Disclaimer: I am not Jonathan Stroud. Period. So I don't own anything by him. Period. Since I am sick of repeating this word, I am off to write my first ever one shot, grammatical errors and all.

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Her green eyes were alive with fury. They shot emerald sparks at the retreating figure of John Mandrake. He would do this to her time and again. She never learned. Oh yes, he was intelligent. Brilliant. Probably that is why. He knew what to do, when to do it.

She was putty in his hands, and she hated that. She shed some of her temper on the cherry wood door of her study and slammed it hard as she banged it shut.

Her anger dimmed as she read some more information on torturing djinn. Tricky creatures they were. The first chance they'd get, the last chance of one's survival. Her thoughts drifted to this afternoon in the Byzantine garden.

He had come in his ridiculously tight black suit and intercepted her. Oh no, not like others who tried too hard, or too little. He came inches next to her and stepped back. He then gave a thin-lipped smile and a small bow, so characteristic of him. All in a matter of seconds. The closeness unsettled her and his slightly musky cologne gave its trace to the air around her nostrils. So boyish. She snorted as turned a page.

She couldn't help but recall how his eyes traveled down her newly acquired form in his so called elegant gesture. As if satisfied, he stepped back and gave an appraising smile. His lips pouted slightly and then parted as the corners of his mouth stretched into the human gesture of a neutral greeting.

To the guests, who had little understanding of his twisted mind, saw it as the by-play of his extreme courteousness. They didn't see the predatory look in his dark eyes. They didn't see his quiet confirmation of something he already knew, right when he was eleven years old, trailing behind his master.

She remembered how he had looked at her, two years ago at he Prime Ministers Ball. His eyes, fathomless orbs that they were, drew in knowledge from everywhere. The Hall. The important people. The smart coats. The hard, crystalline charm which magicians exuded. And then they fell on her.

She felt his eyes on her, as they followed her across the hall and then blinked away as they snatched all information from her, without consent. She wondered if it was then, that they-- he saw the real Jane Farrar. Insecure, ambitious, pretty and above all-- an actor. The one who could emote and make the other person feel as if what she faked were real. But, even so, she felt as if he knew, he knew, that they were not.

He saw that ambitious but diffident magician. He saw that beautiful but unsure girl. He saw that dangerously charming but inwardly trembling girl. Her eyes brimmed with hot, angry tears as she recalled again, with a wince, how she jumped at the tidbits of information he gave to her. The flick of his parting bow was laced with derision. You try so hard, he said, unsaid.

She threw the book aside and looked into her mirror. Tears were streaking her flushed face and she gave a tiny sob and clutched the tiny dressing-table. Despite this provocation, her anger was at something else. Something else entirely.

She felt exposed. She felt as if she was being watched. The voyeur Mandrake was observing, savoring. But then she liked it. Everywhere she felt his challenge, his bait to provoke her. She liked it. It was sick, the way she felt powerful, when his eyes showed naked want. For her. To be with her.

After all, she could also see how that she had something which did threaten his safe idea of age. She brought the thoughts of a man and planted them in his colorless, soft intelligence. So childish. She wanted that childish mind to rake her again and become what he had to. A man. A magician. She could also become a woman that way. She could wait for that. In this world or another, she only needed that touch. Of magic.

If she was putty in his hands, she was the only one who could make him sculpt. She knew he had ideals, she didn't. She had ambition, he had dreams. In derision or desire, her difference from him was the factor which drew him.

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Please, Please review. I've tried one-shot for the first time and let me know what you think. Whether it was good, bad or simply unreadable. All criticisms and ideas welcomed.