Hamartia

*Chapter One: Kingfisher*

song: Z.TAO - CROWN

Chapter One: Kingfisher

Urwarghhghhh.

Her throat made an ogre-like gurgle, as she erupted in a burping mess after downing three consecutive glasses of bubbly champagne. She put a hand over her mouth but it didn't stop some nearby ladies from giving her a look of disgust, with their noses upturned, as they recoiled away from her and returning to their gossiping about some new bachelor or other.

Their voices seemed to overlap one another's. She sighed. She would have gotten up and apologised but she was exhausted after a long day at work sanding benches down to repaint them. She had a large stock collection of self-made furniture for the dressing of apartments and people's houses.

Peeling a strip of dry crimson paint off of her kneecap, she winced. She caught a part of the conversation, which had turned into judgements of her attire, and after that, only the high pitched squeals of the ladies tittering could be heard. Sighing again, she shrugged her shoulders. It was a bit last minute coming here anyways.

I really don't want to be here. Is Henry here? Maybe he's caught the one he's looking for, or maybe the man has left.

She hadn't wanted to come at all, and look at what agreeing to anything her brother told her gave her; people laughing at her and judgmental glares. Typical.

It was as if they had assumed she was there to steal the host for some reason or another, but she was only there as a favour. Besides, it wasn't her fault that the invitation had been on such short notice.

Having had a job, she had been at work, her part-time profession in interior design was seen as unbecoming of a young single woman - especially when she turned up to parties with late notice; dressed in paint covered overalls, a blue-green checked flannel shirt, and trainers.

I wish I was at home eating those crisps that I was saving, the cheese and cucumber ones...

However, despite her uncomfortable feelings, she had to admire the structure of the building, as whoever was hosting this party – she didn't actually know – had very good taste in grand places. She scratched at her arm desperately, as an urge to itch it called on her screamed into her ears like a wailing banshee.

Maybe it was a banshee.

Until she realised it was not her urge to scratch that was screaming but some flouncy dressed floozy, who was shaking her friend, by the shoulders, with definite anxiety painted over her face. Shifting her crossed legs to stand up, the interior designer looked over, her blonde wavy hair falling almost immediately into her line of vision.

She was worried about nothing.

No one seemed to be in danger. It was just a case of a champagne spillage, and melodramatics.

The news had her on edge. She sat back in her chair, her heart thumping louder in her chest. There was this undeniable sense of foreboding in the air that she couldn't, well, deny.

Just this morning, at around six whilst she had been listening to the radio on her way to work, there was a breaking news report and what she had heard left her shaken. A young girl, she thought her name was something like Ophelia Richards, the baker's sixteen year old daughter, was recently found dead. According to the report, she was laying in the woods, found by some passing man who was walking his dog.

Immediately, the woman knew she suspected the passing man. His dog may well have been a shapeshifter in disguise for all she knew. But the man had been cleared by the police, and word on the street was that the case had been passed from the police to a private investigation company heralded by some close friend of the council.