title. beginning of an end.
characters. adam taurus, blake belladonna, mentions of ghira and kali belladonna.
verse. pre-black trailer.
1: based on one of my favorite tauradonna headcanons by tumblr artist dhurain - gambol shroud is a gift that adam gave to blake.
2: the lowercase stylistic choice is still there (sorry) but since more people are miffed by the lack of quotation marks, i added them + some edits/corrections.
disclaimer: RWBY rightfully belongs to Monty Oum. i'm just a fan with an imagination working overtime.
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gambol shroud is strange.
when she asks about it (because it's hers now, he gave it to her but before that it was his or at least he designed it to be made for her so he should know more about it), he turns silent for a moment before describing it as a variant scythe with a chain and proceeds to reach out to it but then he pauses and a smirk strangely dances on his lips seconds after. she's about to ask him what's so funny (and also to give a much more elaborate description, what kind of description was that), but his gloved hand lands on her shoulder instead of on the weapon.
"there are things better learned on your own," he tells her before walking away. blake's lips pull themselves into a blatant frown.
"is that your attempt at a excuse?" she calls after him.
he snorts at her remark, but adam doesn't stop for that and blake can only watch his retreating figure, her hands still holding on to what she would now call her weapon.
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the more she takes it apart, the less she understands.
she doesn't literally break gambol shroud apart (well she tried a little bit, but sadly with no good results because she has never seen or better yet held such an elaborately made weapon), but she does check everything she found of interest in it. the beautiful sheen of its steel blades colored like the darkest of nights, how the blades manage to fold or maybe lower themselves to form an odd gun once her fingers were on the safety and trigger, and the lengthy ribbons that come along with it that feel like satin - how intricate it is, like a puzzle meant to be solved, leaves a tingling feeling in her fingers that spread itself throughout her whole body.
(whether the feeling was fear or nervousness, she would yet know until she would try solving the puzzle.)
he finds her just staring at gambol shroud in her lap one afternoon, with the lengthy ribbons wrapped around their bodies like binds of some sort. with a sigh he lifts the weapons off her lap and sits beside her, unraveling each of the ribbons.
"extend your arms," adam says when his task was done, a ribbon in his hand.
"why?" the skeptic edge in blake's voice signaled a fight - adam scoffed and opted to instead reach out for her left wrist, wrapping his gloved fingers around the bare skin of her wrist with a gentle grip before pulling her arm towards him.
"some things are better demonstrated," he grunts as he started to wrap a part of the ribbon around the lower half of her arm, the cloth cool against the warmth of her skin.
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"ribbons don't count as chains, adam - are these ribbons seriously gambol shroud's 'chains'?"
"stop nitpicking on everything - are you used to it by now?"
he points out to the ribbons wrapped around her arms like bandages, and she nods. her way of wrapping was different from what he had initially taught her, but she stated that her method was much more efficient for the sole reason that appearance-wise, hers looked more acceptable to the public eye. adam rolls his eyes at her words (why do you even care what humans think, he mutters under his breath), before he points to gambol shroud.
when he asks her if she already tried wielding it, she shakes her head.
"this isn't the first time you'll be holding a weapon - don't tell me you're scared," he says.
"i'm not, don't jump to conclusions," she scoffs. "i'm just making sure i understand how it works before actually using it."
adam snorts, folding his arms across his chest and looking away from her. blake raises an eyebrow when he starts whispering to himself for the second time (understand, she says - is everything a book to this cat, he grumbles), and she's already frowning by the time he faces her again.
"belladonna - weapons are for practical use, aren't they?"
blake shrugs, her response coupled with the roll of her eyes.
"obviously. why would you ask me that question?"
"you tell me," adam lets out a sigh. "you're the one who wants to understand, anyway."
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two days after their conversation, she ends up in the white fang infirmary.
he comes back late in the afternoon that day, finished with a successful scouting mission. hell, he wouldn't even know that she spent her whole afternoon in the infirmary if not for her doting father, babbling away in panic while attempting to deal with paperwork (oh, adam! welcome back, good job, you came from a scouting mission, right - i'm sorry to ask this but can i hear your report later, i must see blake in the infirmary… argh - kali! what do you mean, i just visited her earlier!?). curious as to why she was there in the first place, he asks more information from her mother, and after excusing himself he makes his way to the infirmary.
when she sees him from the doorway, the groan she releases from her lips is heavy.
"is that how you greet your visitors?" he says, his tone jeering.
she glares at him when he approaches her bedside: even with the mask over his eyes she can feel the scrutiny of his gaze from head to toe, and it's a sensation she could do without.
"a broken arm, a couple of bruises and cuts, and a sprained leg," adam recited. blake winced, but said nothing. "did you do something stupid like jump off a cliff, belladonna?"
blake's voice rises as her cheeks flood with warmth. "wha - what kind of ridiculous assumption is that!?"
"the only thing ridiculous here is your current state," he chuckles. "alright then - what happened?"
she angles her head away from his gaze and looks at her bandaged hands instead, eyes narrowed and brow furrowed deeply. adam catches her glance briefly at gambol shroud set on the bedside table before looking back at her hands, and a few seconds later she purses her lips.
"you tell me," she sighs, her voice small.
at her response and at her demeanor, adam finds himself smiling.
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3: i'm not really satisfied with this but i can always put a part 2 in the works, maybe.
4: pre-black trailer/series tauradonna is my jam bc sadly, canon tauradonna is bound for heartbreak.
5: edit - mentioned ghira to be human, whoops. thank you to merecreativity for pointing that out.