Hermione couldn't sleep. With the way this war was turning out she kept expecting to hear terrible news, and it caused nothing but tossing and turning in her bed. She decided then to pace. When pacing stopped working she silenced the bedroom and transfigured a chair into a sparring buddy. If she was going to be awake she had might as well practice her offensive magic. That was how Draco and Blaise found her when they came back after two in the morning. Poor Blaise nearly got a curse to the chest.

"One hit here was enough, thanks," Blaise grumbled.

"Sorry," Hermione mumbled sheepishly. "How'd it go?"

"It went well," Draco smiled. "One Deatheater down, more to go."

"Good. If we can take out another one within the next two days that would be great."

"Avery would be a good shot if he gets offed tomorrow night," Blaise offered. "He's out of the country after that and won't be missed."

Hermione nodded and made a reminder to herself to tell Neville and Fleur about Avery at breakfast. It was then that she realized Blaise was holding something and she gulped.

"I see you've got the wands."

Blaise looked down at his hands. He was carrying his small box full of wands and vividly remembered how unsettled she'd been around it. With a gentle sigh he placed it on the nearby bureau.

"Take however many you think you'll need," Blaise told her before mumbling something about being hungry and heading to the kitchen. Draco wasn't oblivious to his best friend's behavior, and so with one glance at Hermione he followed him after she gave a nod.

Hermione was alone now with the box and her heart was heavy. Inside represented death, and she had no desire to look inside, combing through magical remains, but she didn't have a choice. And so, she shook off her nerves and opened the box, her eyes yet again instantly recognizing wands who had once belonged to people she loved.

She spotted Charlie's first before seeing Luna's and Dean's. These were only three in a sea of other wands and it made her just as sick as the last time. Hermione decided to sift through them as quickly as she could before closing the box and letting out a sigh of relief once finished. Draco came back moments later, his face pensive and a crease in his brow. Hermione had no doubts that he and Blaise had talked about why this box was a wooden nightmare.

"Where's Blaise?"

"Gone to bed," Draco replied. "He has to meet up with my aunt in a few hours, and Merlin knows he'll need whatever rest he can get." Draco had walked up to her, and now his hands were outstretched. "I can take that back to him-"

"I'll do it," Hermione interrupted. Her hands had pulled the box close to her body, protecting it almost, and held it tightly. "Blaise is in his bedroom, you said?"

Hermione didn't wait for Draco's reply and headed straight out of the room. Despite how big the home, her and Draco's bedroom wasn't far from Blaise's, and she had a feeling that it had been done on purpose. Some three doors down Hermione paused, and it took a moment for her to get her bearings and knock. She had expected a gruff, "Who is it?," but instead there was a shuffling of feet on the other side and soon Blaise's face in the doorway.

There should have been a preamble. A sigh even. In lieu of either of those things, Hermione began with, "Why do you do this? Collect them?"

For a moment Blaise was lost. It wasn't until he saw the box of wands in her hands, that his face lost a little color. He opened his door wider and gestured for Hermione to come inside.

"Why do you want to know, Granger?" Blaise asked once the door had been closed and the room properly silenced. "It's not going to make you feel better or change the fact that there are dozens of wands-"

"Please, I don't need you to say how many," Hermione flinched, vomit already forming at the base of her throat. "It's just… People who collect things from their victims are...are…"

"Are what?" Blaise goaded.

Hermione wanted to recoil at his tone of voice, but instead she frowned. There were so many adjectives that came to mind. "Deranged" was one. "Sick" was another. With everything that Blaise had done for her, using either of those words seemed wrong. It was the action of collecting wands from murder victims to be sick and deranged, but what to say of the man who did those things?

In the end, Hermione gave up and settled for something less accusatory. "They're not good people."

"That one's on you then, Granger," Blaise huffed. "I never said that I was a good person. Just like how I'll never say that you're a bad person."

"A bad person?" Hermione stuttered. "What have I done that would bring me even close to-?"

"Does plotting a series of deaths come to mind?" Blaise smugly answered. Hermione was instantly offended and stomped her foot like a child.

"Deatheaters are evil, worthless murderers and they deserve everything that they get," Hermione sneered, and Blaise smirked.

"Tell me how you really feel," Blaise teased. "Listen, let's not make this any more complicated than it already is, shall we? You are happily planning a mass murder for the greater good, while I like symbols of the hard work it takes to track down a person in hiding. Regardless of that, in the end, I'm still the creepy bloke who keeps trophies of his murders, and you're the vindictive witch who relishes the idea of someone's body turning cold and lifeless. So tell me, what's the difference between you and me?"

Hermione's mouth had fallen. She tried several times to redeem herself. To say something to put her into a different category than the murderous bastard who was in front of her, but...she couldn't.

