Since I generally try to keep a few chapters as buffer, this was actually written right after I watched episode 8, which amuses me.

94. Penmanship

Jacques Schnee's office might not have been the absolute last place Sun would've expected himself to end up... except, no, it definitely was. He jumped when Neptune shut the door behind him. The room was freezing, and silent as a tomb. Cluttered with photographs, most of them of Weiss' dad when he was younger. One family shot that was jarring by contrast, when he'd just seen Willow and the children playing with Glacier. They looked like they were getting ready for a funeral.

"Make sure you put everything back exactly where you found it," Weiss said—her voice instinctively hushed. "He'll notice if you don't."

She and Blake both looked like they'd snap if they were wound any tighter. Sun took a risk and whispered, "I don't know why, but I thought it would smell more like mothballs." Weiss glared at him, but he thought he caught her trying to hide a smile. And, really, what was the big deal? They were just casually poking around the personal space of one of the scariest people in Remnant.

Sun was careful not to move anything, at first, but the place was so neat that there was really only so much he could do without opening drawers and rifling around inside filing cabinets. He winced every time he made a noise, as if the old man could hear him from the first floor.

"Uh..." Neptune said, holding up a file. "I'm pretty sure the money here doesn't add up."

Weiss crossed the room to read over his shoulder. "Neptune, that's a tax document."

"Yeah."

She pinched the bridge of her nose. "One, we're not auditing him. And two, that isn't news. I'm sure if we looked closer we could figure out which legal loophole he's using but it really doesn't matter."

"Oh."

Weiss turned away, but stopped before she could go back to the cabinet she'd been searching. "Blake?"

She'd gone still, holding something she'd found on a shelf. Sun and Neptune glanced at one another, and both lost the fight with their curiosity. Blake was holding an old album that, judging by the noise it made when opened, had gone untouched for a long time.

Tucked inside was a wedding photograph. Willow beamed at the camera, while Jacques looked... a bit stiff, maybe, but he'd looped an arm over her shoulders in a way that made it hard to imagine that this was the same person they'd just met. A dragon's head poked in from one side, its neck looping around the newly-weds. Its eyes were pale blue, almost exactly like Weiss'.

"Sorry," Blake muttered.

"It's fine." Weiss bit her lip. "I've never seen a picture of her before."

Sun touched the edge of the page. It wasn't laminated—just a clear plastic sleeve that photos could be slipped in and out of. "Take it," he blurted, before he could think better of it.

"What?"

"Take it. It's yours too, right? And he's not looking at it. It'll be years before he notices."

"If you folded it, like, right here—" Neptune poked the space between Jacques and Willow. "You'd have a great picture of your mom and Snowflake."

"Or we could get a pen and give him a dumb hat," Sun suggested. Blake elbowed him hard in the stomach, and he had to bend over and wheeze.

"We should keep looking," Weiss said, but her fingers curled around the photograph. She glanced over her shoulder towards the door, then slipped it out of the album and into her pocket.

"Man," Sun said, a while later. "I'm feeling kinda useless here. I keep finding his junk mail and crap. Look at this!" He waved the letter he'd just picked up. "I swear, give it ten more minutes and I'm gonna find an ad for penis enlargement—"

Weiss stared at him, horrified. Her mouth slightly open.

Sun went over the last few words that had come out of his mouth. "Uh, sorry, bad joke!"

But she wasn't listening to him. She snatched the letter right out of his hands and breathed, "This is it."

Weiss' hands shook as she held the letter. It was hard to decipher the writing—all of it was in a thin, elegant scrawl that was nearly illegible... but very familiar.

"I'm confused," Neptune said. "That definitely looks like junk mail."

Our deepest thanks ... humbled by the gravity of your generosity ... on behalf of Mantle Sugarworks United. It was the sort of letter Father probably received dozens of every month, from various charities he'd donated to. Irrelevant. Except that there was no such thing as Mantle Sugarworks United, and it was signed, Dr. Arthur Watts.

"I recognize the writing."

Blake stiffened up. "Watts?" She squinted at the body of the letter. "Is this code?"

"I'm not sure."

Weiss flipped the paper over. There was a pen-and-ink sketch of a cake. With your help, we've been able to launch several new recipes.

She skimmed frantically back and forth, wrinkling the letter as she backed up into the center of the office. There was more—appreciation for a shipment of icing Father had apparently funded, a not-so-subtle hint that he might have shared information about ice dragons. But why? Why would he risk losing the monopoly he'd fought so hard to maintain?

New recipes.

To get a stranglehold on more dragon types. There was no way he was only accidentally complicit in all this, no possibility of him being tricked or coerced into helping, somehow. He was actively helping them.

"We need to show this to the General," she said. "Now."

Peter would be the first to say that Glynda was good at many things... but hiding contempt was not one of them.

"And you have no video recordings of the incident," she drawled. "Just as your driver can't recall whether or not the attackers were wearing White Fang masks."

"They must have been," Jacques said carelessly. "Who else would be so eager to steal from me?"

"I would think that she would have noticed if they were with the White Fang."

