Chapter Thirty-Three

There was a level of relief to be working at the office again. The mirrored floorplan, the bigger reading room (the returned reader), the new orientation of the files, it was all different enough but still familiar enough that Oscar loved coming in to work. The walk with Qrow in the morning was new, and it leant an even stronger feeling of safety. He could just about walk normally and only really kept his cane for stairs or more strenuous exercise. Well, that and he felt like he was imitating his father and he liked the sensation.

Unlike the winter when he was lucky to have three clients a week, Robyn's articles and the knowledge that the professor was back gave them about a dozen clients a week - still far below average, still too little to pay all the bills, but the normalcy of it soothed him just as much as working in the gardens at the apartment. He slept deeper, and longer, and had fewer instances of waking up in irrational fear.

He worked through the ledger and internally cringed that he was so rusty with his numbers. "Practice," he muttered to himself. It had taken over a week to complete inventory - checking herb supplies, seeing what, if any, maintenance the sand table needed, Oz had asked the sand table and Oscar had given the reading: it had been well cared for after Oscar's hasty escape, but also well used, and Oscar burned to know the general had used Oz's reader for his warmongering. Ozpin took no apology, however, saying it was beyond anyone's control and he was just happy to have it back.

There was going to be a shortage this month - there had been since the fall, and his father had promised to bring him to the bank on the next trip and give him a more detailed understanding of their finances.

"Hello?"

Oscar looked up. "Oh, Miss Hill," he said, standing and moving around the desk. "I didn't know you were doing another interview today."

"Figured I'd drop by and see what the office actually looked like," she said with a wry grin, her blond head swiveling around the space. "Homey," she said. "That surprises me; I thought it would be more esoteric."

Oscar chuckled, shrugging his shoulders. "That's not exactly welcoming to clients," he said.

"What's the smell in the air?"

"Lavender to relax the client, rose for energy, and I think sunflower for alertness. Sometimes the reading room will have different incense burning depending on the reading. You want to charge the air as well as the reader, anything to make the reading easier on the sayer."

Robyn snorted, something Oscar had learned listening meant she was impressed.

"He's with a client right now," Oscar said, "Have a seat. Do you want some tea?"

"Only if it's laced with something stronger," Robyn said, taking one of the chairs in front of the deak. Oscar sat back down.

"The negotiations?" Oscar asked.

"It's a joke to call the last five months negotiations," Robyn said, tsking and looking down. "I've never known the emperor to be smart, but some of the filth coming out of the palace is too shrewd for anyone's good. It was hell I'm told just to get the list of births for Midsummer, and they still think they have the power in this negotiation."

"What do they want?"

"Us turning everything back over to them as if the last two years of starvation and now production hasn't permanently shown us that things can work better than under them. Everything I hear is people eating better than they have since last year, the farmers are learning from the city folk and visa versa, everyone on the mountain is growing, understanding how much power they really have, and the palace just thinks we can hand everything back and slide back into how things used to be."

Oscar looked down. "That's sad," he said.

"That's stupid," Robyn said, "The hell of it is they know more than they should about what's happening down here. Those string of gunpowder explosions during Midsummer? They knew about it before we did. The riots on the north side of the mountain? They knew about it. I'm starting to think they planted those disasters to make people doubt the revolutionaries. What a load of fye and filth."

There was a polite knock on the door, and Oscar got up to open it with a nod to Robyn. She smiled, gesturing she was fine, and he moved forward.

"Oh, Weiss!" Oscar said. "It's good to-what's wrong?"

Her face was stricken, blue eyes downcast and red rimmed with tears, and behind her was someone els-

"Winter!"

Oscar stumbled back, suddenly back in his cell of a room, her asking him questions and oh, his side ached.

"No, wait!" Weiss said quickly. "It's not what you think!"

"No, she works for the general, she's going to-!"

"I'm not," Winter said, her rich alto voice low, soft.

"Who is this pipsqueak?" Robyn asked, standing.

"Miss Hill," Weiss said, dipping into an Atlesean curtsy. "This is my sister, Winter Schnee, apprentice of the late Lady Fria."

"Late…?" Oscar said, holding his side. "You mean she…?"

"I… I would like a reading," Winter said, standing straight. Oscar finally noticed that one arm was bound to her side. "Is… is the professor here?"

