Qrow nodded at Glynda as he and Clover joined James and Winter in a conference room at Atlas. Qrow sipped from his flask. In an attempt to irritate Winter. He was slightly annoyed that he had not had chance to speak to Glynda before the meeting, but decided to deal with it by talking about his trip to the farm as little as possible at this meeting.

James said, "Thank you for joining us, Qrow. I trust your trip to Mistral was worthwhile."

Qrow said, "Yes. It confirmed the identity of a local villain in Vale as being a renegade hunter in training from Mistral who is probably working with Team Salem."

"We have already determined that a scientist from Atlas is almost certainly behind the W the Unknown propaganda in Vale and helped crash the bullhead carrying the prisoner. I would ask that you only tell Ozpin about him as we are nervous about the damage he could cause to Atlas if this became known before we had chance to update our computers and robots. I am concerned that he has left backdoors into any of the technology he and his two main assistants worked on while here. "

Ironwood handed over photographs of Watts and the two assistants who had disappeared. "I would suggest that you could you an eye out for these three in Vale as well as your criminal."

Winter asked, "How important is your criminal?"

Glynda said, "I suspect he is a contractor rather than a member of Salem's inner circle."

Clover said, "Do you think that he can be turned into a double agent?"

"That will require further consideration."

Qrow said, "My instinct is that it is worth a try."

Ironwood said, "It may be helpful if you could delay approaching him for some time. I am concerned that if you roll up the operation in Vale too early, Salem will ask Watts to cause as much chaos in Atlas as possible. By the way, Qrow, as well as Watts and Torchwick, Salem seems to have recruited someone who can cast illusions which fool electronic surveillance equipment."

"Interesting," replied Qrow. He was glad that he had decided to keep quiet about his other suspicions.

Glynda said, "I will speak to Ozpin about that. However, with the Vytal festival approaching there is a limit to how long a delay we can safely countenance. Also, we know about Torchwick for reasons other than the explosion and the W the unknown campaign."

"Could you at least give me until Polendina and Winter come to Beacon in three weeks' time. We may be in a position to assess the risk better then."

Glynda said, "I will recommend to Ozpin that we delay taking action against him until then other than surveillance."

James turned to Qrow and said, "What do you think your sister is up to?"

"Looking after number one and kidding herself she is looking out for the tribe. You probably have a better idea than us as Mistral is in your backyard."

"Despite representations the Mistral council still refuses to call us in to deal with the Branwen tribe and the White Fang. As she leaves Argus alone there is no great desire on the council here to push the point. Our few intelligence sources suggest that the Branwen tribe have decided that they can make more money by running a protection racket than by raiding, although they do use raids to extend the territory they control each year. One observer says that Grimm attacks within their sphere of influence are less than in the areas immediately outside it."

Qrow thought about it. No matter how much he despised his sister as a human being, she was clever and believed in having a strategy. "She must have a reason for doing business with us. I expect we will find out what it is soon. It is likely to be unwelcome news for Mistral, but something she thinks we can live with if she plays nice with us."

Glynda nodded, "When she split with Ozpin she made it clear that he was not opposing him or seeking an alliance with Salem, and he left her alone because at the time the Branwen tribe was not a major problem. Frankly, for Vale they still are irrelevant. Certainly, the Vale council regards them as Mistral's business and not Vale's."

James turned to Winter and said, "Winter I suggest you visit Mistral and see what our contacts think is happening there. Perhaps we can offer their LGDF forces some surplus outdated weapons"

The meeting finished shortly afterwards. Qrow asked Glynda after the meeting if she wanted to go for a walk. She looked at him and then nodded.

They walked outside ignoring the cold and both watching out for surveillance equipment. While Atlas was an ally and James was fundamentally trustworthy, there were some things which he kept from them relating to Atlas and some things relating to Vale and the rest of Remnant they did not automatically tell him about.

Glynda said, "So Roman Torchwick is Norman Bartleby."

Qrow said "Undoubtedly." He showed the photograph showing a scrawny youth to Glynda who nodded. She then stared again and pointed to a little girl holding a doll.

Qrow said, "Yes. That was what I was thinking."

He sighed, "I hate it when the bad guys have a point. Everyone else in this photograph is dead. The farm was going through tough times, and they could not afford to pay huntsman the going rate. Norman was meant to come back after he had earned his licence and defend the settlement. The local hunters took the view that it was not sensible to keep the farm running and most of their neighbours had already left the area. These people were stubborn, and besides which had sunk all they owned into the farm."