"The incident was quite traumatic, I'm sure. All sorts of details escape a person's notice."

Glynda scoffed. "You seem to have quite the fixation on them."

"They've been difficult to ignore."

"A-hem," Peter interrupted. "Mister Schnee, have you considered the possibility that these ruffians were motivated, not by a wish to harm you, but a desire for the chemicals they stole?"

Jacques raised one perfectly sculpted eyebrow. "Why," he said, his gaze turning sharp, "I simply can't imagine why anyone would want something so useless that it's been moldering away in storage for almost a decade. Can you?"

Peter cleared his throat again, much more nervously. "Ah, well, perhaps some heretofore undiscovered use..."

But Glynda cut in before Jacques could reply. "Why was such a useless chemical being moved in the first place? Why not leave it in storage?"

Jacques heaved a put-upon sigh. "New zoning laws. The warehouse I had been using was converted into a residential area. An unfortunate occupational hazard in Mantle, with how prone the population is to multiplying."

Glynda opened her mouth to reply—but before she had the chance, the sound of running feet stopped her. All three of them turned to face the grand staircase just as four students thundered down into the main foyer. Weiss and Blake were near the back, both looking very grave, with Sun and...

Neptune skidded to a stop on the landing, jabbed a finger into the air, and shouted, "J'accuse!"

Weiss slapped his shoulder. He seemed to realize what he'd just done, went pink around the ears, and hid behind Sun.

Jacques went red again. "What is the meaning of this?" he roared. "I told you all to get out!"

Weiss held up an envelope. "I found this in your office."

He waved a hand. "Yes, yes, I'm sure you find that invoice very damning, but the adults are talking—"

"It's signed by Doctor Watts."

Everyone went quiet, at that. Peter signaled to Pepper as inconspicuously as he could, telling her to get ready in case Jacques made a run for it.

But he only folded his arms and said, "You broke into my office."

"You're working for him."

Jacques bristled. "I'm funding him, yes. He's a brilliant scientist, and I have every right to invest in people who I think will give me results."

"What kinds of results are those, exactly?"

He rolled his eyes. "If you've read that letter, and if you've learned anything from me, you know perfectly well."

"I want you to say it."

Their voices had been rising steadily—now there was a scuffling sound from outside, and Specter poked his head inside. Steele and Glacier followed suit soon after, and the rest of the Schnees were dragged over the threshold trying to keep them from further destroying the foyer.

Jacques spared them only a glance. "Very well," he said, his voice clear and crisp. "He will give me another elemental."

Dead silence. Confused, in the case of the newcomers. Horrified for everyone else.

"Now, if you're all quite finished tramping about in my house?" He gestured towards the door. "I believe we're done here. Unless you're planning to kidnap me? Kill me? No?"

His eyes swept over Winter, Whitley, and Weiss, each in turn. "Then get out. And don't expect any sympathy from me when you get yourselves arrested and your creatures put down."

Weiss took a step forward, and Winter opened her mouth to shout—but the only sound, in the end, was a soft whimper. Glacier had withdrawn his head until only one eye showed through the doorway. One paw was wrapped protectively around Whitley. He let out a quiet, betrayed, "Ock?"

Jacques didn't even look at him. "Take him, if you like. The first gravity egg will be mine, and that will serve until the Council take him back. I suspect he'll be much more manageable after that."

Peter didn't understand. No one did, at first—except for Specter, who reared up and smashed his shoulders against the top of the door frame. And Weiss, who let out a wordless snarl and launched herself at him.

Blake and Sun each caught one of her arms. Specter whimpered and backed up, his tail lashing, until Steele covered him with a wing. Horrified realization dawned on Winter's face. Her hand came down on the handle of her pistol and clenched there, white-knuckled. Ragnar's paw punched through a window, raining glass down on the marble tiles, and his growl shook the whole room.

It took too long for Peter to realize. Long after Glynda had stiffened up and hissed the most vicious curse she knew under her breath. After his students had clenched their fists and moved to block the way to Glacier. Even after little Oscar had started to look sick. It just wasn't in him to imagine a rider doing that to his own dragon.

Glacier cocked his head in confusion. He'd never seen those devices before. But Whitley, who'd only heard of them, wrapped his arms around the great dragon's neck and said, "I won't let you."

"I made you everything you are," Jacques sneered, "and you think you can steal from me. You'll regret that." He turned on his heel and swept back towards the stairs. It took the combined efforts of Blake, Sun, and Neptune to keep Weiss away from him as he strode past her, into the destroyed upper stories of the manor.

"I'll kill him!"

"Weiss."

"Don't tell me to calm down, Winter!"

"I'm not. I'm telling you that you're scaring him."

Glacier whimpered. Everyone was so angry, and he didn't understand why. Specter wouldn't come out from under Steele's wing, and Ragnar kept stomping his feet and sending ominous ripples through the ground.

The small Jacques was crying.

Glacier picked him up by the little handle on his coat and pulled him behind his wing. There they stayed while the others started loading onto the big flying metal box. He didn't really want to go back on it, but he would do it if it meant going back to the school.

