A shadow fell over the book Weiss was reading. Or to be more precise – dive-bombed- the text that had captured her attention.

But Weiss, never one to give up without a narrow-eyed battle of wills, merely pursed her lips and turned the page. And shifted slightly closer to the lamp. Perhaps, under this new area of light, the text would survive the onslaught of darkness that was currently poised to-

There was shuffle behind her chair, accompanied by a snuffled snort of giggle that always reminded Weiss more of a dog rather than the human it belonged to. A rather unflattering comparison, especially given the fact that the actual dog in the room, Zwei, managed to snort in a much more adorable manner.

And then, slowly, so slowly that it would have been impossible to blame gravity, the trailing edge of a red cape slid down against the page before her. And dragged itself over the hidden words, eclipsing entire paragraphs in its wake.

Weiss promptly snapped the book shut and with a sharp motion born from years of thrusting a sword down from over her head, threw the book down to the floor in front of her. There was a jerk, an unflattering yelp, and Ruby slammed forwards against the back of her chair, fingers clawing frantically at her throat as she sought to free herself from the python-like-grip her weighed-down cape now had on her neck.

Weiss allowed herself a small smirk and Blake, looking thoroughly bored, lifted her head up from the book she was reading in the chair beside her, a book that somehow, Ruby had decided not to interfere with the reading of.

'You shouldn't treat books like that,' the Faunus said placidly, except Weiss wasn't fooled, oh no, not with that slight quirk hovering at the edge of the dark-haired girls' mouth. 'You could damage the spine.'

Ruby let out a final 'urk', kicked the book open with her heavy boot (an action which earned her an irate frown from Blake) and took a deep breath as she pulled her cape free from its pages.

'What about me?!' she yelled. 'What about my spine? And my neck? Don't I have the right to breathe?'

'Only so long as you're not using it to annoy someone else,' Yang said cheerfully, choosing to lean over and drape half her weight against the sister's back; leaving poor Ruby to stumble and choke anew.

'Urgh! You guys are the worst. I didn't even touch her!'

'You were definitely breathing over me,' Weiss said tartly, bending down to retrieve the book and, now taking Blake's words to heart, running a few careful fingers over the spine. She frowned at the new crease that had appeared there, spreading like a ripple over the golden-leafed patterns. 'Great, just perfect! Look what you made me do, Ruby!'

There was some indignant sputtering from the girl in question and Yang offered her an easy grin. 'Aw, not to worry. I'm sure Ruby will be willing to cover any damage caused.'

'With what, her allowance? This book cost ten thousand-'

Weiss found herself cut off, rather irately, by the dawning look of horror that had appeared on Ruby's face and made her eyes wide. Well. Wider than usual. The pest was actually looking sorry now and had shifted into her usual remorseful position of worrying her two index fingers against each other.

'I love books.' The words, that memory, drifted into Weiss's head, sparking a dim recollection of a voice hushed and lowered in volume by the sheer fondness that seeped through it and made it soft. It had been moments before her third meeting with Ruby, moments before annoyed recognition had kicked in, but still, Weiss remembered the fond tone beforehand. It was stupid; she hadn't even been paying that much attention back then.

But then Ruby always had that annoying habit of throwing things she had taken for granted into question, of making her stare back at her life in some new light.

'It's just a crease,' she found herself blurting out. 'That was made by me when I threw it down. I don't need your money.'

'That's good because I, err, don't think my allowance would cover...' Ruby trailed off before a familiar determination seized hold of her expression and made her narrow her eyes. Weiss watched it happen in dismay, a pit of dread opening up within her stomach.

'But I still feel bad, so I'm going make it up to you! Let me...ah! Take you out for a coffee at some really fancy-pants place that I would never ever go.'

'How about Anna Schofields?' Blake suggested idly, attention now firmly fastened back to her book. 'A coffee is exactly all you would be able to afford there. And it would prove exactly how sorry you were.'

Ruby's face turned the colour of bleach.

And Weiss suddenly found herself looking forward to this coffee trip. She might even have grinned.

Yang peered at her closely with no small tinge of suspicion. 'Are you grinning?'

And Weiss was immediately forced to clutter up her face with a frown.

It had taken longer than Weiss would have liked to actually get inside Anne Schofields. Namely because it had taken five minutes to get Ruby to stop sputtering and gawping and follow her inside the shop. She might have, quite pointedly, had to take the other girl by the hand and drag her inside.