Glynda said, "It is all too common a story."

"This one has some unusual twists. The leader of the settlement had had a combat school education and decided that the best way of avoiding attracting Grimm was to capture two Apathy and keep them under the farm."

Glynda stared at him in disbelief, "What on Remnant was he thinking?"

"He seemed to have decided that two Apathy acted as a tranquilliser and deadened emotions. No fear, no attraction of Grimm. Unfortunately, he had not read enough about the Apathy to realise that they are pack Grimm and seem to be able to sense each other."

"I suppose that he that sent a letter to Norman boasting about his cost cutting idea and before Norman could arrive to tell him how bad an idea it was, they had all died in their beds."

"Almost right. The young girl clearly had a stronger will than the rest of them and was observant. She saw what happened to the others and each day went for a long walk to shake off the influence. She also worked out that the Grimm activated their powers when they were aware of humans. She must have self-activated her aura and found that she had an illusion semblance which allowed her to be invisible to the Grimm."

Glynda looked at him, "How old was she?"

"No more than 12 or 13."

"How do you know this?"

"The leader of the settlement kept a diary. After he took to his bed the little girl wrote in it each day for two weeks while she waited for her cousin Norman to save her. She repeated each day a mantra that she must not be seen that she must make no noise and must not speak. She saw the Apathy touch her friends and family and drain the life force from them until all that was left was the bones. The final entry was that she could see Norman approaching the farm and that she would run to him to stop him being caught by the Apathy."

Glynda was clearly annoyed, and the Disciplinarian was swished through the air. "Is there anything more to identify the girl?"

"She talked about her parasol and unless she was fantasising killed a couple of Apathy before she had perfected her illusions."

"Frack. We have just recruited her to join Beacon next year plus her two best friends who are the daughters of a Mistral crime boss. Another friend is already at Beacon."

"On the plus side, when she comes to the Beacon open day I can follow her home. We also do have your early aura detection operative in Fox Alastair. Reading between the lines, the Grimm suspected that there was an aura around and were looking for her, but as they could not see or hear her did not unleash their full power."

"What about Torchwick?"

"We both know the type. Everyone he grew up with is dead because hunters were greedy. It is all about him and his cousin and the rest of the world can look after itself as it never cared about his family."

Glynda said, "The walk was a sensible idea. I do not want James sending an assassination squad to Vale to take out a young girl."

"Especially when they would probably fail to take her out anyway."

/-/

It was now the evening of the day of the fishing trip. Jaune returned home with his father with enough trout for dinner. He had helped his father gut them but cooking them had been the responsibility of Lavender and dad.

It had been an early dinner. The trout were served with a butter and thyme stuffing and had been poached in white wine and onions. There were a few boiled potatoes and some peas to go with it. After yesterday's barbeque a light dinner had seemed appropriate. It had been delicious.

Afterwards he and Amber had helped mother with the washing up. She said at the end, "Your father and I are going for a long walk and then a drink at the pub. The twins are going out with some friends tonight to a different pub to dance and Lavender is having a sleepover with some classmates. Jaune, it would be good if you could spend some time tomorrow evening with Lavender."

Amber had laughed and said, "You have been busy today mother."

His mother had replied, "I am sure that I don't know what you mean, dear." However, there had been no hint of offence in her voice.

Jaune suspected that Amber was right. His mother had manoeuvred things so that he and Amber could talk in private tonight. She had deferred her pep talk about relationships and had said that they may as well just have one awkward conversation rather than two and tonight looked like being the night.

After the rest of the family had left the house, Amber had opened a bottle of wine and they had sat in the kitchen to drink it and discuss life.

She started by asking "How was your talk with dad? Did he come clean, and did you forgive him?"

"I think he tried to, but I was not altogether satisfied. I think I can understand why he did it and that he meant it for the best. I am angry that he took the decision away from me rather than try to deal with my perceived character flaws."

"At least it sounds as though he admitted it. He was in denial when I spoke to him ten months ago."

"Have you spoken to him since then?"

