Faber et Filia
(The Blacksmith and the Young Girl)
An R.W.B.Y. Fan-Fiction
Written by Hoenn Master, and edited by dashboardgecko
"A strong man stands up for himself. A stronger man stands up for others." Ben- Barnyard (Yes. I'm going there.)
Disclaimer: I do not under any circumstance possess the setting of this story; it is the property of Rooster Teeth. If I did own it, it would likely be significantly worse than it is today. I also do not own the character of Blair, who belongs to Wishmur Publishing House.
It was cold. It was not an average coldness, either, but rather, the kind of cold in which one can feel it seeping into his very bones, no matter how thick one's clothing. The crunches of wheels over dead leaves, along with the steady clopping of horse's hooves, were the only things to break the silence which had fallen upon the Forest of Forever Fall.
A single, horse-drawn carriage, filled with supplies, was the only thing moving in the stillness and silence, apart from the swaying branches and the dancing leaves. A lone traveler with a thick cloak wrapped tightly around his body and the pair of horses drawing the heavy wagon behind them were the only living beings in sight. With a sigh, a cloud of steam escaping his hood, the traveler slipped an icy string of beads into his cloak pocket, and spoke to his horses in a deep, soothing tone.
"How are you two holding up, eh?"
The horses, of course, remained silent except for their snorting as they carried on, but the traveler was used to that.
"Well, at least you're warmer than I am. Still, this mist isn't letting up; I guess we've gone pretty far north by now..."
Just as the traveler finished the sentence, a snap and a loud scream rent the air, startling both of the horses. After a few frightening seconds of bolting, their master managed to calm them down, and without another word, leapt off of the cart, his black cloak trailing behind as his heavy boots sprinted across the frosty ground towards the scream. With quick, quiet movements, the man picked his way through the thick trees just off of the path, the only sound being made above the noise of the forest being the occasional crunch of a small pile of dead leaves.
After a couple of minutes of searching, the traveler was beginning to conclude that he must have heard things. He was just placing his hand on the grip of a large, heavy caliber pistol which rested on his hip just above the sheathe of a plain looking sword, and prepared to go back and defend the cart from possible bandits. He had hardly taken a step, however, when he spotted a clearing filled with about half a dozen of the largest black creatures of Grimm he'd ever seen.
They were made of the purest black; the traveler's own cloak looked grey in comparison, even. The impossible darkness was only broken by terrifyingly white and red mask-like growths on their faces, oddly-placed spikes of matching color lining their forelegs, and massive claws which could rend flesh as easily as a white hot knife through warm butter.
The truly grisly scene, however, was not the creatures themselves, though they ordinarily would be.
No, instead of the monsters themselves, in the center of the clearing lay three bodies: a large, barrel-chested man, with thick brown hair stained with blood; a woman with equally brown hair in a flyaway style, with a gaping hole in her stomach, staining the ground a more sickening red than the leaves could ever have done; and between them, a little girl, no more than nine, crying her eyes out silently.
An Ursa, one of the great number of the dark creatures surrounding the little girl, strode up to finish the family off.
The traveler never gave it the chance, however.
With a whoosh of displaced air, the figure leapt out of the trees, catching the monsters off guard, and with a flash of steel and fire, drew a straight long sword. It was plain in design, the hilt undecorated aside from the deep blue leather grip and the small chamber containing a red crystal at the base of the blade. With a shout and a burst of speed, the sword burst into blue flames and the figure charged into the center of the clearing, cutting down one of the shadows as he made his way to stand over the terrified girl.
"If you want to kill any more people, it'll have to be me before anyone else! Come get some!" the figure shouted in a deep, bellowing voice.
The Ursa, which had been too surprised to fight back until that moment, all began rushing in. Without a second's hesitation, the figure gripped the sword all the tighter, and suddenly the same blue flames which enveloped the sword danced across first the arm holding it, then the chest, and finally the entire body was coated in flames. With a primal roar, the figure, almost moving faster than the untrained eye could follow, leaped from enemy to enemy, not allowing even one to get closer than ten feet of the decimated family.
Two Ursa tried to attack at the same time from opposite ends of the circle of protection the traveler was weaving. Thinking quickly, he took one of his hands off of the hilt of his sword, dancing out of the way of the massive claws coming down upon where he was a second before, and, pulling out the heavy caliber pistol from its holster and taking aim, fired three rounds in rapid succession at the charging beast on the other side of the clearing.
The resulting explosions sent the off-balance beast to the ground, where it fumbled to get back upright. Sensing the opportunity, the second Ursa brought down its claws once again, this time meeting the edge of the traveler's hood, almost catching his face and shredding the hood to ribbons.
