The Atrium of the Ministry of Magic was a huge, vaulted dome that towered above all petitioners, workers and visitors. Its high ceiling was normally a bright, peacock blue but, in the middle of the night, the lights were lowered, the letters that usually passed across the high ceiling were missing and the staff were absent.
The whole, massive area was silent as Hermione stepped cautiously forwards, heading for the lifts at the far end. No alarms had gone off, no outcry had been raised. So far so good, she thought.
Pansy had been right, of course. There were things about the hits they had been given, in the last few months, that didn't add up. Some strange names and unusual places. All orders had born the seal and signature of the Minister and the Head of the Auror Office though, so they hadn't questioned their validity. Now though, in the circumstances, Hermione felt that she should follow up on Pansy's hints.
She just hoped she wasn't walking into a trap, set by the skilled assassin.
The Atrium was very quiet and Hermione kept her wits about her as she stepped into the lift, pressing the button for Level 2: Department of Magical Law Enforcement. The lift door closed rapidly and the car lifted itself into the air, carrying Hermione upwards.
After a short ride the doors opened into the dimly lit corridor. Hermione checked both ways, slipping out and along the wall to the right, stopping at the corner to look for any movement. In front of the heavy oak doors was an Auror, sat behind a desk: the night watchman.
He was asleep, head lolled back and resting against the wall. As Hermione approached though she saw that he wasn't asleep voluntarily. A large bruise was developing on his left temple.
Alert for trouble Hermione stepped closer to the doors. Silence was all that greeted her and no charms, wards or other defensive magic had been placed on the entrance. She frowned, knowing that there was always something on the door, if only to announce the person entering and register them, in case of later issues. There was nothing however.
This, combined with the—clearly—silent take down of the guard indicated one of her fellows; but which one? And why?
Wand gripped tightly, Hermione stepped into the Auror Office, looking around at the empty and darkened cubicles, poster, maps and the like, stuck to the walls. Investigation boards with notes and clippings from the Daily Prophet lined the walkways and meeting areas. Nothing moved.
With more confidence than she felt, Hermione walked towards the far doors and the corridor that led to Draco's office. Nothing stopped her or interfered with her in any way. Reaching the doors she once more paused and listened, and when certain all was clear, she pushed the door open.
Behind her, at the entrance, there was a scrape, as if of a boot on wood and Hermione spun, wand raised, ready to strike.
A figure stood in the doorway, a woman, making as if to leave, but looking back over towards Hermione. The hilt of a sword jutted above her shoulder and the dark-haired woman nodded once, before stepping out of the office without a sound.
Hermione smiled and stepped through the door, heading quickly for Draco's office. She found the door unlocked, partially open and undefended. Praying that she wasn't being played by the secretive woman, Hermione entered the cool interior, moving straight to the filing cabinets to the left of the room.
It did not take her long to find the files she was looking for. No matter what she thought of Draco, he ran a tight ship and his filing was ordered to the point of anal. Spreading them out on the large desk, Hermione began to search, casting a small charm on the door to the main Auror office to alert her for any other intruders.
In short order she began to piece together the pieces that Pansy had hinted at. There it was; the proof that he had betrayed the Ministry. Taken everything he had been given, everything he had worked for, and then cheated, lied and murdered his way to still more.
Several kills were clearly genuine cases and Hermione set these aside. The rest, a pile of over thirty missions all had two things in common. The target's tenuously proven guilt and the assets that became Ministry property upon their death—whether it was because of their Dark nature, their value, or the lack of relatives to inherit it.
Lots of extremely valuable items, wands, artefacts, potions, money… all of it pouring into the Ministry and into a separate vault at Gringotts to be investigated. Every single piece had been inspected and signed for by one person.
Oliver Wood.
His signature covered everything in these files, always above Kingsley's name, signed per procurationem. Hermione shook her head and continued reading, a half smile on her lips as she found more evidence. It was skilfully hidden but she soon had everything gathered together; if this information got out, every single person involved would burn.
The witch began to put the files back again, those that didn't pertain to the conspiracy that is; those, she was taking with her. There was no way Hermione could leave them here.
Halfway through, she paused, realising that a scrap of paper had got wedged in the side of the drawer, amongst the runners. Gently she pulled it free, seeing it covered in a familiar, flowing script: Lavender's handwriting.
