The Witch and The Hunters

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Page count: 14

Sam and Dean had left hours ago to hit the morgue and track down relatives of the victims. Hermione stayed behind—one of her tenants had reported strange noises in the walls.

Turned out to be a Doxy infestation.

Annoying, but easy enough.

She'd handled it in under an hour, cleaned the mess, soothed a panicked four-year-old who'd seen a winged blur zip past her bedroom door, and then returned to her own apartment. Since the brothers would be out for a while, she headed into her potions lab and stocked up—Pepper-Up, Blood-Replenishing, Bruise Balm, a few emergency anti-venoms. Time passed without her noticing.

It was almost seven when she sensed someone attempting to breach the wards of her floor.

Ah. Right. She'd forgotten to give the Winchesters access.

She went down, opened the door, and found both brothers looking mildly offended and mildly impressed at the golden runes pulsing on the wall.

"Sorry about that," she said as she let them in. "Forgot you didn't have the code—or the keycard. I'm the only one who can access this floor."

"Only apartment up here?" Dean asked, stepping inside and glancing around like someone expecting an ambush.

"Yes. The top floor is mine."

"How many apartments are in this place?" Sam asked, curiosity written all over him.

"There are twenty floors," Hermione said, leading them inside. "The ground floor has no apartments. The nineteenth floor is the House-elf floor. And each remaining level has between ten to sixteen flats. With magical expansion, the inside is bigger than the outside. Between two and five bedrooms."

She paused thoughtfully.

"I believe we have about two hundred sixty-six apartments total. Might be more. I'd have to ask Mimsy."

Both brothers choked.

Dean sputtered, "Two hundred and—Hermione, that's a small town."

"That's the point," she smiled. "I wanted somewhere magical families could raise their children safely. There are hidden rooms scattered all over the building. Some I don't even know the contents of. I asked the contractors to surprise me. It keeps the younger children occupied and allows them to safely explore."

Sam looked delighted. Dean looked horrified.

"I do know there's a broom-flying chamber and a familiar-training area," she continued. "And an indoor playground."

"You built Hogwarts 2.0," Dean muttered.

She ignored him. "So. What did you find?"

They sat at the kitchen table.

Sam opened the case file. "Each victim died differently. One strangled. One stabbed. One shot. One hanged. One pushed off a building."

Hermione frowned. "That's... messy."

"Yeah," Dean said. "But there's a pattern—mid-twenties, blonde hair, brown eyes, five-five or five-six, only children, and both parents dead. All taken from the same nightclub."

"And all found three days later," Sam added. "A couple of blocks from each other."

Dean leaned back. "Every friend and family member said the same thing: last seen leaving the club with a brown-haired, brown-eyed guy, around five-eleven."

Hermione tapped her fingers on the table. "Timeframe?"

"Victims disappear every four days," Dean said. "Bodies show up three days later. Which means—"