"Not alone. We said things which we should not have done to each other. I was angry that he had tried to stop you pursuing the career you wanted and forced the headmaster to go along with it. I called him a dishonourable liar. He was obviously hurt by that and responded in kind. Neither of us feels that we should be the first person to apologise to the other. He looked thoughtful at dinner tonight."

"He was relieved to have talked to me without me totally rejecting him and disappointed that I had not forgiven him. I said that I needed time to think about things. However, I did my best to bond with him over catching fish. I also asked for stories about his time at Haven to hint that it would probably be all right between us in the end."

"Mother wants me to talk with him tomorrow and she is going to soften him up tonight. She suggested that I speak to you tonight and see whether his story to you rang true."

"I think it was true that he found retirement hard. I can see that thinking that most of his contemporaries at Haven were dead or crippled took him into a dark place. I am not entirely certain that he was being honest with me about which were the most important motivations in his decision, but it is probable that he is also lying to himself."

"That is interesting. What reasons did he give?"

"First, that he felt that the family had lost too many members to the Grimm and that three of his children becoming hunters was quite enough. Second, he in effect said that he felt that the deaths of his brothers and mum's brother had not been necessary. Third, that both he and mother had worried that I wanted to be a hero rather than a hunter and that I took too much after my uncle in that regard. He was very blunt about the fear that I would just get myself killed at an early age. Fourth, that he was worried about the Arc family name dying out. He said the clincher had been when it became clear that mother shared his concerns and apparently was crying about it."

"He had no right to take the decision from you. It is not as though you were any more reckless than the twins."

"He seemed to say that he could trust them to look after each other, even if they were reckless about their own life."

"That was true by the time they were sixteen but not when they were fourteen. They were busy daring each other to greater excesses then."

"He said that he reminded me too much of Uncle Jaune for him to feel comfortable that I would grow out of it."

"Just because you look like your uncle, does not mean that you are like him. Remnant, you take after dad for obstinacy. A two-year sulk was almost as impressive as dad's refusal to admit that he had got things wrong."

"I know you were not around that much four years ago, but he was in an odd mood then."

"No reason for him to take it out on you. Did he say whether he had played god before?"

"He said only with Saphron and that was because she clearly did not really want to be a hunter but was just doing so because she thought it was expected of her. He genuinely could not unlock Debo's aura and Lily made her own choice in the matter."

"I have no problem with Lily. It was clearly her choice. I am prepared to take his word about Debo in light of the fact he owned up to Saphron. I still feel that he should have given Saphron the choice, but she is happy with her life. Besides which she would not have fitted in at Haven in those days. I suppose I can see that it was easier for Lily to say that she did not want to be a huntress because Saphron and Debo were not then it would have been for Saphron."

"Did either of them ever question your desire to be a huntress?"

"No. Both of them encouraged me. I suppose that I did always make it clear that I saw no point in throwing my life away for no good reason and bullied dad into teaching me defensive techniques when most kids were focusing on offense. Perhaps I recalled what mum and dad said about Uncle Bill and Uncle Jaune."

"Dad said you had almost died on a mission. Actually, he strongly hinted that you had made your own luck. I don't recall that being talked about."

"It was three years back. It was at the time of the bandit intrusions up north. The Branwen tribe had forced four tribes out of the lands which they had used to pillage. The combination of desperate bandits and despairing locals meant that we had to fight Grimm as well as bandits. I spotted that if anything the bandits were projecting more negative thoughts than the locals – the latter cheered up a little when they saw us while the bandits had just about given up. My own view was that we should allow the Grimm a chance to finish off the bandits once they had retreated so I did my best to discourage my teammates from chasing them too hard. However, the home village of one of my teammates had been burnt to the ground and they insisted on exacting revenge themselves. A large team of huntsmen pursued the culprits led by him. He and his best friend killed many bandits including the leaders. However, they were not able to deal with the Grimm which had been attracted. I did my best to get everyone I could back to safety."

"You sound as though you do not think the fight was worth it."

"The fight may have been. The tactics were too wasteful of aura and in the end life. I would have preferred to pick off stragglers and use the snipers to encourage them to run. I certainly would have pulled out quicker when the Grimm started to gather."

"That sounds like something mother would have told huntsmen who were helping with the LGDF."

"She is well worth listening to."

"Two of the best teams at Beacon are going with one of the Professor's on a mission supporting a vale equivalent of the LGDF at the end of the holiday and in the third and fourth years about half the time is spent on missions."