"I am, Miss Schnee," Ozpin said, standing at the door of the reading room. He nodded to his previous client and bid soft good days. "Though it appears perhaps that we should talk first. Miss Weiss, would you be so kind as to get the chairs in the reading room?"

"Of course, professor," Weiss said quickly, Oz giving her space to enter the other room. He limped over to the desk and stood at Oscar's seat, gesturing for Winter to have a seat. Weiss brought in one chair, sitting it next to her sister, and disappeared to get the other seat, placing it next to Oz. Oscar sat by his father, feeling slightly safer with the desk between him and her, stronger with his father at his side. Robyn flicked her gaze between the two parties, but Ozpin motioned for her to sit down.

"It would appear, Miss Robyn, that this interview will be particularly eventful. A round of introductions: this is Miss Weiss Schnee, heir to the Schnee family in Atlas. This is her sister, Winter Schnee, assistant to General James Ironwood, one of the Generals of the Round Table, and apprentice soothsayer to Lady Fria, my first apprentice."

"The late lady," Winter said, eyes downcast.

Oscar saw his father freeze, eyes widening and lip pressing into a thin line. Oz closed his eyes and exhaled, a deep sigh through his nose and lowered his head. "Miss Weiss," he said, "Please fetch Miss Blake. Marrow too, if you can find him. I suspect Miss Robyn will also want their accounts of that night."

"But…"

"Please. There will most likely be details Miss Winter isn't ready to share with you yet."

"... I see," Weiss said, standing. She wavered for several moments, before bending to give her sister a fierce hug and leaving the office.

"Miss Robyn, I believe you wanted to know about the night of blood and fire, the Battle of Haven as the revolutionaries have called it, and what happened in the palace to set it afire. Here are two of four witnesses to explain events there."

Robyn was staring, gulped audibly. "I should have brought more paper," she muttered.

"If you please," Ozpin said. "If I may be so bold, the less you say the better. This will not be a pleasant experience to recount from what my apprentice had explained." He turned fractionally, his brown gaze locking on to Winter. "I want to start by thanking you," he said. "The sands tell me you played a part in saving Oscar, I don't know how, but the fact that you did gives you my eternal gratitude."

"No," Winter said. "It wasn't like that. I didn't…"

"You were the one who smuggled Lieutenant Armin out of the palace. That act affected the sands and brought my apprentice home."

Winter straightened, looking Ozpin in the eye with wide, grey-blue eyes. They welled, and half a sob escaped her.

Behind the desk, his father reached out and snaked a hand into Oscar's, and only then did he realize how tense his frame was. Oscar relaxed, reminding himself of how far he had come, and he squeezed, silently indicating he would be okay.

"Oscar, tell Miss Robyn how you were drafted."

Oscar recounted the story: visiting his master, being found by a recruiter, Marrow trying to get him out of it, the general's intervention. From there Ozpin drew out small, safe details of life in the palace. The palatial gardens he walked by, the width of the halls, the soft hum of voices in the workhouse.

"Why do you call it a workhouse?" Ozpin asked.

"Because that's what it felt like," Oscar said, eyes locked on his knees. "There were so many readers, set up in rows, and so many readings. The soldiers would come in and ask their strategy question, they would get a reading, and then if the reading was bad they would get up and move to the next soothsayer, asking a different strategy question. It felt like a game of ladders, moving from one sayer to the next to the next, until they got a reading that sounded successful. Then the next soldier sat down, and the next, and the next. That's not how readings are supposed to work."

"Miss Winter," Ozpin asked, "When was General Ironwood brought in to advise the war, and how long did it take to assemble that many soothsayers?"

"The emperor brought Atlesean generals in the first year of the war," Winter said, "right after the Valeans attacked the refugee rescue. General Ironwood wasn't the first general they brought over, but I know he was in Mistral at the time on personal business. When he came back he said the war wasn't going to be short, and it wasn't going to be easy. He said he had a reading."

Oscar frowned, so did Ozpin. "A reading?" he asked.

Winter nodded, looking up. "He said he got a reading from you, right before you collapsed."

Ozpin's lips pressed into a thin line. "He never asked for a reading," he said. "That was during the soothsayer defamation during the Lost Summer. I don't know…" Ozpin's eyes doubled in size and he lost a lot of color. "The backbreaker… James…"

"What?" Robyn asked. "What are you talking about?"