In the meantime, he wanted to be alone. So Glacier took the little one and lay down behind the barn, where he and Snowflake used to play. There he could sing to him and lick away the tears.

Everything had gotten so confusing, like it always did when Jacques came. He nudged the little one, hoping that he would explain why he was crying.

"Sorry," he mumbled. "I shouldn't be..."

Another nudge.

The small one looked up at him. "Do you... do you know about Penny?"

Penny was the metal thing that sometimes talked like a dragon, and sometimes like a rider. She had offered to translate for him, but he'd been too embarrassed and had run away. He cocked his head and barked.

"Well, they made more of Penny. Except not like her, because they're not alive. But they can... make dragons do things."

Glacier let out a confused yip. That just sounded like riders, to him.

"Father wants to give you one of those. So that you'd have to listen to him."

The little one still wasn't making any sense. He did listen to Jacques! Mostly.

A hand behind his jaw, scratching at his favorite spot. His eyes drifted halfway shut. "It would mean... if he told you to do something, like stay away from me, you'd have to do it."

Glacier pushed his snout against the small Jacques' chest. He didn't want the little ones to go away. "Nnn," he said. "No."

"No," the little one agreed. "He'll have to go through everyone else, first. Specter and Steele, and Weiss and Winter, and... me. We won't let him."

He curled his tail around himself. He didn't want Jacques and the little ones to fight...

"I won't let him." Heat crept into the small one's voice. He hugged Glacier fiercely around the neck, and hot tears landed on his scales. "Not ever. I'll f-fight him if I have to, I don't care if he hatched you. You're mine and I'm yours and I don't want another dragon."

Glacier whimpered. The words left a tight feeling in his chest, and he curled up around the small Jacques. Except, all of a sudden, he didn't seem so small. And he didn't sound like Jacques at all.

He held the human against his chest and nuzzled his hair. It still hurt, and maybe it would always hurt, but it was good. Much better than the lonely stall. Better, even, than those perfect hands.

"Lee," he rumbled, and shut his eyes.

It was cold outside. Willow hadn't brought a jacket, hadn't thought she'd wind up standing outside the now-destroyed front doors of the manor. Hadn't thought she'd see Weiss and Winter now, or Whitley ever again.

Was she dreaming? It seemed impossible, when a gust of wind picked up and she shivered. A nearby fire dragon noticed, and pressed its warm flank against her back. She shuddered. The blonde girl from Weiss' team patted its side.

But they were leaving, now. Filing one by one onto the dragon carrier. Willow beckoned her daughters to her, and threw her arms around them one last time. "Stay safe," she whispered.

They exchanged a guilty look.

"As safe as you can," Willow corrected herself, and felt a chill that had nothing to do with the weather. She'd lost Whitley, and he'd come back. She couldn't take any more.

Or maybe she could. That wasn't the first time she'd thought she'd lost all she could stand.

She drifted away from the warmth of the dragon and towards the manor door. Hesitated. She'd wanted to say goodbye to Whitley...

A head poked out in front of her, blinking at her with familiar blue eyes. Glacier whined and prodded her with his nose. Willow put a shaky hand on his snout and said, "Thank you." She took another step. He fretted and pawed the ground.

"I'm sorry," Willow mumbled. "I have to..."

His ears drooped. His body flattened against the ground, and he whimpered pathetically.

"Glacier," Whitley sighed. "Leave her be."

She had to go home. Didn't she?

Had to return to the empty halls, the cold nights, the days spent in a fugue of alcohol and grief. She was spent. Useless.

Glacier butted his head against her once more, and stared at her with those fathomless eyes of his. She'd always thought they were fitting, for Jacques' dragon—deep enough to drown in. But they were warmer now than they'd been in decades, as if he'd done the impossible and put some of his pieces back together. Willow hugged him around the neck, trying not to break down again at the feeling of cool scales under her fingers.

Her feet left the ground.

All three of her children started talking at once. She heard, "No, Glacier!" and "Put her down!" and "Careful!" For an instant her arms strained with the effort of holding herself up, and she thought she might fall. But then he placed her gently on his back, just behind Whitley.

Her son pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm fairly sure that's illegal," he told the dragon, in that peculiar tone he'd picked up during his absence—the one that said he knew perfectly well that the dragon would do whatever he wanted anyway, and arguing with him was futile.

"I'm sure he'll make a case for kidnapping," Winter agreed.

Weiss put a hand on Glacier's flank. "Compared to everything else we're doing, I doubt it matters. The important thing is..."

Whitley twisted to look at Willow. "Do you want to come?"

She stared at him. "I... what?"

"He wants to bring you with us."

"Oh." She swayed, and might have fallen off if she hadn't steadied herself against Whitley's shoulders. Even though years had passed, it hurt to touch Glacier and remember who he wasn't. But somehow the sharp pain was intoxicating after spending all that time haunting her children's empty rooms like a ghost. It felt like waking up.

"Yes," she said, and hugged Whitley. "I think I'd like that."