A/N: For the Mount Potter Competition (word count: 654, with fifty words leeway) and the Sherlock Competition (Part 2, Prompt 1: write about someone who is having a bit of an emotional breakdown).
I.
It's still like a dream, a nightmare from which she can't seem to wake. Nothing feels real anymore.
Her mother is dead. Gone. Murdered.
Hannah digs her nails into her wrist, trying to shock her senses back to reality. She barely even registers the pain.
II.
Her father sits across from her at dinner, picking at his food without eating.
"Do they know who did it?" Hannah asks quietly.
He looks up at her, brows knitting together. "Death Eaters, dear."
Hannah shakes her head. "I meant which one did it," she clarifies, pushing her untouched plate to the side, her appetite nonexistent.
"No."
Nodding, she excuses herself and climbs to her feet.
She had hoped for names, though she hadn't truly expected it. If only she could put a face to the source of her grief. But she will have to settle for hating all the Death Eaters even more now.
III.
Hannah stares at her mother's body, tears stinging her eyes.
She looks like she's asleep, lost forever in a world of dreams. Any moment now, she'll wake up and hug Hannah, apologize for dozing off and worrying her.
"Wake up," Hannah urges, resting her hand on her mother's marble-cold cheek.
But she doesn't move. She'll never move again, and Hannah will never feel her warm embrace.
IV.
She sends her books flying, crashing against the wall. There's a satisfying tinkle of glass as one book shatters a window.
"Hannah!"
Her father bursts into the room without knocking. Hannah doesn't acknowledge him as she grabs a shoe and hurls it against a wall.
"Hannah, stop!" His arms wrap around her, and she turns to face him, burying her face in his shoulder.
"I want her back!" she cries, sobbing and clinging to him as she had when she was a small child. "I want to kill whoever did this!"
Her words are so unlike her. She isn't sure if she truly means them, but the thought is too sweet. It's only fair, after all.
He strokes her hair and kisses the top of her head. "Don't ever say that," he says firmly. "You are better than that."
"I don't want to be better than that! I want everything to be okay again!"
"Do you really think another death will make everything better?" her father asks, pulling back and resting his hands gently on her shoulders.
"Yes."
With a sigh, he shakes his head and lets her go. He points his wand at her window. "Reparo. Get some sleep, Hannah."
V.
The battle wages, and Hannah is ready. She's been waiting for the tables to turn, for her chance to right the wrongs.
A Death Eater blocks her path, and he grins wickedly at her. "Oh, good. I can kill the brat, too," he sneers, pointing his wand at her.
Hannah clinches her jaw at his words, her own wand raising.
"Going to fight? Your mother didn't," he laughs.
She feels anger warm her blood. The Killing Curse is heavy on her tongue, and she knows she will mean it. He killed her mother. It's only right that she kills him.
"Want to know what her last words were?"
Hannah takes a deep breath.
"She cried out for you."
Two words. One curse. It should be easy. But she can't. "Stupefy!"
He falls, and she runs.
VI.
"I could have killed him," she says as her father prepares tea.
"Did you?"
"No."
She watches a faint smile curl his lips. "Why not?"
"Because whatever happened to him, it wouldn't bring Mum back," she answers sadly. "His death isn't justice."
Her father pours the tea and sets the cup in front of her. "I'm proud of you."
She almost smiles. She just hopes her mother would be proud, too.