"I don't believe it," Oscar said, realizing what his father was saying. "I don't believe it. Even then…"

Ozpin shook his head, reaching up and running fingers through his hair, the faint scar on his temple visible for a moment. Oscar remembered coming in to see the general pulling readings out of Oz, the horrifying sight burned forever into his memory, and it was triply worse now to know he had gotten the idea far earlier. He forced himself to loosen the grip on his father's hand, forced himself to exhale. Winter was wide-eyed, realizing what had happened too. Robyn was taking it all in, writing notes to herself, and after several moments Ozpin sighed again, leaning back in his chair. "Please, continue, Miss Schnee."

"The… General Ironwood officially joined as advisor in the fourth year of the war, but he knew from the start that soothsayers would be the key to winning the war. He was sending operatives and agents out since the war had started. He recruited Lady Fria and myself in the second year. Lady Fria was happy to help in the war effort but she warned me that the general was a man who knew a little and thought that meant he knew a lot. She often corrected him on facets of soothsaying."

"She treated him like a grandchild," Oscar said. "She treated everyone like a grandchild. She's… she was… very sweet." He looked up at his father, saw him hurting under his calm facade. "How… how did she pass?"

Winter's face, only barely held together, cracked. "... her heart," she said. "That night."

Oscar hummed, closing his eyes.

Ozpin cleared his throat, rubbing his temples again. "We'll get there in a moment," he said. "Oscar, what were the servants like in the palace?"

Oscar navigated through safer topics for a while, calming both he and Winter down after the revelation of James'... Oscar didn't have the right word. He talked about how cold the apprentice rooms were, how the masters trained the apprentices, the day their reader appeared in the workhouse, the checkpoint at the palace gates. Ozpin asked about uniforms, Oscar explaining his adamant refusal to have any part in the war, even that. Robyn, when he glanced up, was riveted, as he talked about how he refused to do any readings, spending all of his time reading and researching the books they had accumulated.

"Miss Winter, you might know this, but what did the Atlesean soldiers and Mistralan soldiers think of Oscar's refusal to wear the uniform?"

Oscar looked up, surprised his father had asked the question.

"The Mistral soldiers were exasperated but ultimately uncaring," Winter said. "With the drafts more than a few knew the kind of rebellion Oscar was under, and several looked away in quiet support. The operatives were more stringent, he came up several times during staff meetings. They thought he was being childish for not wearing the uniform, but General Ironwood said to allow it for now. He said no one could begrudge someone who never wanted to enlist. We… everyone joins the military in Atlas, it is considered an honor. We didn't understand."

"Thank you," Ozpin said softly. "Tell me, did the readings actually benefit the army?"

Robyn snorted but said nothing.

"We had fewer casualties than any other war we took part in," Winter said. "We used unorthodox tactics and were able to catch the rebel forces off guard multiple times."

"And in your professional opinion," Ozpin said, "Why did you constantly lose ground?"

Winter looked down, but her back stayed perfectly straight. After thinking for several moments, she lifted her gaze and locked it on to Oscar's father. "Reading one captain or lieutenant only accounts for their choices, not the choices of the rebel force."

"Did the general understand that?" Ozpin asked.

"... No, sir. He thought the captains were asking the wrong questions."

"Knowing a little and thinking he knows a lot," Ozpin said lightly. "Oscar, it's time you explained Midwinter."

Oscar hunched forward, feeling the anxiety build in his chest as he remembered the general's feast, the story about meeting Ozpin, the questions about Oz's care with the resurgence of his backbreaker and how frightening the questions were, Pyrrha's generous offer and the evening feast in a rented out house. "They took me to the hospital after that, to spend the night watch with Oz." He looked over to his father. "You were lucid, then. We were able to talk. Do you remember it?"

Ozpin stared at him wide eyed, and he broke his grip on Oscar's hand to pull him into a hug. "I'm so sorry," he said into his hair. "I don't." His voice was mostly calm, but Oscar could hear the painful regret underneath it, and he hugged back, fiercely, nuzzling into his father's shoulder. When they pulled away both Winter and Robyn were looking away, trying to give them privacy.

"Miss Winter," Ozpin said after a pause. "What did the general think?"

"He was furious," Winter said, still staring at her knees. "He couldn't find Oscar, and he had to report on the soothsayers that afternoon. He didn't want to report that one of them was AWOL."

"AWOL?" Robyn asked.

"Absent without leave," Winter clarified, glancing at the other woman. "A soldier must account for his whereabouts at all times. If a soldier is AWOL then we can't account for any crimes they may have committed."