Blaise smiled and placed a finger under her chin to close her mouth. "I'll help you out, love. There is none. So, are we finished? Can I go to bed now?"

"Yes, we're finished." Hermione pushed the box into Blaise's chest and he caught it before it fell. She left the room shortly after and felt an uncomfortable weight in her chest.

"Alright, while Blaise is with Bellatrix searching all of your safe houses, we have some training to do," Draco announced to the group. He caught Hermione's eye briefly and refrained from rolling his own. She had jokingly called him "Professor Malfoy" when he had outlined what he wanted to do while Blaise was gone. Now every time Draco looked at her she had this annoyingly cute expression on her face that made him blush uncontrollably.

"What's with the red face?" Ron asked aloud, but Draco ignored him completely with a hard cough before continuing with his speech.

"To go through with our plan, all of you need to be properly prepared. That includes magical training and any helpful information I can give you about your respective targets. Longbottom, Fleur," Draco addressed with gesture for them to come forward. "Since you'll be going after Avery later on tonight, I'll be working the two of you the hardest."

"Great," Neville grumbled. "Never once a teacher's pet, but I am now?"

Hermione laughed from where she stood and gave him a gentle pat as he walked by. "I'm sure that it won't be as bad as you think."

"That so?" Draco's lips devilishly curled up while Hermione's brow did a little raising of its own. "I suppose you won't mind being my sparring partner for my demonstration then?"

Hermione haughtily raised her chin and walked forward with her spare wand dangling between her fingers. While she wasn't afraid of her boyfriend, it was always a dangerous sign when he was so full of himself. She wondered what tricks he had up his sleeve while the words "constant vigilance" rang through her head.

"Let's do a bit of roleplay," Draco suggested. "You can either be Avery or you can be yourself. Your choice."

"I'd rather be myself," Hermione said. "Besides, you're the one who knows Avery best."

"A logical decision, but still the wrong choice," Draco smiled. His wand was drawn faster than Hermione could have anticipated, and soon she was holding a hand over her left shoulder. Blood was seeping out of it.

"What the hell, Malfoy?!" Harry shouted, but Draco paid him no mind as he addressed Fleur and Neville.

"Avery uses the simplest spells, but he's fast. Hermione's shoulder could very well be another limb or a vital organ with a much deeper gash. The best form of defense against him would be a defensive-sneak attack measure. Whoever's fast enough to keep up with me should be able to keep up with Avery and defend.

'Pick who goes first," Draco ordered them. He then brought his attention back to Hermione and frowned shortly after. Harry had conjured a cloth and wrapped under and over Hermione's arm to combat against the bleeding. "Can you move your arm?"

"Yes," Hermione replied as she gently swung it back and forth. Her words were confirmatory, but the grimace that accompanied it said otherwise. Regardless, she let a soft smile come to her lips before shoving a finger in his chest. "You owe me."

"Beat me in a fight," Draco teased and turned from her to find Fleur ready to go against him. It was as he readied himself in a dueler's stance that he analyzed the witch.

Fleur was pretty. Veela blood could do that to you, but Draco figured that even if that wasn't the case she would be pretty just the same. Anyone who looked on her would think her to be dainty and concerned with frivolous things just as the hoity-toity women of the pureblood social elite. Perhaps she once had been. However, the tight way she held her lips together, the lack of color to her fingers, evidence of the grip she had on her wand, and how ready she seemed to fight him told Draco one thing: War had changed her. Theo's death had likely been the push she needed to wave a middle finger to the world.

"You've got two options," Draco told her. "Be as good as me, or be better than me." He glanced at the others who seemed to be in anxious anticipation for what was about to happen. "Count us off."

Draco resumed his stance, hearing to the right of him someone, Ginny it appeared, giving the countdown from three. Draco shared Avery's love of the offensive. It put you in control of a fight's outcome, and it played well to their need of meticulously planning everything. In the three seconds that it took for the fight to begin, Draco had decided how he would attack. He would first need something that could penetrate a shield, and while most spells, curses, or hexes that could do that were wildly dangerous, this wasn't a session for the weak. If he didn't take it easy on his own girlfriend, he damn sure wasn't going to do so for anyone else. His follow-up needed to be something that would get her off her feet, and if properly distracted (and in pain) from his first casting, any spells along the lines of Despulso would do the trick. The final spell needed to cripple her, and considering that Fleur still needed to be alive and functional at the end of this, a simple binding would do.