Still, she might be able to understand Ruby's awe somewhat. Given the rough and untidy sprawl of their bunk beds back at the dorm and the generally un-phased demeanour of the other girls to their bedroom, the appearance of the interior of Anne Schofields was...overwhelming let's say, to those less privileged than herself. Multi-tiered chandeliers hung over her head, five carat diamonds littering every thread of the thin gold spokes that swayed and swam against the blistering white ceiling and everything, from the tables, chairs and floor tiles, was decked with a silver shine that was mirror bright, allowing a dizzying assortment of reflections from the patrons around them to become wedged within their angled cuts. And just to make sure you got the picture that this was a place made for people with actual money; well, here dust swirled out of the thin silver vases placed on each table in place of the usual flowers. Curling blue tongues of wispy particles swirled like a brief outbreak of flames before falling back down into their prisons, consistently alight with a few sparkles of ice. This was to make the temperature lower, just enough for people to lift up their blistering hot drinks against the blue gleam and cool them down.

They're like lava lamps,' Ruby said, thoroughly spoiling the moment with the usual childish awe present in her voice. 'Only actually useful!'

Weiss stared at her. 'I can't take you anywhere, can I?'

Bu Ruby's attention had wandered again, and there was now a glimmer of fear present in her eyes. Weiss turned an appraising look on the source of it, a barista who was giving Ruby a quick and snotty glance over. The customer nearby even had the gall to shake her head disapprovingly!

Ruby flushed and shoved her arms behind her back, scuffing her boots against the floor and promptly freezing when the barista's look morphed into one of plain disgust.

'Err, I guess it's rude to provide any sense of colour clash in here?' Ruby asked meekly.

True, Ruby was the only one wearing black in here... but Weiss suspected that it was the heavy combat boots and the gothic twist to Ruby's dress that were really causing the discomfort here.

Just imagine if Yang were here to join the fun, she thought dryly. The show of skin and demanding force of her body language would really cause heads to turn.

But then Yang was good with dealing with attention. Ruby was not. Unless it was of a Grimm variety.

'Relax,' she muttered, 'they're paid to serve you, not judge you. HEY!' she called, her voice tilting into that imperial, demanding tone that her sister was so good at. 'Give us a table for two, when you're quite finished with your little staring contest.'

And then, with an artful flourish that she had also learnt from Winter, she unfurled her platinum Lien card from her sleeve, allowing the glossy silver finish of her surname to catch the light and glare directly into the barista's face.

He whitened instantly. Even more so than the rest of the decor; and that was saying something.

'O-of course, Miss Schnee, right this way!'

Weiss spared a glance at Ruby, just long enough to see the relief flood her features, and then set off confidently after the barista, each stride letting off a quick tap of noise. She frowned as she heard no accompanying clomp of combat boots; in fact, she felt nothing but air directly behind her, the heat of Ruby's usual presence suspiciously absent. She turned slightly, exasperation filling her as she watched Ruby gingerly step from tile to tile as though re-playing the childish game of refusing to step on a pavement crack. Opening her mouth, ready to deliver a sharp reprimand, she faltered as she saw Ruby peek back over her shoulder and visibly wince. Gaze drifting downwards, Weiss noticed the slight scuff marks patterning the floor. Geez, what did Ruby think she was, a puppy?

Weiss rolled her eyes, turned sharply on her heel and marched back, all to give Ruby a sharp push in the centre of her back.

'Unlike you, the people who work here have actually heard of these things called 'mops' and 'water.' They're not here to yell at you for forgetting to wipe your boots, Ruby. They're here to serve us tea.'

She clucked her tongue at the doubtful look Ruby gave her, though that didn't seem to stop the girl from uttering in a small voice, 'don't you mean coffee?'

'No,' Weiss said firmly. 'You are the last person in the world who should be given coffee.'

Heavens knew what it would do to her Semblance.

Ruby cocked her head to one side. 'I thought that was Nora.'

Weiss paused, considered the tall tales she had been given about such misadventures and then nodded firmly. 'Okay, second-to-last person then.'

Ruby scowled. 'Urgh. Well right now, I'm pretty sure you're the last person I want to have anything with! Whether it's tea, coffee, or any other kind of disgusting grown-up drink!'

Weiss opened her mouth, ready to tease, no not tease, taunt Ruby about the fact that she thought tea and coffee were unpalatable...when it hit her.

'Wait, you don't like them? The staple drink and accompaniment to every afternoon snack?'

Ruby let out a snort and paced her way over to the table the barista was waiting at. And very pointedly hovered there, before quickly whisking herself into the chair he pulled out for Weiss in a whirl of red.

Weiss let out an indignant huff as a flower petal from Ruby's Semblance hit her in the mouth and stomped over, putting her hands on her hips. 'You are the most uncultured, undignified...'

