Interlude III
Kitty wished she had never accepted this job.
She had wished she had denied Torrington and his ridiculously high price. She wished she had turned around before the Potter boy had caught a good look at her face. She certainly wished that she had turned and run before she had found herself under the attention of an escaped Azkaban convict.
Regardless of what her father might have said, no amount of money was worth compromising her identity. While her name might be known to the Aurors, she had only escaped arrest by never being in the same place as the crimes that she had committed. While some of her victims had been able to point her out to law enforcement, they had never been able to stick anything to her.
Until now.
While she had fled before the Aurors could make it across the Thames, Maia Black had stolen her wand. While she had acquired another one rather easily from the wand shop in Diagon Alley, this left her in more danger than she had realised at the time. In the moment, she had been more concerned with protecting her reputation, which was why she hadn't gone to the British Headquarters of the Fallen Sun and acquired a wand from her comrades. It was only later that she realised that Ollivander would be able to account for her presence in London once the Potter boy told the Aurors that she had lost her wand.
It was such a rookie mistake.
Entering the Knight's Dusk at sunset, ironically enough, Kitty ignored the patrons' greetings as she made a hurried beeline for her father's office at the back. Normally, she would be more careful in her approach, not wanting to seem like a little girl who needed to run to her father's office whenever she needed help. She couldn't afford not to this time, as she really did need his help.
Kitty opened his door, speaking quickly as she did so. "Dad, I messed up. We need to-" She froze in the doorway as what she saw took the breath from her lungs.
There, sitting in his leatherback chair behind his mahogany desk, was her father. The Broker of the Fallen Sun. Or at least what remained of him.
Before Kitty could scream, she was silenced and dragged into the office with invisible ropes and the door closed itself behind her. Kitty couldn't even turn her head to see who had killed her father and restrained her, as the ropes bound her from head to toe, only leaving her mouth open so she could breathe.
From the shadowy corner of the room, a melodic voice spoke. "Forgive me, Katrina. I just didn't want you to alert the entire tavern. Not until I want them to be alerted that is." The woman stepped out of the shadows and into the light that was emitted from the fireplace. She was a small, petite witch, with long bright red hair and large blue eyes. She moved like she owned the room and spoke to Kitty in English, as though expecting her to immediately cater to her language preferences and not the other way around.
The moment the woman waved her wand at Kitty, lifting the Silencing Charm, she immediately began to demand answers. "Did you do this?" She realised what a stupid question that was even before the redhead scoffed and followed up with a veritable tsunami of curse words.
The redheaded killer sighed. "Now, is that anyway to speak to your employer?" When Kitty failed to answer with more than just graphic threats, the intruder twirled her wand so that Kitty was facing her father defiled corpse. Kitty let out a sob as she squeezed her eyes shut, but the killer didn't even allow her that much. She used a non-verbal spell to force her eyes open, so that she was forced to stare at the flies that were crawling over her skinned father's face.
"There, that wasn't so hard, was it?"
Kitty had already shed her pride when she had begun to weep openly in front her father's killer. "Why are you doing this?" She sobbed.
"My name is Renata Cushing." The murderer introduced herself, politely. "My subordinate hired you a week ago to track down and kill Harry Potter. You failed to do so."
Kitty screamed in frustration. "This is about him?!" Of all the jobs she had ever undertaken, she had regretted the last the most, and that was before she found out her father had been killed due to her failure. "Torrington never told me the boy knew how to fight! I sent three grown sorcerers after him and he left them all in such a bad state that they had to be taken to St. Mungo's Hospital. That is not a normal child!"
"Of course, he isn't normal." Renata tutted. "I wouldn't have felt it necessary to hire you otherwise."
"Why don't you just do it yourselves?" Kitty spat. "Too afraid of the one who killed your master?"
Renata's face twitched, but her cool expression returned so quickly that Kitty was certain that she had merely imagined it. "I thought Torrington had explained this to you." She sighed. "The Boy-Who-Lived is protected by magic that was left behind by his parents. It is still unknown if we, the servants of the Dark Lord, can touch him. Rather than risk losing what few capable followers he has left, the Dark Lord has seen fit to leave the problem in your hands." Renata narrowed her eyes now. "Which you will complete."
Kitty narrowed her eyes at her, trying to seem defiant even in her current position. "What makes you think I'll do anything for you, you demented bitch!"
"You won't be doing it for me! Oh no, you'll be doing it for Bartholomew." Kitty's eyes widened and Renata laughed. "You thought I didn't know about him? I choose my assets most carefully, Katrina."
"If you touch him, I'll-"
"You'll do nothing but complete the job that you were hired to do." Renata finished for her. "A warning to make your hunt a little fairer. The boy will have almost certainly found protection by now. You'll have to wait until he is alone to make your move."
Feeling defeated, Kitty asked, "Why should I be concerned with his protection detail?"
"Not a protection detail. A guardian." At Kitty unimpressed look, Renata added, "Don't underestimate him. Nicolas Flamel has been killing Rogues centuries before the first of your ancestors touched a wand."
"Lord Flamel." When she had first arrived at the tavern, she had believed that she could not feel more despondent about a job than she had at that moment. As she learned now, she had been very wrong. "How can you know that for sure?"
Renata began to make her way to the door. "Oh, I'm sure. After all, it has been foretold." She paused with her hand on the doorknob in order to rub salt in the wound one last time. "If it makes you feel any better, I used Legilimency on your father before I skinned him. He would have overlooked his prejudices about Muggles if you had told him about Bartholomew. It was a dream of his to live long enough to walk his only child down the aisle."
With that last verbal blow being dealt, Renata left the room, closing the door firmly behind her. She had failed to remove the spells that were restraining Kitty, so she was forced to stare at her father's corpse until Peter, the barkeep, broke down the door the next afternoon.