a few weeks ago, actually.  I happened across a pub, and what would you know but it all played out just like you suggested.  Who knew that stopping in for a pint could get you so far?" he concluded cheerfully, flashing the Unspeakable a crooked grin.

He shrugged, gesturing to the papers in front of him.  "Anyhow, I'm off of it now, but you know how work gets on.  Always something new, innit?" he said nicely.  "You just stopping by today, or are you in after something you can't mention?"

Dante didn’t hesitate when the chair was nudged out, taking a seat across the table from the other man.  Curiosity was a key part of what he did, and he would be lying to say he wasn’t at least a bit interested in what Jonas had found out since their last impromptu meeting.  He couldn’t help but smirk a bit hearing his advice had paid off.  He’d put himself in plenty of less then ideal situations over the years and they had always been more then worth it.

“Good to hear,” he said.  “You never know what you might pick up while you’re just sitting there sipping a pint.”

His best leads had tended to happen that way.  It wasn’t uncommon for those in his department to also follow the practice of handing around the pubs in the less desirable parts of town.  While the lines of legality and morality might have been blurry within his department he always knew which side he stood on.  When it was mentioned of their always being something new he nodded able to understand completely what the other man meant.

“Taking a break before making another attempt at a personal project,” he said.  “I had a mishap in my office a few weeks back and I had to wait for fresh supplies.  Apparently the phrase ‘no good deed goes unpunished’ is true.”  Although he wasn’t entirely sure he minded the punishment of an unlikely friendship with the Ministry’s psychologist.  “I suppose the only good thing about there always being something new is it does tend to keep the mind sharp.”

Jonas cracked a grin at the Unspeakable's analysis of the old axiom.  In his own personal experience, it was certainly true that good turns rarely resulted in an improvement to one's own personal karma, but then, very little in life ever did.  He had always assumed it was only because he rarely did favors without expecting anything in return, namely excitement and/or something more interesting to do on a Sunday, but that didn't change the heart of the problem.

"That's the way of the world, then," he commiserated, looking faintly amused by the prospect of it.  "And yeah, I can't complain about keeping sharp.  Beats sitting in an office somewhere filling out the same paperwork time and time again, doesn't it?  Me, I'll take blatant mishaps on personal projects any day."

He traded his pen for the cup of coffee, warming his hands against it as he leaned back in the chair.  As much as he needed to fight his way through the reading, the temptation of a conversation was too much to pass up.  Ward had always struck him as an alright bloke with a dry wit, and though the Unspeakable obviously couldn't share anything, Jonas appreciated an excuse to discuss things without either parties questioning the need to be discrete.

"Nice of them to let you take time for a personal project," he remarked nicely.  "Ought to say, that's one of the things I'll never miss about working for the Ministry.  Be a bit of a trick to get back up to par with spellwork now, but even if everything else hadn't happened, I'd much rather set me own hours.  Tad more likely that I'll get some time to meself this way."

There was a point to what Jonas said.  The mishaps broke up the monotony of the day, especially for a department head.  After a while he grew tired of reading reports and putting his initials on parchment.  His days of doing field research were over, but there were moments he wished to go back to it.  That was usually around the time something either caught on fire, blew up, or some other preventable act happened.

“If you can learn a lesson from the mishap it’s usually worth the irritation,” he said.  “But your right, it does beat the paperwork.”

He smirked slightly at the comment about the Ministry allowing him time for a personal project.  That was the only sort of balance he strove to maintain with work.  To keep himself sane he knew he had to allow himself some time to be the researcher, the one doing the discovering.  So if it meant staying late and working even longer hours he was willing to give that.

“It is a commitment,” he said in agreement, sipping his own coffee.  “I don’t always have a spare hour or two when the works done for the day.  Judging though from the fact that you’re in a coffee shop on a Sunday with a case file, I’m guessing the old Ministry habit of overworking isn’t completely lost to you.”

Generally once anyone found themselves sucked into the daily hustle and bustle of the Ministry it was extremely difficult to escape.  It was perhaps part of why he had never managed to settle down.  The work had always been more important and something convenient to get lost in.

Jonas chuckled, flashing the other man an appreciative smile.  "Not completely," he agreed, with the air of one who was admitting a great personal fault.  "Hard to break a bad habit, innit?  At least now the extra work's on me own time, though.  I ever get to the point when it's too much, I can send meself off hours again."

