Chapter Text
Weiss didn’t want to say this was her fault, because frankly, it wasn’t her fault.
How could she have known that the route they’d decided to take towards Mistral was being patrolled by Lancers, including a queen!? How was she supposed to know the first people to come and find their downed vessel would be bandits!?
How was she supposed to know that one of them would be named Raven Branwen, which, knowing Ruby’s uncle’s last name, and seeing the resemblance this Raven woman had to Yang…
Yeah, this had all gotten very complicated very quickly.
“I don’t like this.” Jaune spoke out underneath his breath, and Weiss couldn’t help but bark out a laugh.
“Yeah, I’m not a fan myself, either.”
“Tis not what I meant.” He corrected her. “Tis not the situation at large that troubles me, although I do confess that I hath been in more pleasant situations. There is… an odd feeling about the air. I can sense magic.”
Weiss’ brow drew down. “There shouldn’t even be such things as magic in the world anymore.”
“Troubling, because I know what it is that I feel.”
Weiss didn’t expressly doubt Jaune, given that for him, it had been a week or two since he’d lived within an era of magic, and he likely did know the feeling quite well. It was just hard to believe that they’d somehow stumbled upon magic in a bandit camp.
“Stay alert.” Jaune spoke, shaking his head within the mirror. “I know not who possesses it. I will say that in terms of overall strength, it is quite weak.”
“Well, that’s good?”
“Indeed. Although tis more… I feel I recognize the magic itself. The very person from whom it originated.”
“Well, that’s… bad?”
“I know not. I cannot get a good enough grasp of it to truly parse out an identity”
“Very helpful.”
“Ah, my apologies; I must have missed the part where thou were providing anything of use to get the both of us out of this situation.”
Weiss coughed, but had no real retort.
“I must say, however, there is something entirely more troubling to me in this moment,” Jaune cleared his throat, pointed at the sky, and then hissed out, “What in the dire pits of hell happened to the moon!?”
Weiss’ eyes widened. “What… do you mean?”
“It is in pieces! It looks as if something struck it with an intense, horrible blast of energy!”
“Was… it not shattered in your time?”
“No! Of course it wasn’t!” Jaune ran his hands through his hair. “Thou truly did not think to alert me to the fact that the moon had been broken in half!?”
“Well… it’s always been like that.”
“It very much has not! In my time, ‘twas a full moon that hung in the sky!”
“Huh.”
“Don’t just say ‘huh’, as if the moon lying broken in the heavens is of no great concern!”
“Well what else do you want me to say!?”
Jaune paused a moment. “…Now that I think on the matter, I cannot actually come up with anything that I feel would be appropriate.”
Weiss grunted. “Well, you’re honest at least.”
“Hey, shut up in there!” One of the bandits, a tattooed woman who looked to be about Weiss’ age yelled back at her. “You goin’ fuckin’ crazy already!? It’s been like five hours, girl, chill the fuck out!”
Weiss grumbled under her breath, but didn’t respond, and instead realized that if she wished to not be seen as a nutcase talking to a mirror – a rather expensive looking mirror that a bandit tribe may want to sell for a sizeable sum of profit – then she should be a bit quieter.
“So… the moon used to be… what, a circle?”
“A spheroid,” Jaune corrected, as if that wasn’t what she meant. “And yes, it was a counterpart to the sun in the sky. It was worshipped in much the same way as the sun. In my time, it was seen as the God of Darknesses’ answer to the God of Light’s sun. The story went that the God of Darkness grew jealous of his brother’s monolithic glow during the daytime, and so, during the night, he sought to create a monolith of purest black, one which would blot out the lights in the night sky. The God of Light, ever fickle, and unwilling to allow his brother to achieve a victory over him, shone the sun’s rays upon the moon, bathing our world in his light even during his brother’s darkness.”
Weiss… she was surprised at the account. It was written in such a different manner from the modern depictions of the Brothers, who were generally seen as benevolent figures who’d created, and then subsequently guided and shepherded humanity in their earliest days on Remnant.
“That… was it true?”
“I’ve no idea.” Jaune chuckled, and Weiss glared at him. “How should I know? I hath been missing one hundred thousand years, and the Gods are gone. They took their answers with them.”
Weiss nodded her head somewhat absently.
“Tell me; dost thou have a plan to escape this?”