"Lionheart tried to introduce that system when I was at Haven. There was a lot of resistance and while missions have increased there is far too much concentration on fighting each other rather than the Grimm or bandits."

"What happened to the region which you fought in afterwards?"

"Those bandits are dead, but last year the Branwen tribe levied tribute there and the villages stopped paying taxes. If I was being cynical Raven Branwen used the other bandits to exhaust the will of the locals to resist her and made her eventual takeover of the region seem inevitable and the least bad option."

Jaune wondered to himself whether he should take Oobleck by surprise and ask about the Branwen tribe in history class. From what he had heard so far this holiday, the Branwen tribe must have some kind of plan.

"Why doesn't the government or the academy do anything about the Branwen tribe?"

"Raven Branwen scares them. There was an expeditionary force sent in seven years ago which was soundly defeated. Some prominent huntsmen were amongst the casualties and the rumours are she killed them herself. There are rumours of a few assassination attempts being made against Raven Branwen which failed miserably and resulted in her giving sanctuary to the White Fang. There are also rumours that certain Mistralian crime bosses died about the same time and their successors are refusing to allow any operations against her to be launched. Basically no one wants to lead an expedition against her, the costs of doing so are prohibitive and so long as she does not threaten Mistral itself her gradually taking small bites each year out of West Mistral can be ignored."

Jaune decided that he really needed to discuss this with Oobleck. Anyway, it was now time to change the subject.

"Amber, thanks for your help with dad. If he asks you can tell him that I will think things over, but I do believe that he did what he thought was right at the time even though it was clearly wrong."

"In short, you are angry, but he is still your father."

"I think it may be best if I return to Beacon after the trip to Argus to see Saphron."

"I would agree with that. I am ready to make my peace with dad tomorrow, but we needed time apart. Are you seeing your teammate while you are in Argus?"

"Yes. She has invited me to take Saphron, Terra and Adrian to dinner with her and her mother."

"Are the two of you close?"

"We are good friends, and she has helped me a lot. She has never complained about not being leader of the team."

"Glad to hear it." Amber paused and said, "Shall we get the relationship discussion out of the way now?"

"If you don't mind. I think that I can rely on you to be honest with me."

"If you are looking for someone to explain why often huntresses in training prefer to be good friends rather than lovers, I am probably your best guide. I acknowledge that most of you are aged eighteen and normally no one older than twenty-three is training and most will have the usual urges."

"That will be helpful."

"First, there are women and men who do not want the distraction of a serious relationship at least in their first year. They have worked hard to get to the academy and particularly when the Vytal festival is due at the end of the year they want to focus on training and doing their best."

Jaune said, "Yes, at least one friend has said that she wants to focus on becoming the best huntress she can and that a relationship would only get in the way. Mind you she was trying to let me down lightly."

"Second, it is likely that you will bump into the people with whom you have flings or bad relationships in the future. In the whole of Remnant there are only 230 or so trainee huntsmen and huntresses a year. I am told in other universities the first year is when wild oats can be sown with comparative impunity while a reputation gained in your first year at an Academy is hard to shake off. It is better now that there are more huntresses in training, but I heard stories that in the past the danger was that if you had a fling with one guy the others expected that you would do the same with them."

"I can see that being a problem." Jaune blushed a little as he replied to Amber. He was aware that most of his friends regarded his pursuit of Weiss and Lydia as a joke and he had the feeling that it reduced their respect for him that he had pursued both at the same time.

"Third, the people you get to know best are the members of your team. People are rightly wary of having relationships within teams because you have four years to live with the consequences of a bad break up. The other risk is jealousy – if two members of the team are attracted to the same team member then the whole fabric of the team can disintegrate."

Jaune nodded, "There are only a couple of relationships within teams in my year and one of those was a pre-existing relationship. Even Nora and Ren while together are at pains to make it clear that they are not together/together."

"Next, if you are in the running for the Vytal festival, that is a disincentive to having a relationship with someone in a team which is also in the running. It is hard to avoid the fear of giving away secrets and it does mean that there are subjects you should not discuss."

"I suppose it is true that there are no relationships between members of the top five teams. Mind you Team CRDL got off a bad footing with the rest of us and particularly the women and Faunus."

"Thinking about, how many of the members of the best teams in your year are actually in relationships at Beacon?"