She trailed off at the smug look Ruby was giving her, noticing that the girl's silver eyes were flickering over to the barista, who looked as though his dreams were being crushed at the sight of a Schnee acting like...like...

Ruby...

Weiss thoroughly crushed that thought before it could do more than flicker across her mind for a few tantalising seconds. One of them here had to be the mature one.

She pointedly dragged out her own chair and lowered herself into it with a flounce more characteristic of a dancer than a teenage girl. 'Your menu, if you please.'

Ruby leant forwards, and now, Weiss noticed sourly, that she had become confident enough to believe there was no threat of eviction from the barista, actually rested her chin in her hands, elbows digging into the white tablecloth in a slovenly heap.

'What?' she asked, resisting the urge to whack Ruby in the head with one of the two menus the barrister had handed over to her.

Ruby sniggered. 'It's just funny seeing you act like a totally different person in a fancy place like this. You're all obsessed with looking like this important grown-up.'

'I don't act 'grown-up,' Weiss informed her tartly. 'It just appears that way because of the vast difference between us in terms of maturity. Now read your menu.'

She shoved the thing beneath Ruby's palm.

Ruby straightened and cast a critical eye over the sprawling text. 'Their 'L's are all loopy. And the 'W's look more like butterflies than actual letters.'

Weiss cast her a dull look over the top of the menu. 'Are you telling me you've forgotten how to read?'

Ruby scowled, stared fiercely at her menu and then tilted her head to one side as she sounded out the word that had caught her attention.

'A Mac-mach-atta?'

'Macchiato,' Weiss corrected. And tried hard not to think about how strangely cute Ruby looked with her tongue tripping over the unfamiliar syllables.

As though she could hear that very thought, Ruby made a face. 'What is that? A drink for robots?'

'No, it just has a little foamed milk in it; it's like an espresso with a dash of white drifting on top of it.'

Ruby's face developed an avid expression. 'Oooohh...is that like the coffee you see online with people making pictures out of white stuff on top?'

Weiss blinked. 'I...guess?'

Ruby beamed. 'I want one with a picture of a cute little doggie in it! One like Zwei!'

Weiss leaned forwards. 'I don't think they do those here, Ruby!' Her voice issued past her gritted teeth in a fierce burst, but Ruby was already gazing starry-eyed into space, enthralled by the possibility. She kept letting out these weird little sniggers, her feet excitedly pedaling under her chair, causing out a few not-so-subtle thumps to rattle out.

Weiss hurriedly waved the barista over.

'I'll have some rose tea, and my friend here will have the Cocoa Nib-Almond milk.'

Ruby blinked the stars out of her eyes and straightened indignantly. 'I will? Hey! Weiss!'

'She will,' affirmed Weiss to the barrister.

Ruby glowered and did not stop glowering until the barrister sailed back less than a minute later. Then she stared, with no small amount of trepidation, as he pushed a cup of something brown and swirly in front of her.

'It looks like liquid caramel,' she muttered cautiously, using a spoon to shift through the froth of bubbles. She almost dropped it with a squeal as a tiny piece of dark brown bobbed to the surface, her spoon hitting the side of the cup with a clink in her surprise.

'Well done,' Weiss informed her, admiring the soft, white rose they're perched in the centre of her tea; if she wasn't very much mistaken, and let's face it, she thought, she hardly ever was; the spill of green leaves underneath would release a soft, minty aftertaste to the tea, the heat causing the aroma to release and seep through, much like a bath-salt. 'You've encountered chocolate.'

Ruby let out an awed breath. 'This thing has chocolate-chips in it?'

'No. Nibs. They're much smaller. That one you found must have missed the grinder. Or else they slip a few chocolate chips in there to melt with the heat.' Weiss offered her a small smile. 'Either way, sounds like it's right up your alley.'

Ruby beamed back and lifted the cup up-

''Don't burn your tongue!' Weiss hurriedly ordered, and Ruby blinked before actually listening, brushing her cup against the stream of blue dust whirling and falling between them, the thin grey vase jutting up under her hands like an offering.

Weiss watched avidly as Ruby took a tentative sip. And felt something, happiness, pride, and probably something more, hot and sudden, rise up and strike through her as the stars came spilling into Ruby's eyes once more.

'IT'S JUST LIKE DRINKING A COOKIE!' Ruby yelled and then the moment was gone, the feeling had fled, and Weiss ended up cringing into her cup.

Later after Ruby had handed over practically all the Lien in her purse, looking suspiciously teary-ended while whispering 'you're doing a god's work' to the bemused barista, Weiss found herself tugged through a winding ravine of a street, Ruby latched onto her elbow like a leech.

