Time was running out.
Hermione knew it with every pore in her body. Every unassuming tick of the second hand on the mantelpiece inched her closer and closer to being found. The perspiration that coated Hermione's fingers made the lock-picks slippery as she fiddled with the keyhole. If Hermione were any calmer, she would use her barely trained magic. It had taken some time for her to reach the level she had, every step had been a struggle with her wild magic, but it would be useful when she was older and her magic had settled down, or at least that was what one of the wizard assassins in their guild had said.
The urging voices of her parents in Hermione's mind only made her fumble a little more. This was her first mission alone. Her parents would be extremely disappointed if she weren't able to complete it because every other mission had gone so smoothly. Not to mention that it would be extremely embarrassing for her parents, the best assassins in their guild, to have a daughter who wasn't as good especially since Hermione had magic as well. The wizard assassins were always a higher level than their non-magical counterparts.
Hermione sighed in relief as the lock finally clicked. It was nearing one in the morning, and Hermione knew that her target, or his son, woke up for a late snack at that time. The target was a walrus-sized man with a son that seemed to be a miniature version of himself. In fact, the entire family seemed like a family of humans who resembled animals. The man's wife resembles a horse with her long neck, not to mention her continuously pinched expression.
There was that odd, raven-haired boy, who looked to be around her age, she sometimes saw in the house who resembled none of the other family members. He seemed to live there, but Hermione never saw any movement in the last bedroom of the house. She never saw anyone leave the house either, which was puzzling as Hermione had already mapped the entire house out and there was no other place for a person to sleep.
The person who had asked the guild to take care of this man had some sort of personal grievance against this man. That was all Hermione's parents had told her, so that was all she needed to know. The guild had clearly believed it to be reason enough, and that was good enough for Hermione. Besides, if this were successful, she would finally be able to graduate to a senior apprentice before she was sent off to Hogwarts next year.
The door swung open silently. The conveniently placed clock told her that she had half an hour before anyone awoke. While Hermione would have liked to have more time so she could see if she could clean up, she knew that the time would be sufficient.
Hermione was about to start creeping up the stairs, when she heard sniffing coming from below it. It was a muffled sound that Hermione would have missed had she not been trained as rigorously as she was.
Temporarily abandoning the stairs with a frown, Hermione headed for the barely visible door that led to the area under the stairs. She couldn't imagine that there would be someone under here, but there was possible way of mistaking that sound for something else. Hermione had heard it enough in the first week after new recruits were brought in.
Carefully sliding the look open, Hermione opened the door. The sound of hurried shuffling greeted her, although she didn't think there was too much space to shuffle back into, before there was silence once again.
It took Hermione several minutes to find the thin string of the light. The light revealed the raven-haired boy she had often wondered about. His eyes widened at the sight of her, but Hermione put her fingers to her lips motioning for him to remain silent as her disgust for the family sleeping upstairs grew.
She, truly, could not fail this mission now. Seeing this boy, with that sickening look of hopelessness and terror in his eyes, Hermione knew that killing the family upstairs had taken more of a personal edge this time.
"Don't worry. I'm going to take you away from here, and you'll never have to return," Hermione promised, eyes glinting. "Just gather your things, I have some unfinished business with some people."
Hermione watched as the boy nodded quickly, relief filling his expression, momentarily wondering if her parents would be accepting of what she had just done. She didn't have a lot of time after her little detour, which meant that she had to speed the entire process up; not that it was difficult with all the targets being asleep.
She dealt with the boy first. It had been clear from the weeks she had been watching this house, that his parents did everything he said without complaint. The spare bedroom was clearly his, and the boy could easily have convinced his parents to allow the raven-haired boy to sleep on a bed in a proper bedroom at the very least. The boy was dead before he could even flail.
The actual target and his wife would be a bit trickier: both were light sleepers who could wake at the slightest sound. If one were to make a sound, the other would wake and cause problems. Hermione shrugged: it didn't make too much of a difference, it could always be played of as a bunch of robbers who had panicked and killed everyone.
"Ladies first," Hermione muttered in dark amusement, slipping over to the side of the bed with the smaller bump. The limited amount of light coming from the window was enough to tell the gender of whoever was below the sheets, if the sound of the man's snores hadn't given if away first. The woman didn't even let out a cry as she entered the netherworld.
The gasp from the door way startled Hermione into dropping her knife. It clattered to the ground and the large form on the other side of the bed. Hermione saw the boy's eyes widen in fear as he watched the form shift and move.
Scrabbling for her weapon, Hermione wasn't able to pull the boy from the man's line of sight and watched as his face began turning red.
"Boy! What is the meaning of this?"
The boy shook his head fearfully as he visibly shook, taking half a step back. The man lunged for the boy, not noticing Hermione's presence in the room, nor the fact that his wife was unmoving on her slowly dampening half of the bed.
Hermione threw the knife, hoping that it stopped the man in time and not caring that the action left her with no weapon should she have missed. She hated that look of fear and panic on the boy's expression, knowing that no one that young should know such emotions.
The blade grazed the man, but that had been enough to draw his attention away from the boy as Hermione had hoped. Her body was moving before the man had completely turned around to find the source of the flying object.
She swept the man's feet out from under him, the movement taking more effort than Hermione had expected. Hermione yelped as the man grabbed a clump of her hair, yanking her down with him. She wished she had listened to her mother to tie her hair up. Hermione hit every single pressure point her short arms could reach, until one finally managed to make the man release his hold on her.
Hermione rolled away from the man just as a sharp kick to his side made him grunt. Glancing up, she realised it was the boy that kicking the man. She was momentarily shocked by the amount of hatred and anger she saw on the boy's face.
Grabbing her knife, she put an end to the man's suffering, but the boy didn't stop kicking him.
Cautiously, Hermione walked up to the boy.
"He's dead, you know."
"I know, but I had to get everything out. You were serious about me never returning here?"
Hermione nodded.
"I'm Hermione. You are?"
"Harry."
"Nice to meet you, Harry. Let's go."
Written for Little League: Slytherin Beater 2 [crime]
Prompts: experience (word); time was running out (opening sentence); keyhole (word)