The man stood, an angry expression written across his wintry blue eyes and somewhat thick, dirty blonde eyebrows. However, the Ursa didn't have time to register this, as the man charged forward and drove his sword into its neck and pulled back. The action ripped its short skull in half length-wise. Instead of blood, however, the figure dissolved into cobalt blue ashes, which scattered in the freezing breeze. The man, however, didn't wait for this process to complete, instead charging at the Ursa he'd slowed down. It had risen to its feet, and was bringing down a massive paw to smite the cowering girl.
The blow never landed.
With a great grunt of effort, the sandy blonde held his sword over his head, the weapon bending almost comically to hold back the weight of the blow, but it stubbornly refused to break. The flames along the warrior himself began to vanish as he lost energy in the losing battle, rapidly becoming too tired to increase his strength and speed. With a strained grunt, the traveler tilted his sword downwards, causing the full weight of the Ursa to slide sideways, once again falling onto its side. This time, the warrior didn't turn to fight another opponent, but picked up his pistol from where he'd dropped it, and unloaded the rest of the clip right into the flailing shadow's temple, killing it instantly.
The warrior panted from exertion, and dropped to one knee, keeping a steady eye upon the last three Ursa, which were circling dangerously around them. Acting instinctively, the stranger placed his hands on the ground, quickly reloaded his pistol, and began to concentrate.
Soon, a dark patch of dead grass and dirt began to spread around the blonde man as the little girl sobbed into her parent's bodies. The Ursa, sensing a shift in the balance of power, all charged at once, causing the girl to scream in terror. With another roar, the blonde leapt to his feet, and brought his hands together, arcs of cobalt energy passing between his thickly gloved fingers like a Jacob's ladder. Almost instantly, several baseball-sized spheres of energy appeared in his hands, which he threw at the oncoming enemies with deadly accuracy. Each of the spheres either hit just in front of, or directly on, the Ursa, stumbling them and granting the traveler enough time to pick up his sword and pistol.
With a loud series of clicks and whirrs, the pistol began to transform into a flare-gun-sized revolver. The six chambers ejected the now too-small bullets, and instead, the blonde loaded what were essentially grenades into them. With a shout, he braced his arm and fired as quickly as he could, launching all six massive red explosives at the Ursas within a couple of seconds.
A fine red cloud hung over the decimated area not eight feet from the little girl, who had fainted in the fright of the moment. Immediately, the gun reduced its caliber, and the warrior reloaded the dropped bullets. Then, he slowly edged towards the crater he'd made. Inside were the dissolving remains of the Ursa, though one remained alive. It was clearly wounded severely, and a quick bullet down the creature's ear ended its misery.
After making sure all of the other monsters were dead, the mysterious traveler sighed, looking at the decimated family once again. "I'm sorry I couldn't find you sooner," the man whispered to the dead parents, his voice now laced with sorrow instead of rage.
The girl, who he had initially worried had died due to the amount of blood on her dress, was safe, sleeping between the bodies of the two who gave their lives to protect her.
Still, it hadn't occurred to the stranger until that very moment what to do with the child. Initially, he had only had to goal of protecting people in mind, but now he wasn't sure what to do. Yes, he knew he'd have to care for the child, at least until he could get her to an orphanage; it would be counterproductive and evil to leave her to fend for herself and be killed by something else. So, with a resigned heart, he took off his cloak and draped it over the sleeping girl, and set her aside to rest while he dug what he assumed to be her parents' graves.
Upon turning the woman over, however, he noticed a small bundle at her feet, and, with a lurch of sickening realization, that an almost newborn infant lay dead under her skirts. The hardened warrior, who had both seen and dealt out death before, upon seeing the baby's sickeningly disfigured face, turned and retched into the crater where the ashes of the shadows lay, a feeling of the deepest sorrow wrenching his gut painfully.
Once he had settled himself, and had retrieved his cart to get tools to mournfully dig the graves, the man placed the bodies of the girl's family into them with all the respect he could give. Just as he was about to start filling them in, though, he looked at the little girl, who was beginning to stir from her slumber. The traveler sighed, and stood in front of the girl and waited until she fully awakened with a frightened squeak.
"W-who are you?! Where's my mom and dad?!" the girl's voice was somewhat lower than the man expected, but then again, he'd only heard her scream in terror.
"My name is Richard Brown, young lady," the man introduced himself solemnly. "As for your parents, they are resting on the other side of my wagon."
The little girl got up quickly and looked suspiciously at the very tall sandy blonde man. His eyes were of a grey blue, but there was also a hint of green near the pupils. The sword and pistol on his right hip, however, put her on edge, as well as the silvery blue scarf covering his face. "Why am I over here instead of with them?"
Richard sighed sadly, and motioned to the girl's side, which had become uncovered and exposed the swathe of blood. "Your parents… Died in the fighting. I couldn't save them, or your brother. I'm sorry."