Weiss considered that a moment. “Aside from summoning a giant Grimm and hoping that the bandits around here can’t take it out before we can make our getaway? …No.”
“Hm. Perhaps subtlety would suit our purposes more in this case.”
“What do you mean?”
“Thy summoning; tis not magic, and yet it carries some of the same properties as a spell I once knew. Summoning magic was powerful, but more than anything, it was versatile. It could be used in a variety of situations to fill a variety of niches. And one of the most important aspects of that was learning to control the size of the summoned Grimm.”
Weiss’ eyes widened. That… she hadn’t even thought of that. Yet, it seemed somehow obvious when Jaune pointed it out.
“Try it. Thou hath all the time in the world to learn control.” Jaune spoke to her, oddly steady. “Attempt to summon thy smallest Grimm as miniscule as thou can make it.”
“Someone will see!”
“Not if thou hide it behind the tents just in front of us.” Jaune gestured towards the tents before them, where, sure enough, one was positioned in such a way that it blocked the tattooed bandit on watch from seeing what was going. “So?”
“…I hate that this is a good idea.”
Jaune smirked.
Weiss didn’t have Myrtenaster, but then, stabbing her blade into the ground to summon a Grimm wasn’t expressly necessary.
She did admittedly do some things just for the flare of it.
So, Weiss focused her energy on the point just behind the tent, and attempted to summon a juvenile Nevermore. She did her best to picture it smaller, far smaller, barely the size of her hand.
And it was summoned…
Well, it was summoned, maybe, an inch smaller than a normal juvenile would be.
Her annoyance must’ve shown on her face, because Jaune didn’t even laugh at her when she failed. “A fine attempt. Unsummon it and continue working. Thou will likely need to shrink it down to around the size of your palm.
She’d actually been aiming for that size, so she was happy she’d gotten that right, at least. She unsummoned the Nevermore, and then tried again.
The results were similar for the next thirty or so minutes. During that time, no words, beyond advice, were exchanged between Weiss and Jaune.
On Weiss’ part, she was surprised that Jaune could offer advice in a non-disparaging way. He was actually quite intelligent, it seemed, and had a good, solid grasp of her semblance; or, well, the magical equivalent from one hundred thousand years ago.
…When had she started believing his story, exactly?
…Just… she wasn’t going to think about that.
Eventually, however, she’d managed to summon a Nevermore that was, roughly, the size of both of her hands. It wasn’t quite as small as she wanted, and yet, nonetheless, Jaune hummed out, sounding impressed.
“Thou hath done quite well to improve in so little time. In my own time, thy would have likely been considered a prodigy for such.”
Weiss did her best not to preen, and then preened.
“W-Well, I have been taught by the very best.”
“Indeed. Thou dost them credit.”
Gods, but her ego did not need this.
She wasn’t complaining, though.
…Actually…
“You’re being suspiciously nice right now.”
Jaune’s eyes widened briefly, before he coughed rather pointedly into one hand. “I’ve no idea what thou art referring to.”
Weiss eyed him.
“…Well, thou art my only means of escape.”
Weiss groaned, but shook her head. It was the truth, after all, and he’d been helpful. She supposed his intent didn’t truly matter given he’d been assisting her, and doing a damned good job of it.
So, she returned to what she’d been doing. Her aura was waning, slowly dissipating as she utilized her semblance more and more. She was panting below her breath, tired, but this was about escaping from a camp of bandits.
It was, in a way, akin to a life and death scenario.
That had thoughts of Beacon coming back up in her head. Thoughts of when she’d last been in such a scenario.
They were not welcome.
And perhaps it was that distraction, ultimately, that caused her to swear out under her breath just a bit too loudly when next she failed to summon the Grimm at the size she wished. She saw, out of the corner of her eye, the tattooed woman who’d been set to guard her stir.
She quickly dismissed the Nevermore – which was roughly the size of her hand outstretched, not quite small enough – and tried to pretend like she’d not been up to anything.
Unfortunately, the woman looked annoyed as she walked over to Weiss’ cage.
“The fuck are you doin’ in here?”
Weiss was very, very tempted to say ‘nothing’, as if she would possibly be believed.
“Man, you just won’t shut the fuck up, will ya’?” The woman planted her hands on her hips, and sneered.
And then…
Then her eyes locked onto the mirror inside Weiss’ cage.