J. F-F
Department of Chemistry
Gordon Street
Lo
The rest of the address had been torn off but it didn't matter. That made sense at last, Hermione mused. She had wondered how they had got hold of the dimethylmercury. Looked like Lavender had kept in touch with—or, more likely, tracked down—an easily manipulated Muggleborn and used him to get some of the lethal neurotoxin from a Muggle chemistry laboratory. Or tortured him till he helped. How the poor Hufflepuff had managed it and if he even still lived, Hermione didn't know, but it was another mystery solved.
Waving her wand over the files, she shrunk them down to miniature size and popped them into a pocket. Tidying the office, Hermione walked quickly out again, heading for the lift. At the lift she paused, eyeing the doors in surprise.
A large arrow, pointing towards the ceiling, was drawn in dark purple lipstick. A message from Pansy, no doubt. Could she mean…? After some moments of internal debate she pressed the button for Level 1 and headed up towards the upper level.
The thick, purple carpets, muffled her rapid footsteps as she headed, knife drawn and held point down, towards the office at the far end. At the last minute she turned aside from the Minister's office and kicked open another door, striding through the large chamber. Rows and rows of desks lined the room to her left but she ignored them, heading instead for the only door on the right. The little plaque said: Oliver Wood – Senior Undersecretary to the Minster for Magic.
With a solid kick the door splintered in the middle and the occupant of the large chair, behind the highly polished desk, sat up with a start. Before Oliver could do more than stammer her name, Hermione had grabbed him by the collar and dragged him across the desk, throwing him to the floor.
As he struggled to stand Hermione kicked him in the ribs, lifting him from the ground and stealing his breath. He lay on the floor, waving at her to stop as he gasped and wheezed.
"Good evening, Mr Undersecretary," Hermione said, pleasantly, crouching down beside the stricken wizard, knife resting against his throat. "Did you miss me?"
"Hermione," he managed after a moment, "why… what…?"
"We need to talk, Mr Wood." Grabbing his collar again, she hauled him to his feet and pushed him through the open door, into the open plan office filled with desks.
Oliver staggered away, catching himself against one of the chairs. "Hermione, wait! Whatever it is you want I'm sure we can sort everything out."
He tried to duck but he wasn't quick enough to avoid the right hook that spun him and knocked him off his feet. "Should have kept up your Quidditch, Oliver. You're getting slow."
The man groaned in pain, lying on his back as Hermione walked up to him. Without a word, or change in her expression, the witch grabbed his ankle, lifted his leg, and slammed her heel down on Oliver's kneecap. The sickening crunch was partially hidden behind the deafening scream of pain.
Ignoring the man's cries, she flicked her wand, hooking a blue rope of magic around his ankle. He found himself being dragged towards the far end of the room where, over the balustrade, one could look all the way down to the floor of the Atrium.
"What are you doing? Hermione!?" Wood stammered, desperately trying to retrieve his wand from the pocket of his jacket, as he slid along the floor.
"So what was the plan, Wood? I believe there was a plan?" Hermione didn't slow, didn't even look at him, just twirling her long knife through her fingers, still casually dragging him along.
"Hermione, please. Don't do this, I'm begging you!" He wrenched his wand from his pocket.
"Expelliarmus," Hermione cried, the disarming charm pulling the wand from his hand. He gave a cry of anguish as the bushy-haired witch snatched it from the air. With swift, decisive movements, Hermione snapped the wand between her hands and threw the pieces over the balcony.
Oliver slumped to the floor in defeat as he stared at the wand tip, aimed between his eyes.
"Did you want to go get it back, Oliver? No? Well, here's what we're going to do. You're going to talk to me and you're going to tell me the truth. If I'm not satisfied with your answers, you get to go fetch your wand."
"I had nothing to do with the Minister's death, Hermione!"
"Well, see that's wrong, straight away," Hermione said, shaking her head in disappointment and lifting a finger. "I'd be careful what I said next, if I were you."
"The Minister wasn't supposed to die! Honestly, I never wanted Kingsley to die… just become ill enough to retire, to step down early. That's what was supposed to happen!"
"Ahh, now we're getting to it. So what went wrong? Kingsley was going to die, even if someone hadn't slit his throat for him."
"I don't know… no, no, honestly, I don't!" Oliver panicked slightly as Hermione began to lift a second finger. "I didn't know he was going to die. Him dying would bring too much attention onto us. He was going to get sick and then retire, that's all that was supposed to happen. It was going to take a few months, a year at most…"
"'Us?' You mean you and Draco? And Lavender, of course."