The little girl looked absolutely devastated, and for good reason. "N-no! You're lying! Daddy is strong! He's fought the Grimm forever! And mommy helped him, too, even though she just had Hilbert! Let me see them!" her voice was rapidly becoming hysterical, and Richard, being a kind hearted man, allowed the girl to sprint to her family's graves and see them.
He kept her a reasonable distance back, though, as he didn't want the child to hurt herself.
It took several cold, depressing hours to get the girl to allow Richard to bury her family, but once that was done, he built a fire and heated a stew, but not before heating some cocoa for the shivering girl and giving it to her. She wouldn't drink it, although she held it to her body to keep warm. At any other time, Richard would have been impressed with the girl's intelligence, but the sun was going down, and it was only going to get colder in this extreme northern stretch of the forest.
"Listen, young lady," Richard started kindly, "I need you to drink that before it gets cold; you're going to freeze to death tonight if you don't."
Spotting the even more suspicious glare she sent him, Richard held his hand out for the mug. "Alright, if you want, I'll drink out of it first, so you know there's no poison in it, alright?"
The girl looked untrusting, but reluctantly handed the mug back to Richard, who took a large sip. "Ah, thank you. Now do you believe me?"
The girl looked satisfied, and began gulping the hot drink down. Thankfully, it wasn't still scalding, but the perfect temperature for drinking.
Realizing that he didn't know this girl's name, he asked, kindly, "And what is your name, young lady?"
The girl slowly lowered the drained mug, a mustache of chocolate left behind from how fast she had drunk the beverage as she did so. At any other time, the scene would have been cute, but the thick tear tracks and depressed face only served to heighten the sense of depression emanating from the girl. "My name is Blair Litchenburg."
Richard nodded kindly, gently taking the mug from the traumatized girl. "That's a pretty name, Miss Litchenburg. Would you care for some stew?"
The brown haired girl simply bit her lip and shook her head. Richard understood; he didn't have much of an appetite either, and surely Blair felt many times worse than he did. Regardless, there was one final order of business for the blonde warrior to take care of.
"Miss Litchenburg, I know you may not wish to, but I must bring you with me for the time being."
Blair froze in place, the distrustful glare locked firmly back into place. "Why?"
Richard had expected this type of reaction, and didn't miss a beat. "Because I cannot simply leave you behind now that your family is gone. If I were to do that, it would have been better to leave you to die in the first place."
The way he spoke about death was distant, and some would likely say cruel to someone who had experienced so keen a loss that recently. However, the man wasn't one to skirt around issues if flat honesty would achieve the same result in a shorter amount of time.
Blair looked at Richard with eyes that swam with tears, and the blonde privately wondered if he'd been too direct in dealing with the situation. Still, the young girl spoke with a voice which echoed nothing but pain and sadness. "Maybe I want to die… There's nobody who'll want me, anyway," Tears began spilling over her eyelids, and they only seemed to grow in number as time went on.
Richard didn't pry any deeper; he now knew enough to guess that either her village cast her out, along with her family, or her village had been decimated by the Grimm. Still, he couldn't let a child start thinking like that; if she did, he didn't want to picture the outcome. Doing the only thing he could think of, he inched closer to the sobbing girl, and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Don't think that, Miss Litchenburg. I'll find a place where you'll always be loved and taken care of. Who wouldn't want a beautiful little girl like you?"
Blair slowed down her crying slightly and mumbled something as she wiped her eyes before asking softly, "Do you promise?"
The sheer weight of that question was not lost on the young man, and without hesitation, he knew what his answer was to be: "I promise."
Then the brown haired girl looked up at the man with absolute sincerity, and asked, "Pinky swear?"
Richard could only smile wanly at the pain and uncertainty in the request, but regardless, he linked his pinky with the girl's outstretched digit and shook their hands. "Pinky swear. Now, you need to go to sleep. We need to get up early tomorrow if we hope to make the nearest city by the day after tomorrow."
A.N.: Oh, look; it's another fan-fiction from Hoenn Master! Does this mean he's given up on his other stories?
No. No I have not.
I recently have become absolutely obsessed with R.W.B.Y. lately, and, as I have better things to do with my life, I decided that I could put them off to make a teaser story of sorts to test the waters for my next big idea in a new fandom. I won't be giving spoilers, but I think I've hit gold while talking to my good friend, Wishmur Publishing House, who insisted that I write this to the point that I was responding to her messages every five minutes, if not sooner, while I was writing it.
Regardless, this is, by a fair amount, the longest thing I've written yet, and I have to say, I'm glad I managed to get 2,700 words out this time. My only hope is that I can capture the feel that Rooster Teeth has managed to craft in their amazing tale.
Finally, I want to give a massive thank you to dashboardgecko, who has helped me along immensely by beta reading this for me, as well as providing insightful commentary on all of my stories.
Signed: Hoenn Master, forever a patriot.