Hello folks! This chapter we've got more of the Schneeblings and Glacier, Harpy learning new things, and newcomers.

87. Empty Saddle

The next morning, Winter was in a meeting with the General and Atlas' remaining professors when an imperious bark interrupted her mid-sentence. She stopped. Sighed. "Would you all excuse me?"

General Ironwood waved her off. "We're just about done here, anyway."

When she strode outside, she found Steele waiting for her with an apologetic droop to his ears. Glacier, on the other hand, showed no sign of remorse. He barked again and gave her a sniff, then nudged her over towards where Whitley and a slightly disheveled Weiss stood at his feet.

"Glacier," she began, "I have to—" He butted his head against her side. She rolled her eyes and stroked his nose. "I have work to do."

Weiss grimaced and pushed her bangs out of her eyes. Her hair was up in an unusually messy ponytail. It occurred to Winter that if this was fairly early for her, it would be very early for the students, especially since they were supposed to be getting some much-deserved rest right about now.

"Glacier," she repeated, giving him a stern look. "We will see you later, but right now I need to get to work and Weiss needs to go back to sleep."

He stared at her, blinking guilelessly.

She frowned. "Soon," she tried, "just not right now—"

"He knows," Whitley said. He seemed completely unsurprised by any of this, and was still wearing the same clothes as he had the day before. "He just wants you to think he doesn't."

Glacier's affronted snort left her brother's hair sticking up in every direction. He smoothed it down again without missing a beat and gave the dragon a shove with all his weight behind it. "Go on," he said. "This way. They'll stay with us for a little while and then go do whatever it is they do all day."

With this compromise reluctantly accepted, Glacier led the way to a small hill overlooking the rest of the campus. The morning air was still chilly—which meant that Whitley was the only one of them who seemed at all comfortable. Weiss, who'd probably gotten dressed before she'd fully woken up, was shivering. She shot a wistful look towards the dorm building she and her friends were staying in. "I don't suppose you'd let me get a blanket?"

Glacier dropped a mud-spattered backpack at her feet.

"Biggest pocket, at the bottom," Whitley said, without looking.

Weiss dug through several books of matches, a thermos, and a waterproof poncho before she found the blanket. She wrinkled her nose a little before draping it over her shoulders. The shivering stopped.

"Where did you get all this?" Winter asked, gesturing at the backpack—and more generally at his boots and coat, which she was quite sure she'd never seen before.

"I stole it."

She choked. "Whitley!"

"What? I had no shoes and no money."

"No shoes?" Weiss stared at him. "How did that happen?"

His ears went pink. "That's not the point. And they weren't waterproof, anyway. It's not like they let me pack first."

"...Is that Rusty's jacket?"

Winter blinked. "Who—?"

"Yes." Whitley tugged it a little tighter around himself. "He let me borrow it. I was going to give it back, but... well..."

"He can't have been with them."

"I don't think so." Whitley frowned. "I never saw him, and there was someone else in the stables instead. I'm not sure what happened to him."

"Who in Remnant is Rusty?" Winter demanded.

"He works at the stable."

"Since a few years after you left," added Weiss.

"Oh." It hurt more than it had any right to, hearing that. Steele's shoulders hunched a little in sympathy, but he knew her well enough not to say anything.

Glacier had no such compunctions. He whined and bumped her with his nose, and then both her siblings were staring at her. Winter had to resist the urge to scowl at him. She sighed. "I'm... sorry. For leaving you two like that. I know it can't have been easy."

Weiss drew her knees up to her chest. "It wasn't," she said softly. "But I know why you needed to do it. And it helped me leave, too."

Whitley scoffed. "What, am I supposed to thank those brigands for getting me out of the manor, now?"

Winter flinched.

"That's completely different," Weiss snapped.

He rolled his eyes. "If you say so. I didn't notice much of a difference, after she left." Glacier flicked Whitley with his tail. "Ouch. What now, you meddling lizard?"

