IMPORTANT: TRIGGER WARNING FOR DOMESTIC ABUSE AND VIOLENCE

Hello again! This is the Second chapter of Where the Snow Trail Leads and I have to say before we start that this references DOMESTIC ABUSE AND VIOLENCE! I'd like to remind you that this story is rated M for a reason. Anyways, please enjoy this chapter and please leave reviews. It lets me know what you guys want to see in the chapters going forwards. As of now, I do not plan on Weiss/Kakashi being romantically involved with anyone. He has seen too much of the horrors of war and that wouldn't let him relate to anyone in the rwby universe except probably Ozpin and Salem. An argument could be made for Glynda, but I don't see it happening.

Fathers are such strange things. Kakashi more than anyone would know as this was his third father. His first father, the white fang, was a man who Kakashi admired, hated, and grieved for. He had been sent at just 12 years old to fight for a war that his father had failed in, he had hated him when he first killed a man on the frontlines, had hated him when he finally returned back after blood ran under his fingernails and he couldn't wash it off to come home with that fabled blade in his father's stomach as blood ran in the crevices of the wood. Kakashi had stood there in only hate as his father's lifeless eyes refused to meet his own until a civilian had come buy and screamed in terror at the stench of suicide and guilt that covered their small house. He hated his father until he found a second one.

His second father had hair as bright as the leaves in fall and a laugh that even in the midst of his hatred, brought him back from the brink. Minato and Kushina had loved him as their son and pangs of guilt and frustration ate at him whenever he went to visit their graves. He apologized again and again for his failure to care for their son, his cowardice in letting the legacy of the 4th hokage bleed as whips and stones battered his body and all he did was watch. Kakashi was asked to be the protector for their child when they had passed and he was allowed to live a life that wasn't worth scolding in the kitchens for skimming food or hugs from a man who smelled of comfort.

Weiss Schnee does not care for his third father, she knows that Jacque Schnee does not worry for her, she notices the way he ignores all of their siblings and meals are served with an air of indifference. He watches as his older sister and younger brother try to please that man with awards and medals and prizes and he continues to ignore them. Weiss does not hate her father, she does not have the energy to.

Weiss discovers early how her family makes their money. It's a simple infiltration mission that she has done thousands of times before. She reads reports about faunus who are born into mines and forced to work in mines every day until they die. She reads handwritten accounts and begins to see just how much more monstrous humans are than the grimm as they list faunus deaths in numbers, and ask for new shipments only focusing on profit. She reads of the procedure for branding nearly 2 year old babies so that if they ever escape, they can find them again. She reads all of this with a passive face as anger and disgust well deep inside her. Weiss knows that she can kill her father. Ever since the day she lost her eye she has pushed her body to the dust before doing it again. Eyebags are hidden underneath concealer and shaking bones are hidden under years of practice dealing with exhaustion. Weiss at the age of 6 can run a mile in under 3 minutes, 2 if she uses aura, she can escape from the watchful eyes of the bodyguards around her 24/7 with ease, she can kill assassins from the white fang and under companies without batting an eye, and break into the database of nearly every computer if given enough time.

Weiss knows that it would be simple to kill his father, she can create a kunai made of pure ice and knows the exact place to aim for him to die instantly. She can melt the murder weapon and hide all traces of her involvment and no one would ever know she was responsible. Weiss does not kill her father because she knows that by killing her father, someone more ruthless will take his place and his siblings and mother will have nowhere to go. Instead, she begins to use her allowance to donate to peaceful faunus right groups, signing it under a fake name and with cash so no one can trace it back to her. She spends her time not practicing with a sister that is gradually growing more distant but since they're still children is happy to paint her nails and tell her stories about her training and the friends that she is making in school. They do not talk about a father who does not care for them or a mother who is nowhere to be seen, they don't speak about the fact that Weiss has mild frostbite all along her arm and eating at her fingernails, they don't talk about how weiss always has one eye shut and has taken to wearing a mask when no one else is around. Both of them don't mention the bruises that form on Weiss' arms and body when her father has had too much to drink and takes it out on her. They don't mention the times Weiss has pushed her sister and brother into a hidden corner to confront the man only to return after hours with a split lip and glyphs of ice covering pressing against her stomach.