Oliver was wide eyed, shocked at how much Hermione seemed to know. "How…?"
"Just because I'm asking a question, don't assume I don't already know the answer." The witch gave Oliver's broken leg a little kick, eliciting a groan of pain. "Now talk."
The injured man began to speak, details spilling out of him about his terrible gambling debts, brought about by extremely poor decisions, made over Quidditch matches; the money Draco leant him to place his large bet on the last World Cup; the plan to recover his loses with artefacts and the Minister's job; Draco holding his leash.
When he paused to breathe Hermione spoke over him. "The only problem with that plan, my sweet, is that everything that was coming in… all those wonderfully valuable artefacts and whatnot? They're all in your name. Draco's name doesn't feature anywhere on many of the official documents. I know, I checked."
Oliver gaped, his thoughts seeming to abandon him, as he took in what Hermione was saying.
"You're in very serious trouble here, Oliver. With the Minister out of the way, you no doubt hoped to step up and become the new Minister, with the full backing of the Head of the Aurors. But, unfortunately, you have a devious and sneaking Slytherin for a co-conspirator, just waiting in the wings. And he has all the evidence he needs to put you away forever, and in the process claim the job he's wanted for a long, long time."
"No, Draco wouldn't… why would he do that?"
"You need more of a reason than 'because he's a sneaking, devious little shit who wants that job'? He is bitter, angry and resentful, and in you he found a desperate little scapegoat that he can lock up and reap all the benefits." Hermione flicked her hair over her shoulder and crouched down so that she was level with Oliver, the long blade of her knife resting over her knees. "As long as Kingsley didn't die suspiciously, your plan would work fine, and Draco's would have followed swiftly after. Now though... a vicious murder, whilst in his office... Well, that just brings a whole different set of questions, and much closer scrutiny." Hermione stood, walking towards the balcony. "Now Draco has to keep you around, so he can deflect the blame, if he has to. But if someone found the pen…"
Oliver looked up, fear in his eyes warring with hope. "You've got it? You've got the pen?"
"No," Hermione said, "the pen is somewhere safe. I took it from the Minister shortly after his death so that it could be used against the one who had planted it." Walking back towards the fallen Gryffindor, Hermione smiled coldly. "But that was you wasn't it? It was the same pen you had on you, all those months ago. You told me it was for Draco, but then I saw Kingsley using it. Two and two, does tend to keep making four."
"You took the pen from…?"
Hermione ignored him, speaking over him. "You can help bring Draco down though, Oliver. I have a plan that will ensure that all of the evidence gets to the right people and it exposes Draco for the sneaking, lying snake that he is."
"How?"
"You're not going to enjoy it," she said, as Oliver struggled to sit upright, trying and failing to stand. "Your name will be dragged through the mud too, but I will do my best to ensure that there is enough evidence to show that Draco was the man behind the plot, him and the Ice Queen both. That they poisoned the Minister with a Muggle compound, obtained by Lavender Brown, smeared on a pen that you procured for them. That they used you and planned to kill you or arrest you, after you had taken up the post of Minister. All so Draco could claim it for himself as the 'rightful' successor. You would be an accessory but I can help you avoid going to Azkaban for it."
"Okay, but how do you propose to do that?" Oliver shuffled closer to Hermione, one hand held out, imploringly.
The brief flash of the blade was all he saw in reply, before a terrible burning sensation began in his shoulder and neck. Lifting an unsteady hand, he felt the hilt of Hermione's long knife, jutting out at the point where his torso and neck met. He coughed, a squirt of blood dribbling over his lips. A bright red spray of arterial blood flooded between his trembling fingers as he struggled for breath. His lungs were bubbling as he tried to breathe.
Hermione crouched down in front of him, barely visible through his dimming eyesight. He felt her warm hand on his and her voice, coming from miles down a dark tunnel, washed over him.
"The same way I helped Kingsley start to expose this conspiracy in the first place."
Hermione pulled him onto her lap, holding him close; whispering comfortingly to him, as his life's blood seeped and squirted between his fingers. She held him gently, until Death closed his eyes forever.
ACTING-MINISTER FOR MAGIC MURDERED!
Rogue Hit-Witch Strikes Again As Conspiracy Is Revealed!