“Ooh.” She walked over towards the cage, and squatted down so she could get a better look at it. “What do we have here?”
“It’s just a mirror. A gift from my family.” It was a lie, and likely a bad one. Implying that a Schnee had thought of it as a decent gift probably made its value shoot up in this bandit’s eyes.
And just as Weiss had suspected, the bandit’s eyes shone.
“Reaaaally.” She let the word hang as she stepped around the cage. “Well, I think I’m going to have to take that off your hands, then. Purely business; I’m sure you understand.”
Weiss wanted to protest, and she did, in fact, close the distance and take hold of the mirror just as the woman leaned in to grab it herself.
“Let go!” The tattooed woman stressed. “Or I’ll come in there and make you!”
“It’s… it’s an heirloom!”
“You think I give a shit!?”
Unfortunately, with her arms tied together as they were, Weiss couldn’t quite muster the strength to resist the bandit as she yanked the mirror out of her grasp. That motion sent the mirror flying, and the woman swore as it landed hard on the ground, in a manner that would have shattered a normal mirror instantly.
“Ah, fuck, did’ya break it already!?”
“How is that my fault!?” Weiss hissed out, even if she knew that no, the mirror was not going to be broken. “You were the one reaching in and refusing to let go.”
“Yeah, cause it’s my mirror now!” The tattooed bandit stressed. “We captured you, I found it, that makes it mine.”
It was the logic of a child, in Weiss’ eyes, but then, bandits seemed to think like children; attacking and profiting off of the lives of others instead of engaging with the world in a way that true adults would, so perhaps that was less of a surprise than she’d initially thought.
The woman walked over to the mirror, turned it over, and seemed surprised to find it totally unscathed.
“Huh. It’s not broken after all.”
Weiss said nothing.
“Damn… what are these gems, sapphires?”
They were, as far as Weiss could tell, stones of Lapis Lazuli, which were much less valuable than sapphires in general. She said as much, hoping that she might see it as a worthless antique.
“Huh. Never heard of them. Sounds posh as all hell.” The tattooed woman barked out a laugh. “I think I’ll keep this. Hang it up in my tent.”
Weiss bit down on her bottom lip. It wasn’t as if she couldn’t get the mirror back, but–
“Oi, Vernal, whatcha’ doin’ over there?”
The tattooed woman – apparently named Vernal – swore out under her breath as she hid the mirror behind her back. She swiveled on a dime, and Weiss leant slightly to the side to see the figure that was coming at them.
Another bandit, it seemed. Muscular, but not overly so. He certainly wasn’t anywhere near Yatsuhashi’s size, for instance.
“Just watching the prisoner.” Vernal spoke unconvincingly, doing her best to pretend like she wasn’t holding something behind her back. “Nothin’ much.”
“Psh, yeah right, kid. You’ve got somethin’. What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit. But I’ll take it off your hands, if–”
Vernal snarled, and brought the mirror back around so that she was holding it in front of her. “It’s just a fuckin’ mirror, alright?”
“Huh?” The man leaned in, looking down at the mirror and raising an eyebrow, looking rather unimpressed. “Shit, I didn’t realize you were goin’ all girly girl now.”
“It’s not– what, I can’t want to look at myself without you thinkin’ I’m going around, puttin’ fuckin’ makeup on and shit!?”
The other bandit barked out a laugh. “I’m fuckin’ with ya’, Vernal. Still, that’s a mighty fine piece. Could probably fetch quite a bit. I challenge you for it.”
Vernal swore out under her breath. “Challenge denied.”
“Oh, then you surrender it–”
“I outrank you; I have the right to turn down your challenges.”
“You ain’t Raven, kid. Just ‘cause she keeps you around doesn’t mean–”
“You fuckin’–”
There were a lot of other terse words exchanged between the two of them, and at one point, the larger man reached for the mirror, trying to pry it from out of Vernal’s grasp. She wouldn’t let him, and the two briefly wrestled for it. The larger man came out on top in a duel of pure brute strength, and pried the mirror from out of her hands.
“Oh, seems I win after all.”
“Fuck you, you piece of fucking–”
Vernal swung with a weapon that she’d drawn in no time at all. It seemed to be some kind of ring blade, and she possessed two of them one attached to either wrist.
She made to attack the other man, but he, sensing her hostility, put the mirror between them.
And the mirror, almost acting as a shield, took Vernal’s attack.
