The street was quiet, which should not be odd at such times of the morning.  Or was is still night?  Wilton was so used to these odd hours now that it little bothered him if it was truly morning or not.

The stones were wet beneath his feet, from rain or from the street washers one could not always tell, but there was a wet slap of his shoes against the pavers as he walked these last few yards to the door set slightly back in a brick building with a hunter green painted front and window.  In gold lettering on the window was the words 'WICKWOOD'S HANDCRAFTED WANDS, STAVES and MAGICAL FOCI'.

Climbing slowly up the three steps to the door, Wilton fumbled with the keys before selecting the correct one and sliding it into the first of three locks.  The second and third locks being magical required but a wave of his wand, and the use of a Latin password.  Silently slipping into the gloom of the shop, Wilton smiled at the silence that enfolded him like a warm blanket.

His life before meeting and falling deeply in love with Arianna had been one of solitude.  It was also a lonely life, which he would now be returning to.

The fights had only gotten worse as the frustration of being unable to start a family together blew them apart.  Blaming each other and never taking the blame upon themselves.  Wilton was by no means a traditionalist, but the night he accused Arianna of using birth control potions just two days ago had spelled the beginning of the end.  The result being Anna moving out to Adam and Vivienne's, while Wilton made the decision to move over the shop leaving the brownstone they had both fallen in love with empty.  He would decide what to do with it when he was ready.

Lighting one of the gas lamps with his wand, he wandered back into the workshop area of the building where his office was, thinking that letter writing would be a good way to tire himself.

The office was small and mostly utilitarian, a desk upon which the ledgers and logbooks sat, a high-back chair behind it at which to sit and work, and a large bookcase behind with books on wand crafting, magical foci, as well as scrolls of parchment filled with his own and family notes on the successes and failures of the family over the centuries.

Pulling a fresh sheet of parchment and finding a sharp quill, Wilton began to write.

"Gregor,
I have founded the shop and will begin looking for clients for our unique wands.  I am now living at the shop so that owls might find me, and that you might make the usual deliveries from the Dragon Reserve.  Hoping this message finds you well.
Wilton"

Folding and addressing that first, Wilton wrote similar letters to the ten suppliers of wand cores that he had made arrangements with.  Dragon, Unicorn, Harpy, Hippogriff, Merfolk, Kelpie, Manticore, Pegasus, Sphinx, and Phoenix keepers around the globe were preparing the right cores for him as they became available.  Never harming the animals who were donors, often waiting decades to collect even a single sample.

The sun was moving just over the horizon now, and the light began to break through the little shop windows.  The light warming the surfaces it touched but nothing could warm Wilton's aching heart.  As he looked out into the new day, he wondered what Anna was doing, if she was managing as poorly as he was, and if there would ever be a chance for them again.

It was at this point in the post dawn quiet that his contemplation was broken by the bell over the door, snapping him back into reality.  Draping on his apron, Wilton made his way to the front of the store to meet his visitor.

A new wand shop. A new wand dealer.  A new opportunity.

If a few robe shop had opened in Diagon, there might have been chatter amongst the witches of Knockturn.  Novelty was always intriguing.  But, new wand shops were so rare that they stirred murky undercurrents of rumors days  before there was an official rumor.  Especially amongst those who, for so bloody long, had been denied the very things that defined them as witches and wizards.  Clothes made the man.  The wand defined the man and made him a force.

Cinaed had not owned a wand proper for over ten years and never as an independent, legal adult.  His first wand - Ollivander; maple with dragonheart string - had been snapped three days after the battle of Hogwarts.  All his fellow ex-Azzies described the same, gut-wrenching feeling of loss the moment Ministry hands robbed the wands of their life.  Since his release from Azkaban, Cinaed had made his way, mostly wandless - only "borrowing" the occasional from victims when need really dictated.  Katz, Wrinkleton - their wands had kept the thirst for power quite alive inside of him but the time had come to, once again, grasp his own, chosen wand between his fingers.

It was a reckless move.  He was still forbidden from having one.  Ministry presence had just started to wane around the Black Chimaera after the runespoor explosion though Cinaed didn't delude himself into thinking it was gone.  Raynor was watching him, no doubt.  Like a fly on the wall.  A maggot in the apple on a shelf.  But, Cinaed knew it was only a matter of time before Raynor had the information to nail him with.  Once that happened, tricking a wandmaker into giving him a wand would be that much harder.  And, then, he'd need a wand.  Right now, he was a name on a Do-Not-Sell list.  When Raynor found what she needed to find, he'd be high on the Most Wanted list. 

It was a familiar tactic and, therefore, seemed the most logical to utilize.  As long as the man was given no reason to suspect, there would be no reason for him to look further than the surface.  He made wand sales every day.  Surely, he didn't have the time to check and evaluate every customer for foul play or deceit.  For the most part, that's what the threat of the law was for.  If the man was tricked into selling an ex-Azzie a wand, it was the ex-Azzie who was locked up. 

The mission had been important enough to warrant extremely careful concealment.  Polyjuice only altered a person aesthetically; the wand didn't see appearances - it would see past it.  The shop owner might a curly-headed, middle aged witch but Cinaed would the wand would only see the power-hungry brute underneath.  Mannie had been highly amused by the disguise but, as far as Cinaed was concerned, if at the end of the day he had his own wand it would be well worth it. 

"Are you open, yet?" he asked as he let himself into the shop.  He made his way towards the counter, not trying to look down at his long, thin, white fingers.  It was a bit too strange.  Even that ruddy coffee shop kid had had more meat to his bones.  "I was wondering if you'd be able to help me.  I'm in need of a new wand."