Glacier's eyes narrowed. Whitley gave his head a light shove. "Well, it didn't! It's not as if she was around much to begin with."

"Whitley!" Weiss hissed.

"No. I understand." It wasn't until Steele followed her example that Winter was aware she'd stood up. "I should get back to the General," she said, and strode off.

Not fast enough to avoid hearing Weiss blurt, "Winter—", or Glacier's disappointed whine.

"What?" Whitley huffed, into the silence.

"She's trying, Whitley," Weiss snapped.

He scoffed at that, and she had to resist the urge to smack him upside the head. "I didn't think we were in the habit of calling failure good enough."

"Since when has that attitude done anything except make us miserable?"

"Oh! My mistake! If it'll make her feel better to pretend she wasn't wasting her time and ours—"

"Just because you'd rather suck up to him—"

A low moan ended the argument as abruptly as if a gunshot had gone off. Glacier had buried his nose in his paws and flattened his ears against his head. He whimpered, once, and huddled his wings tighter around himself.

Both of them deflated at once. Whitley moved to the dragon's side and scratched between his ears until he stopped hiding, and Weiss hummed a few bars of the song he liked so much. "Sorry, Glacier," she murmured. "You're right. We shouldn't be fighting." Not in front of him, anyway.

Glacier opened one eye, then closed it again and lay his head on the ground. His tail flopped lifelessly behind him.

Whitley rolled his eyes. "Don't be such a drama queen. We're not shouting anymore, see?"

He made an affirmative rumbling sound, but still didn't move. Whitley sighed and rubbed his neck. "You'd better not be planning to drag me off to the woods again," he said—though there was a wistful note in his voice. Then, with a visibly pained expression, "I... suppose we could bring Winter back here."

One of Glacier's ears flicked lethargically, but he didn't jump at the chance. Whitley frowned. "Glacier? Are you alright?"

He whined again and pressed his nose into Whitley's jacket. Both of them were quiet for a while, focusing on petting him and hoping that might bring a little life back into him. Weiss tried humming to see if he would whistle along. He didn't, but he seemed to like the sound, so she kept it up.

Whitley wished he was back in Solitas.

Sure, Atlas Dragonry had indoor heating, and real food, and mattresses... but the campfires he and Oscar built were just as warm, and the two of them had just started getting the hang of cooking, and he'd kept sleeping with Glacier in the water barns anyway. And if he had to listen to this stupid song one more time—

Well. No. It wasn't stupid when Glacier sang it.

He probably liked being able to sing with someone else.

Minutes passed. Weiss kept singing, and he kept drifting backwards in time to places he didn't much care to go. He wound up tighter and tighter until he would have been glad for any interruption.

Even the one he got.

His first warning was footsteps coming around the corner of the earth barn. They were sitting in between it and the water barn—Glacier seemed to like the tight space, and Weiss was probably more comfortable out of the wind. The dragon's ears pricked up, slowly, like moving even that much was an enormous effort.

Then the faunus girl rounded the corner, and he was on his feet so quickly that Weiss and Whitley were both knocked on their backs. He hissed, ruffling up the spines on his neck and face. It somewhat spoiled the effect when he tried to mantle his wings and knocked them against the barn walls instead, but he made up for it by baring his fangs.

She took several long steps back and held her hands at her sides, palm-out. "Sorry," she said, and she would have seemed completely unruffled if her ears hadn't gone flat the same way Glacier's sometimes did. "I didn't know you were back here."

"Oh, for the love of—" Weiss pushed herself to her feet and strode out in front of Glacier. "No."

He made a confused yipping sound.

Her expression softened. "I know you don't like strangers. It makes perfect sense that you don't. But it's going to be very difficult to spend time with you if you keep hissing at my friends."

Tentatively, Glacier reached out and tried to nudge her behind him with one paw.