It didn’t put a scratch on it.
Vernal swore out under her breath as she brought her hand away, evidently having hurt her wrist swinging with such force. Weiss imagined that had to hurt; Not even aura was going to prevent pain, even if it likely kept her wrist from shattering like someone without aura’s would have.
Weiss would’ve been lying if she were to say she felt bad for the woman.
“Fucking asshole!”
“Damn, this thing’s fuckin’ tough!” The other man spoke, laughing under his breath. “Hold up, I wanna’ try something.”
“What are you–”
A moment later, the man drew a club from off of his belt. He held the mirror out in front of him, wound back, and then slammed his weapon into it as hard as he could.
The mirror emerged from the attack entirely unscathed.
“Fuck!” The man’s wrist had also been hurt in that attack. “Ack, fuckin’ shit! This thing’s fuckin’ indestructible or somethin’!”
“Whas’ going on over here?”
“Yeah, what’s up?”
More and more bandits were coming out of the woodworks, evidently having been awoken by the commotion in front of Weiss’ cage. The bandit who’d taken the mirror from Vernal showed them each what it was about, and then challenged them to see if they could break it.
And so it was that, over the course of the next hour or so, a good twenty bandits did their damndest to find a way to break the cursed mirror that contained the Dread King Jaune D’Arc.
None succeeded, as was perhaps obvious given the whole ‘cursed by the gods to remain trapped forever’ thing.
It would’ve made for a pretty shitty prison for all eternity if a couple of bandits with some clubs and hammers could break it.
…That was the second time Weiss had mentally accepted Jaune’s story, and used it as a reason that something couldn’t possibly happen in the real world.
Great. She really was going crazy.
“Fuck, man!” One of the bandits shouted out as he shook out his wrists, having used a giant two-handed hammer to try and smash the thing with a straight vertical hit onto its exposed glass. “Is this thing made of steel or somethin’!?”
“Never seen anything like it.”
“I challenge you for it!”
“Nah, fuck that, I challenge you for it!”
“Me!”
“I challenge–”
“Enough!”
It was a voice that Weiss had heard but once during her time in the Branwen’s camp. She had, in all fairness, not been here too terribly long. But even so, she recognized it, recognized the commanding tone, the utter assuredness the speaker shouted out with that their words would be obeyed.
And sure enough, Raven Branwen stepped out of her tent and onto the orating platform in front of it.
She looked…
Actually, she just looked tired. Weiss wondered if they’d woken her up.
“Do you idiots not realize that it is the middle of the night!?” Raven did not seem happy, confirming Weiss’ suspicions. “And yet all I hear from you lot is constant bashing and braying! Are you a band of bulls, mindlessly charging the first thing that draws your attention!?”
None of them responded to that, and yet, Raven clearly expected an answer.
It was Vernal, who Weiss had begun to suspect was her second in command, that stepped up, and kneeled before her.
“Ma’am, I found an item within the prisoner’s cage that caught my interest. I took it from her, but it has… odd properties. The others wanted to test it, despite my telling them that this would–”
“Enough, Vernal.” Raven interrupted before she could speak any further. “This item; show it to me.”
One of the bandits did, holding up the mirror and approaching the tent.
Raven hummed as she saw it, evidently not terribly impressed with it.
“We been tryin’ to break it for an hour now, but it don’t break!”
That, at least, seemed to garner some interest from Raven Branwen, who held out her hand and allowed it to be placed within it.
And then…
Well…
All hell sort of broke loose.
/
Jaune D’Arc, Chief among the Lords of Light and Dread King of the D’Arc Kingdom, had initially been uncertain as to how he was going to avoid detection within his mirror, whilst also not allowing himself to succumb to the accursed slumber the Gods had forced upon him, as his prison was taken into the hands of a plethora of bandits, and repeatedly experimented upon.
It certainly wasn’t a very dignified method of hiding himself, but it turned out that lying down within whatever realm he’d been locked away in hid him from those looking into the mirror.
So, there he was; laid out on his back, looking like a total buffoon as a band of thieves attempted to somehow overcome the magics of the Brother Gods with large hammers and sticks.
It was, rather predictably, not going well for them.
Bandits, however, were not the brightest lights in the proverbial sky, and so they continued to do this for a quite frankly unreasonable period of time until someone came out to physically stop them.
