A/N: Just a note, I know little of comic!verse, especially when it comes to comic specific characters. That being said, I know I'm probably butchering Barney's character, but for the moment he's just a minor supporting character, so I'm not too concerned.


"…are you even listening?"

Clint's eyes darted up from his breakfast plate to his mother, sitting across from him at the table. "Hm? Yeah, totally. Hanging on every word."

Her expression said otherwise.

The second she continued with her barrage of political matters, the young man turned his attention back to his meal of ham and eggs. Honestly, he was still irritated that his father and brother had, once again, left him to tend to the lands as they gallivanted around on a hunting trip in the wilderness.

"Clint…" her tone made it clear what was coming. "What am I going to do with you?"

He shrugged, shoveling in another forkful of food. "Nothing."

"You can't carry on like this. Your behavior is inexcusable! I will not have my son drinking himself to the floor every evening and sleeping with every woman he stumbles upon. You're a grown man, and a Lord, at that, you need to start acting like one."

This wasn't a new speech. In fact, he was almost certain he heard it on a bi-weekly basis at this point.

"I've never gotten any complaints."

"I know," was her deadpanned response, and quite literally. In fact, after last night's romp in the sack (Clint hadn't been aware a woman could scream so loudly in pleasure), the entire country probably knew.

His gaze hardened. "I'm not Barney, mother, and I never will be."

"That's not-" his mother paused for a sigh before going on, "and I'm not asking you to be. All I'm saying is you need to start thinking with your brain. Your upper brain."

That's what the conversation always came down to: his behavior vs. his brother's. Barney was smart, calm, happily married, the perfect characteristics for a leader, and he seemed genuinely interested in it, too. Exactly what their parents wanted their sons to be.

Not that Clint resented his older brother in any way. No, quite the opposite, he was pleased that Barney took such an interest in the politics and fine print of ruling. It gave Clint the perfect excuse to not care for any of those frivolities, instead providing him the opportunity to actually enjoy life (something he had no clue how his brother actually managed).

And so, as long as brother dearest continued his prolonged desire for such things, Clint would go on living his life to the fullest.

"What he needs is the hand of a woman to set him straight." It was with that that Clarisse, Barney's wife, made her entrance, taking a seat beside Lady Barton. Just what he needed, two women who thought they knew how to run his life better than he.

"I've got plenty," he snapped, barely refraining from adding 'and some whose hands were more than adequately skilled'.

Any reply she could've made was interrupted by the dining room doors bursting open, revealing a panting and banged up Barney. Both women were immediately on their feet, rushing to his side, holding him up as he staggered. The longer Clint analyzed him, the worse his wounds seemed. Clothes torn, cuts, scrapes, smears of blood, the most evident a slice across his forehead.

"Red Union," he managed, coughing a stream of blood as he did so. "Ambushed. Kidnapped father, up north. I don't-" His strength seemed to give way, collapsing unconscious to the floor, but Clint had heard enough anyways.

A plan had begun formulating in his head as he hastily pushed away from the table, making for the armory down the hall. Catching one of the family's guards on patrol, he grabbed the man's arm, issuing the command, "I need every able bodied knight assembled and armed as quickly as possible."

The man scurried away, leaving Clint to himself as he scavenged the armory. His bow, of course, was his weapon of choice – strong, reliable, able to take out someone before they were aware there was even a threat. Though it wasn't his strongest point, he also strapped on a longsword and, as an afterthought, two daggers and a belt of throwing knives. It may not have been often that he needed them, but when called upon, Clint was more than confident in his combat abilities.

He'd just finished fastening his gear to his horse when Lady Barton finally caught up to him.

"Clint!" she rushed to his side, placing a hand on his upper arm, which he lightly shook off as he sprung into his saddle. "You can't do this, it's a fool's errand. You'd need three times the men to face the Union on a bad day alone."

She was probably right, and maybe if he was thinking clearly, he'd grudgingly admit it. For fourteen years, the Red Union had been a looming threat to the north, ever since their acquisition of the Romanov lands following the family's sudden, tragic death. Yet they never struck out, aside from a single bout with the Starks years ago that ended in a reinforced northern border, but nothing more. Their abrupt actions seemed odd on top of alarming, all the more reason Clint had to do something. He was tired of sitting around on the sidelines.

"You're throwing your life away," his mother urged, eyes boring into his, pleading. But he wouldn't be deterred.

"The longer we wait," he argued in return, "the more father's life is put at stake. If we can attack before they're expecting, catch them off their guard-"

"You haven't the forces to even attempt such a thing!"

True. The fifty or so men Clint had managed to gather were meager, at best, but it still gave them somewhat of a fighting chance.

His mother, aware she couldn't win, let out a sigh. "Burnes Hollow. That's where Barney said your father was taken. Please, Clint," her voice caught as her hand slipped from its place upon her son's thigh, "come back alive."

The trek north was nothing short of painful. Maybe a third of the soldiers had horses; the rest had to foot the journey. It was sundown by the time Clint led his troops across the river marking the border between the Barton's land and the Union's, though the sun had long since been hidden by a thick layer of snowfall.

The men were uneasy. Horses snorted, spooking and prancing beneath their riders. Even the forest lining the path seemed unearthly still, silent, tense.

Clint unsheathed his sword uneasily as they filed their way into the open ground of Burnes' Hollow. Any traces of an earlier skirmish would, of course, be gone by now, but that didn't stop him from scouring the area sharply. Finding nothing amiss, they marched on, continuing along the road northbound.

It was completely dark when the sharp clangs of steel-on-steel disturbed the silence, from the rear of the group. Wheeling his mount, Clint turned in time to see a mass of soldiers emerging from the trees on either side, surrounding his men, weapons drawn. The symbols of red flame on their armor were easily spotted in the open, telltale Union.

"Ambush! To arms, men!"

This wasn't right. Clint had made certain to avoid all known outposts and patrolled roads. There was no way the enemy could've known which way they were coming, or that they were coming at all. Unless…

Unless they'd been sold out.

Well, shit.