"And you thought Oscar was out there committing crimes?" Robyn demanded, aghast.

"No," Winter said. "Not crimes, but command should always know where soldiers are in case of emergency deployment, orders, inspection, whatever may happen."

Robyn opened her mouth but Ozpin cut her off before she even spoke. "Thank you for the clarification, Miss Winter," he said. "If I may ask a personal question, did General Ironwood seem more upset than normal to learn a soldier was AWOL?"

Winter frowned, casting her thoughts back. "So few dare go AWOL," she said slowly, "but the general is always professional. He was very stressed, there was an agitation in him, but nothing more than running the war normally brought out in him. When he learned Oscar was visiting you, he calmed down, but with your active backbreaker he had to quarantine Oscar in case he contracted the fever. Pyrrha was released once we knew she didn't enter the infectious ward."

"Hm," Ozpin said, reaching down to hold Oscar's hand again and turning his eyes to Robyn. "There is, I suspect, a side story about Miss Pyrrha Nikos, but other parties need to be here to recount that. Oscar, how long were you in quarantine?"

Oscar hunched forward even more, staring at his knees again, as he explained his two week isolation, not even seeing Blake. After that was the interview.

"He wouldn't let me see Oz again unless he knew I could follow orders," he said. "I worked with Pyrrha that day - it was the last day I saw her, and Marrow decided to bring me to the hospital to see Oz."

"To see him?" Robyn asked, looking up from her notes. Oscar noticed she had several pages by this point. "After the general's orders?"

"He… he said no one had explicitly told him to stop taking me to the hospital," Oscar said.

"Ballsy," she muttered. "I want to meet him."

"He lives on the third floor of our building now," Ozpin said. "If he doesn't arrive shortly you can arrange a meeting with him later. Miss Winter, what was the general's impression of Oscar's answers."

"He was frustrated," Winter said. "So was I. I thought he was being disrespectful, calling him James so casually. He was so defiant. If he'd just followed orders…" She trailed off, eyes lost in a memory, and Oscar wondered what she saw.

Ozpin squeezed his hand, and he talked about going to the hospital, Marrow following him all the way to Oz's room, and what he saw in there. "The general… he and Lady Fria and Winter were there, they had a sand table set up, and Ironwood was asking questions to Oz. They had propped his hand on the fulcrum, his magic was open and…"

"Dark Brother's filth," Robyn said, wide-eyed, her head swiveling to Oz. "You were in a fever, right?"

"Deliriously so," Ozpin said.

"That son of a bitch." Her eyes shot back to Winter. "And you were okay with this?"

"The general said that Ozpin had agreed to say the war just before the fall. The hospital reported he was in a bad way and might not make it. He's the greatest soothsayer of a generation - several, generations, even. If it would stop the war, then General Ironwood would stop at nothing. Lady Fria wasn't okay with it, but if Ozpin gave consent she was willing to-"

"When would he have given consent? When would his apprentice have passed on that consent? Are you really that stup-"

"Miss Robyn," Ozpin said quickly, his voice firm. "What is done is done, and as I said Miss Winter played a role in bringing my apprentice home to me. Please withhold your recriminations."

Robyn opened her mouth to retort, but thought better of it, grumbling low in her throat but settling in.

"Oscar, what happened when you saw what they were doing?"

His words were slower now, explaining the eruption of chaos, putting himself between James and his father, Marrow's attempt to stop it all, and the double arrest. Robyn was cursing under her breath, writing this all down and looking like she was going to breathe fire.

"Miss Winter, this is perhaps the question I have the most personal interest in: how did you feel after all of that had happened? What were you thinking?"

"I… I didn't know what to think," Winter admitted, her voice low again, her eyes downcast. "General Ironwood, he was - is - aspirational. He cares for his soldiers, works harder than anyone under his command, he makes the hard decisions so we don't have to. But that night… Lady Fria and I, neither of us knew you had not given consent. I never thought he would hold a gun on Lady Fria. That night she saw me, asked what I thought and… we did a reading, a self-reflection reading. She pointed out so many parts of my life, all the choices I had made up to that night and…"

She looked up, and her eyes were glassy, brimmed with unshed tears. "That's not the kind of person I want to be. That's not what Weiss needs. I thought I was-" Her voice broke, and a hand quickly came up to cover her mouth. Oscar eyed her bound arm, wondering.