That someone had a commanding voice, and a presence that radiated… familiarity.
It was magic.
Weiss had told him that no one in this world possessed magic any longer. And yet Jaune knew what he felt. The ability to recognize the magic of others was one of the first spells taught to any mage in his time. It was a blanketly useful ability, one which could be utilized to see an enemy coming before they could advance upon oneself, or to locate a lost ally in the wilderness that would have otherwise gone unnoticed.
Those were simply two examples. It, like most magics, was extremely flexible.
But right now, he was using it for something far more complicated.
He was trying to identify the originator of that magic.
Because he couldn’t help but feel the magic itself was known to him.
He focused in on it as the woman took his mirror in her hands, and suddenly, that feeling of familiarity hit a fever pitch. Jaune’s head practically radiated with it.
He knew it, he knew it, but where from, where had it–
And then he knew.
He remembered the color of it, the timbre of it; that magic wielded by that foolish knight that Salem had chosen to be her own. How it had glowed an emerald green, how it had radiated life, and hope, and goodness in every spark.
Oh, how it had disgusted him. That such a nobody like him had wielded such potent magics, such heroic magics, when Jaune’s had only ever been dark, and horrid, and weak. Oh, how he had hated him instantaneously; the very moment he’d laid his eyes upon him.
This…
This was Ozma’s magic.
Impossible. That was his first thought. It was entirely impossibly for Ozma’s magic to persist this long after the man’s death.
Unless…
Unless he wasn’t dead.
It was a thought that had Jaune’s brow creasing; his lips peeling back. A thought that had his eyes narrowing; his teeth grinding together.
This woman…
If she served Ozma, if she served the man who had taken everything from Jaune…
He could not harm her from within this mirror. He had briefly tried to utilize his attack magics from within during his time in the Schnee Manor whilst Weiss was asleep. But…
There was a magic he could utilize that would be able to escape from out of his mirror.
A magic based not on power, but on emotion.
He channeled it into his form, felt it in the back of his throat, and then pushed himself up inside of the mirror.
For a brief moment, that woman – Raven, he was fairly certain her name had been – looked at him, and her own eyes widened.
Surprise, perhaps shock filtering through her.
That, Jaune couldn’t help but want to laugh, would only be getting worse.
/
The effect was instant. One moment the clearing that Raven was standing within had been lit by the fire in the center, and the light of the moon above. It had been a somewhat chilly, but ultimately comfortable night. The clearing itself had been filled with a bunch of rough, tough, and confident bandits.
And in the next…
“You!” A voice echoed out from all around them, a heinous, vile thing that had Weiss grimacing, placing her hands over her ears and falling to her knees instantly. A fear unlike anything she’d ever felt coursed through her chest, and briefly, she thought that perhaps she was going to die.
It only grew worse when the voice spoke another word.
“You who have been given power by that bastard, Ozma.” It was Jaune’s voice, Weiss realized, and that was perhaps the only thing that allowed her to push herself up off the ground; to take a breath where so many others in the clearing were squealing, or hiding, or running for their lives. “You who wield ancient magics far beyond your understanding!”
Raven Branwen – who had, previously, stood as the stalwart leader of the group – practically threw the mirror back as she took a battle stance, placing her hand on the hilt of Omen. Despite that she was ready to draw her weapon, her eyes were filled with terror, and her bottom lip was quivering.
“Who the hell are you!?” She somehow found the strength to scream.
“I am a sworn enemy of that man. A sworn enemy of everything he stands for; of everything he’s built. I shall tear it down, brick by brick, until naught but ash remains of his legacy! Hear me! I am Jaune D’Arc, Chief among the Lords of Light! And I have risen once again!”
It was clear that those final words, at least, Raven had no idea what to make of. Where Jaune had, apparently, detected the magic of the man from his tale, Ozma, he had also seemingly jumped the gun somewhat. Thought that his presence would be the influential element.
Yet he was an unknown to Raven; that was clear to her.
“Girl!” Jaune’s voice called out, and it took Weiss a moment to realize he was talking to her. “We are leaving this place. This rabble shan’t hold us any longer!”
It was about as subtle as a brick in terms of a signal, but Weiss understood what Jaune was getting at. She had little aura left, but she possessed enough to summon the Arma Gigas – not at all limited in size – and strike the cage holding her in twain. It broke into splinters, scattering to the wind as Weiss rose from her feet. The Arma Gigas’ sword served to cut the restraints on her arms and legs, and she stepped towards Jaune’s mirror.