It had been a long time since he'd thought about how his time at the Ministry had shaped his work habits.  Working as an Auror had certainly taught him useful skills, not that he was ever willing to go back to it again - not that he could now, not if his wand kept malfunctioning.  That was a mystery that seemed to have no solution in sight.  He hadn't exactly been excited to test all of his magic when he'd started edging back into life as a wizard, but now even the simplest spells had stopped working.  Jonas had no idea as to why.  After being gone so long, had he simply only been left with a limited store of magic?  Would he be stuck as a Muggle from here on?

The thought wasn't entirely as heartbreaking as it probably should have been, but it was certainly frustrating.  If it meant that he could no longer get into Diagon Alley or summon the Knight Bus with ease, it was likely to become even more so. 

But there had to be others who had stopped using their magic and then come back to it years later before, didn't there?  And as an Unspeakable, his current companion was likely to know about them.  Level Nine dealt with all sorts of mysteries concerning magic.  If there had been any instances of someone losing their thaumaturgical ability before, chances were that someone there had already studied it.

Jonas paused, considering how best to frame the question, and then glanced inquisitively at Dante.

"There must be other blokes who left the Ministry when I did though, aren't there?" he asked, keeping his voice light and curious.  No reason to make him think there was anything else to the question.  "You get many of them coming back again?  Must have been a fair few who decided that life on their own was better than standing before some court and getting sent off to Azkaban."

Somehow Dante couldn’t truly imagine not working for the Ministry.  There was the realization in his mind that he was just two years shy of two decades of service to the Department of Mysteries.  He was well aware that he was going to be one of those employees who would probably there until the day he died.  Somehow the thought of retirement or being self-employed just didn’t seem to suit him.  He always figured those were sure ways to drive him straight to the madhouse.

“A few have come back,” he said.  “In my department once you’re in…well, no one really ever leaves.  For those who did leave and come back usually after a few weeks it seems like they never left.   The habit is hard to break, and it’s extremely easy to slip right back into the usually scurrying of the anthill like no time has passed.”

Glancing at Jonas as he took a sip of his coffee he tried to gauge the reasoning behind the question.  Perhaps it was merely curiosity from the other man, but he couldn’t be sure.  There weren’t many who managed to successfully leave.  The few who had seemed to see enough during the war usually found a way to come back in some other role.

“Not thinking about throwing yourself back into the dragon’s lair, are you?” he asked.  “I got the feeling you rather liked doing things on your own terms.”

The red-haired man cracked a grin, rubbing at the back of his neck.  "Yeah, not as much," he agreed cheerfully.  "Still leaves something of a bad taste in the mouth, the way it ended, to tell the truth, and I can't say I miss having to give me life away for the cause.  But if I ever start losing me mind and considering it, the Ministry'll be the first to know."

It was, Jonas had no doubt, completely beyond the pale; he'd take up full time work for Kronos Malvivicus before he'd be back at the Ministry again.  There were some betrayals that were unforgivable even after years had passed.  But he gave an easy shrug, as if it were the most nonchalant topic in the world that they could have been discussing and plowed on. 

"I was just thinking that that must have been quite the mess to clean up afterwards.  Witches and wizards scattered about, plenty of the Muggle-borns not likely to trust anyone in a red robe for a bit.  Hogwarts, too," he said thoughtfully.  That was an angle he might be able to use.  "Probably ended up with a handful of kids who never got the proper training, yeah?  They ever have trouble being brought back into it again?"

Dante couldn’t help but smirk slightly at Jonas’ statement about giving his life away for the cause.  After the war and the death of his sister and father there had been countless times he had gone out into the field to research with ever intention of doing whatever it took to get the information he sought, even if it put his own life on the line.  He knew about things most people couldn’t even begin to imagine.  It often meant a risk, but in his mind it had always been well worth it.

The conversation shifted slightly to the aftermath of the war and the lack of trust some felt towards the Wizarding community.  He took a sip of coffee trying not to think too closely about that time.  There hadn’t been anyone whose life wasn’t changed in some way by it all, and he was no different.

“The Ministry has classes set up for those who want to learn,” he said.  “I suppose you could equate it with how some Muggles go back to finish high school degrees at night.  It seems like some have it easier then others, but if the talent is there it just takes a little time to cultivate it.  I haven’t heard of anyone leaving there not being able to function as part of the magical community.”