Senior Undersecretary and Acting Minister for Magic, Oliver Wood, was found dead today, killed by rogue hit-witch, Hermione Granger. His body was found in the Atrium at Ministry of Magic headquarters, floating in the fountain. This is her second savage murder on Ministry grounds. The wickedly sharp knife that ended Wood's life, conclusively identified as Hermione Granger's, had stabbed his throat and cut the Acting Minister's life short in a brutal display of violence.
More terrible than this, dear readers, is that he was surrounded by files; each containing details of assassinations and kidnappings, perpetrated by a team of secret Hit-Witches and Wizards, the names of whom are unknown at this time. Referred to only by aliases, the six man team has been working secretly for several years, right under our noses!
As shocking as the twin revelations of Oliver Wood's death and the discovery of a team of murderers are, it is nothing compared to the deeper conspiracy revealed in the documentation found by senior investigators!
Draco Malfoy, Head of the Auror Office and leader of the secret band of assassins, has been taken into custody for conspiracy to defraud the Ministry, to murder the Minister and to profit from the cold-blooded killing of magical citizens…
Shifting in her seat, feet up on the patio table, the dark-haired woman continued to read the newspaper article, peering briefly over her sunglasses and murmuring her thanks, as a large glass of cider was placed in front of her by a waiter.
Her companion, stood with his back to her, muscular arms folded across his expansive chest, gazed stoically out onto the small beer garden at the back of the quaint village pub. A gently babbling stream ran through the centre of the lawn, a sturdy wooden bridge crossing it. All around the lawn were scattered tables with long benches attached. Most were empty, with only a couple of Muggles out in the later afternoon sunshine, enjoying a pint.
"So," he said, gruffly, "now what?"
"All in good time, cub, all in good time." The woman took a sip of her drink and gave a small laugh as she continued to read. "Clever girl."
Marcus looked over his shoulder, his handsome face twisted in annoyance. "Clever? She killed Wood. You do realise that she most likely killed Kingsley as well, right?"
Pansy lowered her paper and tipped her sunglasses with a lazy gesture. "Kingsley Shacklebolt was a dead man walking, the moment he picked up his shiny new pen. If she did help him along then it wasn't much of a journey. She had her reasons… and probably the blessing of her victim, if I read things right."
Marcus shook his head. "I don't know why everyone is always so bloody cryptic, or why you won't tell me what you know. We've already laid our cards on the table, Pansy, by not turning up when we were called. Lavender's already busted Draco out of Azkaban and Blaise is with them too. Pretty sure we're both fucked, so you may as well level with me."
"Not as fucked as we would have been if we had answered Lavender's call," Pansy said, turning her attention back to the paper. "If we can keep hidden then the public will forget about us in time."
Marcus gave a bitter laugh. "They've got the files, Pans. They'll figure out who we are pretty quickly. Draco won't forgive us for betraying him. And the bitch who started all this has up and scarpered as well! She causes this complete shit storm and then…"
He paused suddenly, his sharp eyes catching sight of an unusual creature in the river and Pansy looked up, catching his mood. Looking towards the stream she felt a wide grin on her face as something pulled itself out of the water and scrambled up the bank. "Now," she said stowing the paper in the small satchel, sat beside her chair and standing smoothly. "Now we're getting somewhere."
The small, blue Patronus bounded along the path, shaking water and sparks of magic from its fur and tail as it did so. Reaching Pansy and Marcus, it stopped and stood up on its hind legs, leaning its head to the side.
"Hello kitten," the assassin purred, crouching down to tickle the otter under the chin. "You ready to talk now?"
The End…?
Notes: Thank to my recipient for her awesome prompts, not that I would have expected any less. I hope I have managed to interpret your prompt in a way that you will enjoy :) Thanks also to my esteemed team of Alpha and Beta readers: Ladies, you all know who you are. In many ways, I couldn't have done this without you. And last, but not least, to MM: for trusting me with this and for giving me the chance (albeit a bit last minute! lol) to write for a fellow author that I admire very much indeed.
Original Prompt: Hermione is an Investigative Auror or Hit Witch, who is accused of a crime she may or may not have committed (intrigue pls!). She goes to [insert name here] for help, a colleague/counterpart she has a history with beyond what appears on the surface. Said character may or may not be someone she can trust, potential for much double crossing. Can be dark, humorous, or somewhere in between.