When the final countdown number had left Ginny's lips, Draco had settled on a curse that that would give Fleur seizure-like twitches. He would aim for her arm which would only give her a mild effect unlike if it struck her in the chest. And while yes, she did put up a shield like he thought she would, Draco's curse didn't break it. On the contrary, it collided with the shield and fizzled on contact. Draco fired two curses one after the other, one to Fleur's right and the other to her left. She managed to dodge one, but not the other, and although her left arm was now limp, she still had enough sense to copy Draco's methods, this time aiming at his head and another spell at his feet. Draco darted to one side, clear in the direction of a third spell he had somehow missed, and it hit him in the shoulder. He immediately stopped moving.

Draco knew this curse. It was warm and tingly, and the feeling moved down his wand arm. Instead of growing limp, his arm seized up, curling into his chest, and his wand fell from him. Had the curse hit him anywhere in his torso, it would have spread to every limb and left him like a human pretzel. He knew because he had seen the curse before.

There was applause in the room, but Draco ignored it, and so did Fleur. She looked neither proud nor smug at what she had done, but rather she was sad.

Draco wet his lips before hesitantly addressing the witch. "Theo taught you his curse."

The joy of her friends died down at that, and now they were paying rapt attention. Fleur sniffled once, but nodded. "'E did, yes. 'E said it could be 'elpful."

"Of course, he did," Draco happily, yet bitterly replied. "Did he teach you anything else?"

"A couple more curses, a few spells, and some dueling techniques. "

"Good. Take this curse off of me and you can help me train the others."

It was easy to forget that Bellatrix was originally a Black. Aside from pureblood rhetoric and mudblood hatred, the Black family was known for their grandeur and love of fine things. This was evident in what the witch's home looked like.

The Lestrange household wasn't Malfoy Manor per se, but it was still larger than the average. The massive foyer was accentuated with a modest crystal chandelier and a floor that shined beautifully from scrupulous house elf care. Having been in this house before, Blaise knew that down the main corridor that faced him was lined with artwork from famous painters, some of them first editions. There were also cabinets filled with fine china. Rodolphus didn't give two shits about anything like that, and so the logical deduction was that Bellatrix had wanted them. Somewhere beneath the crazy was a woman who still cared about the mundane. Blaise supposed that there was no getting rid of childhood training and family traditions no matter how many murders you committed. He could attest to that.

"Chin up, boy. We're going on the hunt!" Bellatrix cheered as she appeared from the shadows of the hall ahead.

"Bellatrix," Blaise greeted with a soft tilt of his head. "You're looking as bloodthirsty as ever."

"Charming," Bellatrix giggled in an evil way that only she could produce. It bounced off the walls and penetrated Blaise's skin something awful, but he kept that feeling to himself. "We're going on a killing spree. Why shouldn't I feel tickled?"

Only she would use such a description for what they were about to do, but he felt less worried knowing that Hermione's lot had warned their people. It wouldn't last long, however, and Voldemort's impatience would wane yet again. When it did, Voldemort would come down on him just as before, and Blaise doubted that he would come out of his punishment alive a second time.

"Who's coming with us on this little expedition?" Blaise questioned. Bellatrix had told him that she would choose the proper people for the job. That had saved him a headache, but it had also left Blaise curious and he hated being in the dark.

The answer to his question emerged from the hall just as the witch had. The Lestrange brothers. Perfect. It made sense that Bellatrix would pick them, not to mention that they probably wanted revenge and thought this an opportune moment to fall into their laps.

"Zabini," Rodolphus greeted. No, he didn't look as evil as his wife, but then again, he was more of a silent breed. You never knew of his skill until the time came for it. Much like Draco, if Blaise was honest.

"Lestrange and...Lestrange," Blaise added for the other brother. "Is there anyone else?" he asked Bellatrix. She's smiled broadly before taking out her wand and holding it loosely in her hand.

"Just us poppet," Bellatrix replied. "We should get moving."

Blaise nodded and walked over to the group. Although he had known it before, it was painfully obvious that he was the youngest of the foursome. He briefly wondered what the others thought of this matchup before all of their hands held in a clasp and they disapparated. Blaise took them back to the pantry they had gotten to McGonnagall's safe house with. Once they landed, Blaise took a quick count of how many cabinets there were and found roughly fifteen of them. Aside from McGonnagall's, one he knew had to be Hermione's. Another had to belong to that Finnegan bloke whom Blaise had heard through the grapevine was dead.

"Does it matter which one we use?" Blaise heard Rabastan ask. Blaise fought the look of annoyance at the man's sheer lack of common sense and politely replied,

"Not when we have to check them all." Blaise decided to go methodologically with this and simply went up to the next cabinet beside McGonnagall's. Without fanfare or even a warning to the others, he went inside and felt the cabinet do it's work and transport him. On the other side, he was equally likely to find an abandoned safe house or walk into a fight.

Turned out to be the latter.

