All was well in the small muggle town of Perlshaw, East Sussex. Until it wasn't.
Everything was normal to the inhabitants - it was a Saturday night and the bi-weekly film group was meeting in the hall attached to the church to watch Titanic - little Janey Sattler had been the name picked out of the hat at the previous showing, and so it was her turn to figure out what movie to watch. Titanic had been her mother's suggestion.
Across the road sat the White Swan Inn, and through the heavy oak doors out stumbled Nellie Mayden and her friends. The summer night's air hit them quickly, and alcohol-induced laughter. It had quite simply gotten far too busy and stuffy in there for Nellie to enjoy it any longer, and as half-past ten approached and the film club was nearing the end of it's meeting, the group of friends began their various ways home.
"I'll see you tomorrow Holly." Nellie smiled and rose her hand in a wave as she passed the very last cottage along that road and continued out onto her bush-lined path. Slowly, just like how the concentration of building had depleted, as did the number of glowing street lamps.
Nellie glanced behind her, deeming herself far enough away from the village as she pulled out a slender stick of wood from her bag. "Lumos." She muttered, and the blue-white light illuminated her way.
Some distance down the road, top-most roof illuminated against the purple-tinted sky (air pollution from the nearby town seemed to be getting even worse these days) was the Mayden Manor, where Nellie's husband was waiting for her return home.
Orson Mayden wasn't one to be awake at this time of night. He was far too old for gallavanting around town, although his younger wife wasn't - and who was he to stop her from seeing her friends, she had certainly put up with seeing many of his.
But given that his wife met up with her friends away from the house, the evenings in which she were gone had become his quiet time, when he could kick his feet up and watch that strange Muggle sport on the strange muggle contraption that showed moving pictures all whilst eating the remains of the chicken pie he and Nellie had shared the night before.
He was so engrossed in his game that he didn't hear the loud crack outside, didn't even see the sudden movement out of the corner of his eye. The trees and bushes of their elaborate garden fluttered uneasily although there was no need.
Orson wouldn't notice that there wasn't the sound of the clunky old brass doorknob as the door creaked open, barely even looking away from the TV. "Nellie? I didn't realise it had gotten so late."
He didn't get a reply, and taking one last forkful of the pie he paused the Muggle sports match and turned around in his chair. There was no sign of Nellie in the hallway, although there was the blue glow of the porch light flooding through into it.
"Nellie?" Orson repeated, moving the container onto the coffee table and standing up. "Did you really drink that much beer?" There was humour in his voice, expecting to find his wife leaning against the wall, head drooped.
Instead, he just found the open door and absolutely nothing else. Stepping outside, there was a sudden flash of darkness around the corner and he turned, something clicking in his head. "That dratted cat!" He exploded. He had come to the conclusion that Nellie had accidentally not closed the door properly and the cat had pushed it open.
"I knew that she fed it too much.. inviting it into our house and-" Orson had returned to the house, closing the door behind him - yet it seemed that there was something else, an odd flash of light suddenly in the kitchen.
Confused, the Mayden man stomped his way along the hallway, ruffling the rug that lay along the length of it suddenly not caring that his wife would have a go at him for it.
But reaching the kitchen, he found the same state as the doorway. Empty, completely void of anything that shouldn't be there. He didn't notice the shadow flicker behind him. But he did, this time, hear the crack that seemed to come from the living room.
"Alright.. who's there?" He called, voice as gruff as ever. "Nellie if that's you and-" He paused. The sound of cheering and the commentator could be heard - someone had turned the game on again.
Without a second thought, Orson began back towards the living room.
He stood in the doorway, eyes surveying the scene. He still couldn't see anything, and crept around to the coffee table, ready to reach for his wand that lay beside his plate.
Only that it had been snapped in half. And very suddenly, there was a sharp pain in his neck and his knees were crumpling.
"Good evening, Mr Mayden." A voice said in his ear as he fell to the ground. The sound of the knife being pulled from his neck was audible over the noise of the TV, and blood dripped onto the carpet as Orson struggled to clasp onto the arm of his chair.
"What-" He gurgled, air catching in her throat and hands clawing desperately. "Who-"
"Oh, you don't know me." The voice continued, moving around to stand in front of him. A girl appeared in his lidded eyeline, crouching down as she wiped the knife of his blood. "I suppose you're not going to wish me a good evening are you. Oh well, pleasantries are normally wasted whilst doing this, you would know, wouldn't you? I suppose Voldemort wouldn't have used you as much in the second war - getting old, aren't you?"
"How did you.." Orson coughed, blood spilling down his chin. "Why?"