The effects of his magic, the fear that had briefly taken hold, was waning on Weiss specifically. yet, when she looked around, she couldn’t help but notice that the other bandits didn’t seem to be having the same luck. Many of them were still cowering in abject terror, unwilling to so much as look at the mirror that laid on the ground beneath Weiss.
Vernal, who seemed to be the only bandit besides Raven to still possess a spine, drew her weapons with shaky hands.
“NO!” Raven shouted at her, holding her hand out and preventing Vernal from stepping forward. “Let her go! She… she is not someone we wish to toy with.”
Weiss wasn’t really sure what that was about but she was more than willing to take it. If this had somehow devolved into a battle, Weiss was almost sure she wouldn’t have been able to do a thing against Raven Branwen, who was likely Qrow’s equal.
But fear was a powerful thing. The belief that one could not win a battle was often enough to decide it before the battle had even begun.
Weiss took up the mirror and backed away slowly at first, but Jaune, it seemed, had not finished speaking.
“Tell your master, child, that I am returned! And that I shall bring about an end to all he has writ upon this world! I shall restore my kingdom to its former glory! I shall have my revenge!”
And with that, Weiss ran.
/
Raven was still shaking when the Schnee girl disappeared beyond the tree line.
The rest of her camp was no different.
There were several figures who had retreated into their tents. Others had pissed themselves, and fallen to the ground, cowering in fear. One or two had passed out, and laid still on the grass. Some had even run away entirely, fleeing the confines of the Branwen’s camp and into Mistral’s wilds. Radiating fear as they were, the Grimm would almost certainly kill them.
Raven was pleased with Vernal that she’d been able to bring herself to raise her weapon; to actually attempt to defend herself and Raven both.
Pleased, but even so, she hadn’t been willing to allow her to go through with it.
Because…
That presence, that darkness…
It was too similar to that which Raven had felt before. Too similar to that which the man within that mirror had just said.
He’d gotten some things wrong, of course. He’d claimed that she was the apprentice of Ozpin – he’d called him Ozma, and wasn’t that concerning? – or some other such nonsense, but the rest of it…
He’d known about the Spring Maiden’s powers.
He’d known about her former allegiances.
And…
He’d said he was an enemy of all that Ozma had ever built.
That could mean only one thing.
He was in league with, or allied with, Salem.
Still, the facts of the matter seemed almost alien to Raven. That Salem could have a Schnee under her employ… did her reach, her ability to worm her way into the hearts of men, truly have no limits?
She thought of Summer, and what had happened. She thought of her own cowardice. She thought of the lamp, the accursed lamp, and that question she’d once asked it.
And its answer; entirely damning.
She shivered in place, even as she turned back to Vernal, and, lacking any energy to try and do any of the things that might normally be expected of her – rounding up the deserters, getting everyone to calm down, hell, to just wake up the few people who had passed out – she said, “Let’s just… go back to sleep for a while. We can deal with the fallout of… this in the morning.”
Vernal nodded shakily, and Raven thought that was the end of it. Yet, when she went to turn back to her tent, Vernal called out to her.
She turned back to see her right-hand woman looking down and away.
“Uhm… can I…” Vernal was blushing in embarrassment. “Can I sleep in your tent tonight?”
Raven just stared at Vernal. Vernal was pale as a sheet, as if shocked she’d asked such a thing.
Silence reigned in their clearing for a good five to ten seconds.
“…Ugh, fuck it. Sure.”
Raven would appreciate the company as well, though she’d never once admit it.
/
A few hundred kilometers away, walking through the wilds of Mistral, Oscar Pine felt a chill down his spine.
He turned, but there was no one behind him. In fact, the path was empty of anything, even animals. To be fair, it was the middle of the night. The fact that they were still walking came down, mostly, to the fact that there had been no frontier towns within range when Oscar had first thought to stop.
Ozpin was also incredibly paranoid about falling asleep out in the wilderness alone, and… yeah, actually, Oscar couldn’t really fault him on that.
“What was that?” He realized it had been around thirty seconds, so clarified. “That… odd feeling just now?”