Her father begins to worsen as time goes on. She can see the deranged look of a man ensnared in his greed and only thinking of fortune. Weiss watches with a straight back and head low as his father beats his mother during one of their rare family dinners. She looks straight down as she hears whimpers and yells and breaking of plates and the cracking of her family. She glances at her sister and brother who have their eyes staring down and tears in their eyes and Weiss knows that they know their family is cracking. Winter expressed during dinner that she would be joining a school where after she would join the atlas military. Their mother had congratulated her while her father had expressed his displeasure. After that dinner, she never saw her mother leave her room again, her sister left only a few days later in the middle of the night. She had come into her room after Weiss had woken up from one of the few dreams that didn't leave her forgetting how to breathe and a kunai of ice in her hand. She had kept her breathing steady as her sister sat at the foot of her bed and apologized with choked breaths for leaving her and her brother in this suffocating household built on fear and lies that her father bathed himself in. She apologized for not being a good sister and for letting Weiss lose her eye, she apologized for not knowing how to act around her and slowly drifting away. Weiss kept her eyes closed and allowed her sister to believe she was asleep until her sniffles stopped and she left by gently closing the door.

The next day her father was furious and took it out on them. This wasn't the first time her father had a fit of rage, but it had never escalated to this much. Weiss quickly told her brother to stay out of sight and went to confront him instead. She holds no hate for the man in front of her because she knows that if it ever becomes too much, she can kill him. She is happy to take the beating if it means her mother who is so frail and her brother who is just a child do not have to. She is a man who has been in wars, she has been tortured with the worst genjutsu and beaten to the point of death hundreds of times. Anything that the man hitting him with a cane does is nothing compared to that.

Whitley Schnee always knew that his sister was strange. He sees how her eyes curl up in amused smiles when he talks about the newest video game, how she wears a mask and covers her face with her hand without one. He remembers the first time he is told to stand in the broom closet after a white fang attack cut profits by 3%, he remembers her telling him to not make a sound and only come when she says it's ok to. He was curious and like all children had peeked outside to see his sister gone, so he followed her. He looked into the doorway where Winter was standing and saw his father hit her sister as she laid on the ground, protecting her vitals against his blows. He had almost gasped before Winter clamped his mouth shut and brought a finger to his lips. He continued to watch as blow against blow slammed into a child that should never have to endure such treatment or abuse. That was the first time that he realized just how much his sister cared for him. Weiss would always know when something like this would happen and tell him and his sister to go hide while she dealt with it. One thing was that her father never hit her face, no, he needed for her to sing and greet business partners with an unblemished smile and eyes that were too fake as underneath her dress and black leggings, bruises turned green and yellow when ice hadn't been applied for long enough.

This time, Whitley watched as his father took a bottle of alcohol and smashed it against her face, leaving blood and glass spilling against the marble floors that were paid for with faunus' lives. He watched as his sister stood back up again only to be knocked down as Jacques used his cane to wail against her back. He heard the sound of flesh and bone breaking and knew that his sister would spend tonight resetting bones with a combination of hastily made casts and glyphs of ice that would hold her bones together enough that aura could do it's work. Whitley watched for nearly 3 hours as drunken rage propelled his father to madness and all the time Weiss laid on the floor until her father finally collapsed onto his plush leather chair. Only then did Weiss stand up, and Whitley stared in horror as she limped her way over to their father and helped him into his bed. She turned around and caught him looking before reaching into a pocket and bringing out a mask which she carefully put on with one hand. After, she limped out of the room and gave him a small eye smile before heading to her bedroom and Whitley could only cry for his big sister who was too grown up and for the love he received from her.

I hope you enjoyed it, and I have to say I really enjoyed writing Whitley in this narrative. Next chapter will probably see Weiss leaving the family and going to Beacon. I might add just one more scene of Whitley explaining how he got to be like he is in rwby, but we'll see how I feel. Feel free to pm me, and if you want to talk or discuss in a different format, you can ask for my discord. I haven't actually seen past season 5 of RWBY though I intend to do so at some point or other so if anyone could help correct my inaccurate lore, that'd be appreciated.