"Because you lied, Mr Mayden. You got away with the horrific crimes you committed. Twice." The girl chuckled humourlessly, sliding the gleaming knife into the strap around her leg. The elaborately decorated handle still poking out. "You can't get out of that, even if the Ministry believes in important technicalities, small little things like actually having evidence."
"But you know you did it, don't you? You know the crimes that you so willing went along with." The girl was shaking her head slowly, hair falling across her face and quickly being pulled back behind her ear by a lace-covered hand.
Jewellery was illuminated against the netted pattern, and Orson let his eyes take it in, hoping that somehow he would survive this. The girl watched him, tongue running against her pointed molars.
"Crucio."
His gaze was dragged away in an instance, eyes screwed shut as the excruciating pain flowed through his body like a river crashing through a valley and bursting it's banks during a storm.
"That's what it feels like, if you ever wondered what pain you were causing to your victims." The girl continued, the wand in her hand playing through her fingers as if she were in a lesson, not on the way to murdering someone. "That's how it should work, right? Whatever you did to them that was so, so bad should happen to you. At least that's how I see it."
"I.." Mr Mayden couldn't say anything, chest heaving up and down as he even attempted to get out words, every inch of him burning in pain.
"No protests against it? Well I do have to say I'm surprised." The girl was crouching down again, but before she got out any other words there was sound from outsides and she disappeared out of his vision.
Nellie Mayden bustled through the front door, drunken stance dissipated in the cooling night air. "Hasn't the football finished yet, dear?" She asked, barely any slur to her words. Just like Orson, Nellie didn't recieve a reply.
The woman didn't even remove her shoes, hurrying towards the living room, expecting to find her husband asleep in the chair. She didn't see him at first either, just the slowly growing pool of blood.
"Shit!" She exclaimed, rushing to her husband's side and trying so hurriedly to find the wound and stop the bleeding. "Orson - darling it's okay, I'm here!" She cried when seeing her husband's glassy eyes.
"Behind.." He managed to mutter, weak voice dying once again.
"Behind - Orson, what? Behind?" Nellie asked, eyes widening as it finally pushed through her blurred thoughts and she looked behind her, seeing nothing but the light in the hallway.
"Oh Nellie, if only you had stayed for one more pint." A voice sang, an element of sadness growing between the words. Nellie's head shot forward, seeing a girl crouched in front of her, smiling. "Then you wouldn't have come home and find your husband on the brink of death. But now, they're going to find you laying right beside him."
"What do you want?" The woman gasped, eyeing the wand in her hand and knife by her thigh. "We have money! I have money.. it's - it's in the vault behind our beds.. there's some in that picture frame or - or."
"This isn't a burglary, Nellie." The shadow stepped towards her, something glinting threatningly against the black. "This isn't something you can just pay off and not actually suffer for. This isn't something you can throw money at and expect it to be alright."
"Why are you doing this?" The woman sobbed, her husband limp in her arms. "What did we do!"
"Nellie, Nellie." The girl shook her head. "You didn't do anything but.. your husband's a Death Eater, didn't you know? He has to pay for the crimes he committed. And because you saw me, you'll have to suffer too."
"They'll find you - they track wands that have used the Unforgiveable Curses." Nellie gasped, hatred in her eyes echoing into her voice.
"Oh I know." The girl was grinning now. "Weasley Wizard Wheezes has some extraordinarily realistic fake wands, you know?" She shook her head, reaching for the broken wand on the table and pocketing it. "This isn't my wand. Oh no, this wand belongs to Orson Mayden."
Nellie squeaked, eyes wide. There was no getting out of it now. "We have money, lots of money!" She managed to get out again. "You can have all of it - the key to our vault and everything."
"You're getting annoying now." The girl rolled her eyes, standing straight and pointing the wand at the woman. "And I'm going to kill you."
Green light flashed, curse uttered.
"Killed by her own husband, who then kills himself seconds later." The girl looked down and met Orson's barely open eyes. "That's all they can get from the wand. Because now I'm going to kill you."
Orson gurgled, trying to get some last minute plea out. His wife was slumped on his shoulder, completely still and pressing against the wound in his neck and pain continued to numb him.
"Avada Kedavra."
Green light flashed in the living room again, and with a gloved finger, the girl spelt out a name in the blood. Then a crack and she was gone.
The Ministry would be all over the scene within hours, when the first employee arrived at work and saw that alert on the use of the three Unforgiveable Curses and tell everyone else.
This was the first of many, and she couldn't afford to get caught by hanging around the scene of the crime.
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