"Actually, only Cardin is but both he and Julie say that it is a friends with benefits arrangement. Corkran apparently has some friends in Vale he sees every few weeks and comes back on the morning shuttle. However, he is a mustang, and is older than the rest of us. Yang enjoys flirting and will do slow dances but nothing more. She enjoys dancing with Russel most who seems happy with the arrangement without looking for anything more."

"I hope that helps. The fact that you are in not in a relationship is not necessarily your fault."

"The problem is that the two people I have pursued are not interested at all and are finding me a nuisance. One snubs me and the other teases me."

"I may be less help on this aspect. What do you think you are doing wrong?"

"With the first one I tried taking dad's advice and tried to show that I was confident and doing her a favour by considering her."

"Jaune, while lack of confidence is fatal, do you think you may have overdone it? Arrogance is likely to be a turn off to most huntresses especially as you are less experienced as both a fighter and a lover than most people your age."

Jaune said "Amber!" with a tone of outrage in his voice.

"Sorry, but while the twins said that you are quite a decent fighter now, at the start of term you must have been at least three years behind everyone else. You would have been conscious of that and that must have impacted on your real confidence. Also, you spent two years feeling sorry for yourself and pushing everyone away and another two years being sensitive to being looked down on. You did not go to either combat or ordinary school and so were not meeting people of your own age. None of the family ever talked about you and girlfriends. It seemed a logical conclusion. I will grant you that some others at Beacon may have as little practical experience as you, but they almost certainly have all spent more time with people their own age at dances and social events."

"I suppose that is fair enough."

"Look, it may still not have been you. Have either of the people you chased after shown any interest in anyone else or expressed reasons why they are not interested in a relationship."

Jaune thought about it. He had heard Weiss complain about people trying to be friends with her so that they could sell gossip to the tabloids or because of her money while Lydia had made it clear that she was not attracted to boys of her own age. "That is fair. One of them has reason to be cynical about people pursuing her and the other is focused on being the best huntress she can. However, I still feel that I messed things up. I should have accepted that both had told me no earlier and in retrospect the fact that I only dared tell one of them how I felt about her when I was drunk was not perhaps the best idea."

Amber looked at him, "Jaune, you know what you are doing wrong. However, it is clear from what you have said to me previously that you get on well with the women on your team and with those on other teams. How do you behave with them?"

"Nora and Pyrrha are simply good teammates and I treat them that way. What you said about not having relationships within the team is true. Anyway, Nora clearly loves Ren and Pyrrha is out of my league. Even if she were not, if me and her had a relationship it would force Nora and Ren to think about whether they are a together/together couple. It would be bad for the team."

"And the women outside the team?"

"Ruby is sweet and is my best friend, but she is two years younger than me. It would feel creepy going after someone who reminds me of Lavender. I get on well with Yang, but she reminds me of the twins. Blake is cleverer than I am and prefers reading to socialising. We get on well enough, but we do not have much in common. Anne and I are friendly, but she tends to keep to her team. Also, she is a Faunus and is wary of people from Mistral. There was another woman I find attractive, but she is going out with her best friend from combat school."

"Are you saying that you are just your normal friendly self with them and that they respond well to that."

"I suppose so."

"You are not by any chance deliberately going after women who are guaranteed to say no and finding excuses to avoid pursuing those who might say yes?"

"It may seem like that, but I don't think so."

"Are you interested in men?"

"No. I like having male friends, but I can tell that I prefer women"

"Fair enough. I only asked as there were a fair number of hunters in my year who in retrospect were denying things to themselves."

"No harm, no foul."

Amber looked at him and said, "By a process of elimination you made a pass at Weiss Schnee and the girl with the umbrella who looks like mum. Perhaps dad had a point when he said you were too brave for your own good." She held up her hand and said, "Sorry, but you wanted me to be honest. I learnt too much from mom."

"You keep saying that mom is blunt, but when I was working with her on the LGDF she avoided confronting people and cajoled them into doing things her way."

"I will take your word for it. When I was at combat school she was seen as abrasive by my friends and their parents. Maybe she has learnt that mixing it up works better, but her instinct is to deal with problems directly."

"Perhaps. I do know that people tend to be on their best behaviour with her, but I put that down to her being in charge."

"Maybe I need an afternoon with her. I still tend to upset people rather than persuade them. If she can learn to butter people up then so can I."