At first Blaise thought that he was seeing a ghost. It could have been that he just didn't get a good look. Understandable, considering that not more than two seconds out of the safe house's pantry a wicked Flippendo had hit him in the stomach. Had Blaise still been standing directly in front of the cabinet, he would've been thrown into it, effectively destroying it. Instead, he was careened onto the hard surface of a tiled countertop, his body twisting enough that the tip of his head hit the sink's faucet.

Blaise had got his bearings quickly and shook his head to correct his vision. His eyes told him that he was seeing Dumbledore, and he was right, but it just wasn't Albus.

Aberforth had either taken his time in moving his arse out of the safe house or, more than likely, he decided to stay and to battle it out with whoever had come looking. Leave it to a Dumbledore to not heed someone else's advice and to go about doing things his own way. Granted, his spellcasting and fighting ability was strong like his brother's as he went on the offensive yet again. Bellatrix had come through the cabinet next and, as with Blaise, had been attacked within mere seconds. She had been directly in front of the cabinet, however, but her husband had been right behind her and took most of the blow when she was pushed backwards. Their combined bodyweight crashed into Rabastan, and the very thing Blaise had thought would happen to the pantry's cabinet, happened, and left splintered wood beneath them.

First Ginny Weasley, now Dumbledore's double. I'm going to die at the hand of a bloody Gryffindor, Blaise fretted in his mind. He didn't even get the chance to attempt to curse him, and instead he was holding up his best shield against the barrage of spells Aberforth was throwing. If this had been a one-on-one situation, Blaise would have had cause for worry. However, no matter how good you were, when you were outnumbered the better option was to flee and fight another day. Perhaps that was what Aberforth was going to do when his avalanche of magic had stopped coming. Not that Blaise would ever know.

Three wands had set three different curses on him and the screams had the potential to break glass. Blaise soon joined the fight with green light and the screams immediately stopped.

"What did you do that for?!" Rabastan growled. "We weren't done having fun yet!"

"This isn't supposed to be fun, you idiot," Blaise huffed. "The Dark Lord gave us a task to do and we're doing it. Torturing him would've been a waste of time."

"Perhaps," Rodolphus chimed in. He looked down at Aberforth's body and nudged it with his foot before bringing his gaze back to Blaise. "Or maybe you were just sparing the old man by killing him so quickly, hmm?"

"Excuse me?" Blaise nearly sputtered. "Just what exactly are you implying?"

"I'm saying that he was prepared." Rodolphus threw a finger at the broken cabinet and continued on, "He was right on us the moment we got here."

"He's a resistance member. They're always prepared," Blaise argued, but he could see that Rodolphus, nor his brother for that matter, were convinced. He glanced over at Bellatrix who was oddly quiet, but she was observing well enough, the tip of her wand gently tapping her cheek as the base of her wand rolled in her hand.

"They're not that prepared."

"Humph, say what you want to say, Rodolphus," Blaise sneered. "You think that I'm a traitor like my friends?"

Rodolphus didn't confirm or deny. He merely stared at Blaise as though contemplating whether to bind him right at that moment. Blaise suddenly began weighing his options on how best to get out of a three against one situation if they all turned their wands on him. He nearly put up another Protego when Bellatrix moved, but she didn't fire the first spell. She only put her hand on Rodolphus' shoulder, never once taking her eyes off of Blaise.

"Now, now, kiddies let's be good boys," Bellatrix smiled with one side of her mouth. "The blood traitor is dead as he ought to be. Besides, Young Zabini wouldn't do anything that would put a price on his head like my dear nephew. Would you?"

The way Bellatrix's forefinger slid up and down the handle of her wand was unsettling to Blaise, but he did his best to ignore it. Instead, he adorned his sternest expression and gave half a lie.

"Last I checked I wasn't charmed by some witch and stupidly put my head on the chopping block for her."

"What about Malfoy?" Rabastan threw out. Blaise sucked his teeth and casually shrugged his shoulders, unable to resist a smirk in his direction.

"Draco's an alright bloke, but he's got one too many balls for me." Blaise turned to Bellatrix and raised a brow. "Are we done?"

Bellatrix didn't say anything. She gave him one look from head to foot before ordering everyone to search the house. Blaise let out a small sigh of relief once everyone was gone and paused in following after them as he passed Aberforth's body. The man's wand had rolled about a foot away. It was a beautiful dark piece of wood, anywhere between nine and eleven inches, with minimal carvings. Blaise bent over to pick up the wand, but his fingers stopped short of it. He stayed there, hunched over, his hand reaching for the wand, but retreating every time he touched it.

Blaise stood and ran his hands over his face, stifling the groan that he wanted to make. He left the room then, the wand still on the floor. He had enough trophies.

Author's note: IT'S NOT ABANDONED LOL. Thank you to those of you still reading this :)