“I do not expressly know.” Ozpin murmured, but his voice suggested he had some idea. Oscar was already beginning to get some idea as to when Ozpin was holding information back from him. “The simple fact of the matter is that what I think it might be is an impossibility.”
“What do you think it might be?”
“That is beyond our concerns at the moment. For now, we continue making for Mistral. Once we are there, we can contact my allies.”
Oscar rolled his eyes. “Y’know, I’d appreciate some actual answers every once in a while.”
“And you will have them. In time.”
“Sure, we’ll pretend I believe that.”
Ozpin said nothing as they walked on, putting ground behind them.
/
Deep within the bowels of Evernight, one Salem D’Arc – though she had long since forgotten that name – felt a shift in the air.
She stood from her position within her dining hall, and made her way out, and up the stairs. As she went, she thought on just what it was she’d just felt.
She…
She recognized that feeling.
She knew it.
And yet it was an impossibility. It was something that could not possibly have happened.
That was what she would assume normally.
But then, the world of Remnant had ever been one of impossibilities, had it not?
Watts seemed quite startled as she disassembled his door to its basic components, and invited her way into his space.
“Have I… done something to upset you, mistress?”
“No, you have not.” Salem sighed as she reassembled the door behind her idly, not even turning to face it. “I simply require your assistance.”
“Of course. What is it I should do?”
She appreciated that about Watts; he was not one to waste either of their time.
“Contact Hazel…
It was something from the dawn of time; the revenant of a long-forgotten enemy, and yet…
“Tell him to be on the lookout for a figure travelling Mistral…
“One holding a lapis mirror.”
/
Yang Xiao-Long had expected finding the Branwen’s camp to be a little more action packed.
After all, she’d had this whole spiel planned. She was going to rough up one of their members, get them to take her back, and then confront her mother, beat the crap out of her, and convince her into giving her a ride to Qrow. It seemed pretty foolproof, at least to her.
Life, it seemed, had other ideas.
Because when she’d arrived at a rather seedy looking bar, she’d found a man scared out of his wits, ranting about some horrible dark figure who’d assaulted the Branwen’s camp. Apparently, he’d run away, and somehow not been caught by the Grimm on his way here.
Yang had interrogated him – okay, really, she’d just asked him questions, but saying interrogated made her feel cooler – on the camp’s location, and then taken Bumblebee the rest of the way. When she’d subsequently arrived, she’d found…
Well, a mostly abandoned camp.
She parked her bike and locked the wheels in place. Someone could still take it if they wanted to by hauling it along with them, but it wasn’t going anywhere on its own power.
She walked up to the wooden gate, and, lacking any other ideas, knocked on the door.
Nothing happened.
Huh.
She pressed her hands on the door, and pushed it open. She stepped into the Branwen camp to find…
Well, not much of anything.
There were the remains a fire in the middle of the camp, one that had burnt out entirely. There were a couple of people who were passed out on the sides of the camp. Yang had initially thought them dead, but no, a quick check for breathing – which they were – and injuries – which none of them had – proved that they were just unconscious.
This was… well, weird felt like a small understatement.
She saw the big tent in the center of the camp, and sort of just assumed it belonged to her mother.
It was as fair a guess as she was going to be able to come up with, so she just sort of… walked in.
Her mother’s tent was pretty spartan in terms of decorations, seeming much more focused on function than form. She felt a bit awkward about barging in without saying anything – but given her mother was a bandit, and her recreation was barging in without saying anything, she felt she could be forgiven.
She looked around, saw what she presumed to be her mother’s cot, and found…
Well, she found her mother cuddled up against a girl who was, at most, the same age as Yang.
So, yes, Yang had some questions almost immediately.
They were sleeping together, but were they sleeping together? That felt like the first and most important. Those were drastically different things; sleeping and sleeping.
She then realized that she’d been stuck staring at the two of them, wide-eyed and astonished, for going on a fifteen seconds now, which was really creepy.
She cleared her throat, and watched as both figures in Raven’s bed stirred. The younger girl yawned before snuggling her way back into Raven’s embrace, which hurt Yang in a way that she was not at all willing to acknowledge.
Eventually, Raven stirred herself, grumbling about not wanting to get up right then, but she looked up at Yang, went pale, and then seemingly realized the situation that she’d been found in, with her arms wrapped around a girl half her age.
“So, uh…” Yang wasn’t even really sure how to start this.
“I’m taking it I missed something?”