"No," she said again, gently but firmly. "It's alright, Glacier. She won't touch you. Won't come near you at all, in fact. She can sit by me, right over here." Weiss stopped about fifteen feet away, and gestured for the faunus to join her. She hesitated, then walked over and sat down.

Reluctantly, Glacier did the same. He didn't lie all the way back down, though—he kept his head up and his eyes open, alert in case the girl tried anything. Which was patently ridiculous, she'd have to be a complete idiot to start anything right now... but Whitley did prefer it to the lifeless sprawling from earlier.

"I don't believe you've been introduced properly," Weiss said. "Glacier, Whitley, this is my teammate Blake. Blake, my brother and my father's dragon."

"I'd guessed that much," Blake said, with a wry grin.

"Oh?" It was times like these when Whitley wished he could raise only one eyebrow like his sisters did. "I wouldn't have thought she'd talked about us much. She's certainly never mentioned you," he added, before realizing that it was a bit of a stupid insult, considering yesterday had been the first time in months that she'd seen him.

Weiss groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Well," said Blake, looking deeply uncomfortable, "she did talk to us about you... disappearing."

Whitley blinked. "Oh."

Weiss glared at him. "Yes, oh. And I still can't believe you were completely fine and wandering around in the woods almost the entire time."

"That wasn't my fault," Whitley said, indignant. "Glacier didn't want to fly."

Then he froze, because blaming the dragon—even though it was absolutely true—might not be the best idea at the moment. But Glacier didn't seem to mind. He was giving Blake a chilly, narrow-eyed stare, and only flicked an ear in agreement.

"Well." Weiss pursed her lips. "We didn't know that."

Whitley sat there, completely unable to form words, because... well, it hadn't really hit him until that moment that yes, she'd probably been worried about him. Not that it mattered! He'd been kidnapped, there had probably been complete strangers worrying about him.

Weiss didn't speak, either. Just sort of sat there with a far-off look on her face until Blake gently bumped her shoulder. And that was when Whitley noticed for the first time that they were sitting right next to each other—since when did Weiss allow such blatant breaches of personal space? No, she'd been the second to sit down. So why...?

Blake left soon after that, since Glacier was getting restless. But it was plenty of time for Whitley to notice Weiss laughing at quite a few things she said that were, objectively, not funny. Once she was gone, he folded his arms and said, "Well? What was that about?"

"What?"

"You like her, don't you?"

Weiss blurted out, "Wha—no!" apparently completely on instinct. Then, "I mean, yes. I do. But I don't see how that's any of your business."

Whitley made a face. "I'd much rather it wasn't. But... really? Why?"

She folded her arms and glared defiantly back at him. "Because she's brave, and passionate, and kind, and..." Words apparently failed her. "Look, it's a difficult emotion to explain even if I was good at this sort of thing, which I am not, so would you drop it?"

"I'm just asking."

"Well, you don't see me asking about that boy Ragnar adopted, do you?"

Whitley's ears went bright red. "What does Oscar have to do with anything?!"

"Nothing," Weiss said airily. "Nothing at all."

He dropped the subject like a hot coal.

Somewhere above Gigas, there was a deep sigh.

"Go on," Ursan rumbled, and gave him a little push. "Go outside. I know you want to."

Gigas didn't stir. He didn't want to, today. Even now all sorts of new and exciting smells were coming in through the open doors, but he didn't feel like chasing after them. He wanted to lie in Ursan's lap like a lump.

Ursan rubbed his head. Gigas closed his eyes and went limp, his tail sprawling pathetically across the floor, too lethargic even to wag. "What's wrong with you, huh?" his rider wondered, and gave him little scratch under the chin with his pinky finger.

Nothing was wrong. He wasn't sick, and he could still fit through the little flap in the stable door. Except he'd had a dream, last night.

"I saw you kicking in your sleep. Nightmare?"