'Okay, I'm sorry you used up most of your allowance, you can let go now!' Weiss protested, her annoyed voice came to a halt as Ruby jerked to a stop. A suspicious-looking bookstore was now unveiled before them, what looked to be an occult spell book lying open behind the expanse of glass. Meanwhile unruly black shapes cluttered up the corners, Celtic-styled depictions of Grimm tacked on in a makeshift college of cheap plastic.

'Wow,' Weiss said.

Ruby turned to her with pleading eyes.

'What? No way! You can go by yourself!'

'But Weeeissss, they have really expensive looking books at the back! Boring looking ones too!'

Weiss squinted. 'Is that your way of trying to entice me inside?'

Ruby looked guilty. 'Uh...kinda?'

Weiss sighed and pushed open the door.

The bookseller, hunched over his desk which had, Weiss was sorry to say, dust smothered over it's surface like snow, at least the non-magical, grey kind, grunted. And turned the page of his garishly pink celebrity magazine.

Weiss twitched. Ruby meanwhile, had shifted over to the 'bargain bin' corner and was currently digging through the threadbare paperbacks, pausing to giggle at the covers involving vampires with over-large cartoonish canines protruding from their lips. Some of them actually made her wheeze, especially one involving a lady in a red bodice fainting into the arms of a hairy werewolf.

Weiss, thankfully, had more class than that. She went over to the bookshelves at the back and starting pouring over the harder-to-read titles. The one with actual glyphs decorating their spines, arranged like snowflakes or lace doilies over the leather bends, drew her attention most and she found a few which actually looked useful. Carefully electing three which didn't look as though they would fall apart as soon as they touched the air outside, she carried them over to the desk.

'Ahem,' she announced, as soon as it became clear that the bookseller found the 'ten top tips for making your woman look more like Lisa Lavender' more riveting than an actual customer.

He looked up. And a few creases wrinkled his brow. 'Junk,' he pronounced with all the finality of someone who had played a lacklustre video-game for a few hours. 'But hey, if you want 'em lady...'

'I do want them,' Weiss stated, ice in her tone. She didn't have time for idiots.

To her left, Ruby snorted and doubled over. 'Weiss, Weiss! You'll never believe this passage I found. 'Slowly, the huntress shifted forward, lips puckering to welcome the bewitching green of the frog's oily skin. And as they made contact, she thought, it's not so bad, no different than licking ICE-CEEEEEEEEEEAAAAM!' This last word was caught in a hysterical scream, blurted out at Weiss like Ruby thought she was deaf or something. And then the red-hooded girl fell over in a spasm of laughter.

'Hey lady, you gonna buy that book you're mocking?'

Weiss found herself admiring the irate scowl the bookseller now sported and the slightly reddened flex of his jaw. She didn't have much sympathy though. Ruby was a pain, but she had never disrespected someone else's taste in books.

'Oh, sorry, yes, yes! I gotta show this to Yang, she'll have a fit!'

Ruby deposited herself next to the desk and bounced eagerly on her toes, book firmly clenched in her hands. Then winced and frantically checked her purse, book tumbling to the counter in her panic.

Weiss sighed and plopped the fallen book onto the top of her own waiting pile.

'I'll buy it. It's less than two Lien after all.'

She tried not to feel too pleased at the grateful look Ruby flashed her. Maybe the girl was like some sort of puppy after all.

The bookseller sighed and grumbled, especially after Weiss caught sight of the brown wrapping paper he was trying to hide beneath his shin and demanded he wrap up their purchases with haste.

'Soooo...' Yang trailed off, unnerving grin in place as she towered over Weiss. 'How'd your little date go?'

Weiss raised an eyebrow. Unlike Ruby, Yang had a talent for riling people up without making them want to explode.

'Not a date,' she said firmly. 'But it did have its...let's call them perks.'

Yang laughed and clapped a friendly hand on her shoulder. 'Whatever. My sister's way out of your league.'

Weiss turned, to see Ruby reading out loud a passage of her newly purchased 'Thirty Shades of Oily Green' to Blake, who looked as if she was seconds away from bringing out her Gambol Shroud. Ruby however, looked thoroughly undaunted by this possibility; instead she was gleeful and bouncy, her voice rising and falling in short jerks of volume in time to the excited hand that she was using as a makeshift frog prop. In short, she was acting just like usual. Small, annoying, and a dolt.

But the world, Weiss had to admit, was a lot prettier, a lot more right, when Ruby Rose was smiling in it.

'No,' she said truthfully. 'I think she's out of everybody's league.'

And she refused to elaborate when Yang suspiciously pestered her to know if she meant in a 'good way or a bad way.'

Both, Weiss thought, but did not say. And would refuse to say, for many months to come.