Of course there were some items on the agenda for the classes he questioned, like the practicality of a hair-raising potion.  Certainly there was something to be learned from the brewing process, but why waste the time of adults with something they would likely never have a use for?

"Yeah, makes sense," Jonas agreed, filing the fact that there were adult learning classes for failed wizards away as a particularly useless bit of information.  He'd snap his wand and go back to life as a Muggle before he asked the Ministry for any help with magic.  Anyhow, going back to school wasn't going to solve his current predicament.  It wasn't that he didn't remember how to cast spells - he'd remembered just fine, at least with the simple ones - it was that he suddenly couldn't.

The conversation wasn't going anywhere helpful, and as much as he would have appreciated the other man's input, the private investigator didn't want to flat out tell him what the problem was.  It was as if the fact that he couldn't do magic was some sort of personal failing.  Jonas liked Ward alright, but liking the bloke and admitting to him that he was a failure of a wizard were two completely different beasts.

But then - there was an easy way out, wasn't there?  'I've got a friend' might be completely transparent as an excuse, but who was going to question him if he said he had a client who'd asked him to look into the subject?  Ward knew what he did for a living.  Suddenly feeling much more confident, Jonas straightened in his chair, reaching for a pen as if he were preparing to take notes.

"So you haven't had anyone come back and not be able to work magic at all?" he asked, giving Dante a quizzical look.  "There's a...bloke I was mates with at school."  The 'friend' excuse.  Transparent.  He stopped himself from wincing. 

"Who's hired me on," he corrected quickly.   There.  'Client.'  Much more believable.  "It was just to poke around a bit into something unrelated, but when we were talking the other day, he mentioned that he hasn't been able to get his wand to work for years."  A little embellishment obviously couldn't hurt.  Jonas soldiered on. 

"You ever heard of anything like that happening before?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at the Unspeakable.  "Seems like it would take a lot more than classes to help the poor bastard, yeah?  Can magic just dry up like that?"

At first Dante looked skeptical of there being a bloke Jonas went to school with.  Most of the time when there was a ‘bloke’ it meant something was going on with the person telling the story that they didn’t want to talk about.  However, the mention of him being a client seemed likely.  He wasn’t completely convinced, but he could go with it for the time being.
 
It was an interesting sounding case.  Magic didn’t simply just dry up on its own.  There to be a cause of such an effect, the trick was narrowing down what.  His interest was peaked as the researcher in him quickly started trying to come up with possible causes.  Thanks to Analiza Snark’s project he had spent a lot of time recently looking into very similar cases.

“That’s not something I think one can fix with classes,” he said his brow furrowing a bit as he thought.  “It’s not like we can just stop being wizards…you’re either born with magical abilities or your not.”  He took a sip of his coffee pondering just how much he should say before deciding he could be both helpful and somewhat vague at the same time.

“There are some studies out there, mostly theoretical, about ancient curses,” he said, his mind wondering if this client might have been the one with the Egyptian artifact as well.  “It’s nothing commonly practiced today…but some of that old magic was fairly potent.  There are no concrete examples that I know of, so really it’s all based on research and old writings.  Any chance your ‘friend’ might have encountered something like that?  Maybe some lingering curse?”

"A curse?" Jonas repeated, sounding amused in spite of himself.  It really shouldn't be very funny, not considering the circumstances of his situation, but he couldn't help but marvel at how absolutely ridiculous it sounded.  Maybe he ought to inspect himself just to make certain that he wasn't bursting out in boils or having his firstborn slaughtered every night when he wasn't looking.

"Reckon an ancient curse is a possibility.  Sounds a bit overdramatic though, doesn't it?" he asked bemusedly.  "Next thing you know, there'll be mummies at the door and he'll be off to acquire a leather jacket." 

The thought of starring in his own personal B-movie was unfortunately far more appealing than it should be.  For not the first time in his life, Jonas promised himself that he'd make an effort to get out of the office more frequently.  When his life started devolving into self-narrated epic plots, it was time to find something better to occupy his spare moments.

Attempting to swallow his amusement, he took a moment to consider Ward's suggestion more seriously.  "Not any way to tell if that's the problem, is there?" he asked, his forehead creasing.  "I know you blokes like to poke needles into spare body parts sometimes.  Is there anything that you can't talk about on Level Nine that'd be able to tell him if he's dealing with a curse?"