No. Not a nightmare. He'd been back in the camp, and there'd been a little flap in the tent, and the rope leashes had been gone. It had taken a long time to convince Flux to follow him out, but once he'd done it Justice and Harbinger and Harpy were there, and they'd all chased each other between the tents and crates and into the trees.

Justice was right. It was wrong to be happy here.

"Whatever it was, you need to get out. Go talk to one of the other dragons." Ursan nudged Gigas off his lap with his good arm. The bad one still hurt him if he used it too much.

Harpy's fault.

Gigas whined. He didn't want to talk to the other dragons, he wanted to talk to Flux.

"I don't give a damn if it's one of theirs. Just... don't just lay there."

He knew he was making Ursan sad, so he hauled himself out of the flap and padded across the floor of the barn. Maybe he could go find Freya—she seemed like she wouldn't mind lying down and doing nothing for a while.

"—and if you ever nervous, or uncomfortable, or anything, you'll tell me, right?" Pyrrha asked, shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot.

Ruby just smiled at her. "Yep!"

She sighed. "I'm overdoing it, aren't I?"

"No, no!" Ruby waved her hands frantically. "I mean, I get why you're worried and everything."

"I know. I'm sorry to ask, it's just... well, I think she's been making some progress with Ren and Nora and their dragons, but I don't like to keep asking them all the time and she's going to need to get used to other people eventually, so..."

Ruby put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm happy to help, Pyrrha. And I'm just sitting with her a few minutes so she gets used to me, right? That sounds fun!" Honestly, if it meant Pyrrha would keep smiling this much she'd be happy to do pretty much anything. Even writing a giant essay or something. Ten minutes hanging out with Harpy was something she'd have wanted to do anyway, so it was extra worth it!

Except, she couldn't help but notice, "Um... what about Jaune and Twiggy?"

Pyrrha winced. "They... don't get along. We're working on it."

"Sorry!" Ruby blurted in a panic. "I didn't mean—!"

"It's okay." Pyrrha sighed and nodded towards the space between two barns. "Thank you again for doing this."

Pyrrha went in first, with Ruby right behind her and Storm at the rear. It was sort of weird seeing Storm tower over another dragon. She had to bend her head down to touch her nose to Harpy's. Then the hybrid snorted and pulled back to stare at Penny. Her eyes narrowed.

"That's Penny," Ruby said. "She's, um..." How to explain androids to a dragon that had probably never seen a computer before... "She's a dragon! Kinda. But instead of hatching like you and Storm or getting born like me, she was built!"

Harpy gave Penny another wary sniff.

"Hello, friend!"

The hybrid leaped into the air, twisting in midair so that she landed in a crouch with her eyes bugging halfway out of her head. Ruby was pretty proud of herself for not laughing.

"I'm sorry, did I startle you?"

Harpy hissed.

"Penny can also help translate," Ruby said quickly—because it would kinda suck if Harpy got off on the wrong foot with her, too. "If there's anything you wanted to tell us?"

She snorted and tossed her head. Ruby didn't really need Penny to tell her, "She says no, thank you." And she was pretty sure Penny had added the thank you part.

Still, she seemed to relax a little as time went on. She even chatted a little with Storm, and listened with increasing interest when Penny talked about herself and how she came to be. Pyrrha sat down beside her with her back to the dragon's chest, and Harpy curled a foreleg around her.

They stayed longer than a few minutes. Long enough that Ruby was starting to think about excusing herself so she could find some dinner when a noise cut through their conversation like a gunshot. The cry of a dragon—but not just calling out like Ragnar had. Scared.

Ruby was up and running in an instant. She couldn't see much of the sky from between the barns, and then she burst out into open air and craned her neck and—

She recognized them instantly. Rudder's oily scales were hard to miss, and she'd spent so many wonderful afternoons lying in the grass with Emerald and Jade.

Jade, whose saddle was empty. Who hadn't been the one to make the sound. Who didn't make a sound now, either, as she half-flew, half-plummeted towards the academy grounds. Holding something in her talons.