"Oscar, are you ready to talk about the blood and fire? I know how painful that night is for you."

"I'm… I'm okay," Oscar said. He didn't feel good, certainly, but he wasn't half living in the memory, he was grounded with his father's hand in his, and the slow buildup to it had given him time to mentally acclimate. His emotions were high, but he was okay. "The general… I don't know the word for it, but he brought me to the workhouse for some kind of trial."

"Court-marshal," Winter said. "For withholding information vital to the war effort, desertion, insubordination, violation of several codes of conduct. The general had finally had enough, and he couldn't keep making allowances for him any longer."

Oscar was able to explain how scared he was, the performance of the trial - court-marshal - the trick Ironwood used to make Oscar admit to being gifted, the test of dragging out Ozpin's reader, the challenge of Pyrrha's whereabouts. Then… then…

"... He told me only friends call him James. That was when he shot me."

Robyn's paper crinkled, one of her hands balling into a fist to contain her obvious desire to react. She was gritting her teeth, glaring at her notes and vibrating with untapped energy. "That brothers-damned son of a bitch," she cursed, slamming her fist into the arm of her chair. "Brother of Light and Dark's fye and filth! This is the monster who's running the war? I can't believe it! Son of a bitch! What happened next?"

"... I don't know," Oscar admitted. "Blake was there, and I think I was carried, I remember floating, and thinking the seasons kept changing. I have this one memory of blood…" he shook his head, not wanting to say that in front of anyone but Ozpin.

"Miss Winter?"

Winter was positively shaking now, holding her bound arm, her straight back finally hunched forward. She sniffled, an unexpected sound for Oscar, and she wiped at her eyes. "The soothsayers," she said, "they panicked - no matter how they were treated they weren't soldiers, they weren't trained for live ammunition, they were afraid. They were ordered to fall back in line, to form up, but they didn't listen. Then… then… General Ironwood ordered troops to fire into the crowd."

"He what?"

"The Mistralan soldiers refused, but the Atlas soldiers did. Everyone was running, readers and candles were knocked over, and in minutes the room was on fire. I didn't… I tried to tell the general to retreat. He ordered Professor Ozma's reader be recovered, I was one of the people who secured it. I found the general in the imperial court to report. He took one look at my arm and… Somewhere along the way I had been shot, and I hadn't even realized it. I fainted and…"

"I'm sorry," Ozpin said, and Oscar leaned into his father, hiding his eyes as Winter broke down. "Winter, I'm so sorry."

"No," she sobbed. "I'm sorry. I didn't realize…! I should've…!"

"But you did," Ozpin said, his voice soft in Oscar's ear. "You did realize, and you realized sooner than that night. It's time you told us about Lieutenant Armin."

Oscar heard several ugly sniffles, a few heavy gulps, and when he finally risked looking back up Winter was again straight-backed, cheeks flushed and eyes rimmed with red. She sniffled again, taking a deep breath, and centered herself.

"There isn't much to tell," she said with a watery voice. "He was confined to quarters after his head injury was treated, much like Oscar. I was to interrogate him, and I did for the first few days, but it was obvious what had happened that night. Treason wasn't a fair punishment - insubordination would have been better. Treason is punishable by death in Atlas, and the lieutenant didn't deserve that. He didn't deserve what General Ironwood did to him. I filed escort papers and took him to Higanbana for treatment; that's what the papers said. I released him there, and told him not to come back. I don't know how he found you."

"That's easy, I looked for your sister."

Winter and Robyn both looked up to see Marrow there, rolling down the sleeves of his gi and zubon day laborer clothes. Winter made a noise, standing. "You made it…" she said.

"Yeah," Marrow said with a nod, stepping deeper into the front office. Behind him were Weiss and Blake. "I made it. That's thanks to you. So, thank you."

Winter shook her head, ponytail instead of a bun swishing back and forth. Marrow moved up and patted her arm, uncertain what else to do.

"Miss Robyn," Ozpin said, standing. "You will no doubt want the account of Lieutenant Armin and Miss Blake for more information about life in the palace. I trust you can handle those interviews for the next twenty minutes. Miss Winter asked for a reading and it's past time my apprentice and I gave her one."

"Alright everybody, I have a long, long list of questions for you."

Inside the reading room Winter's eyes drifted around the space, taking it all in. Her good arm reached out and touched the reader, face soft. "I wasn't certain if this would get to you," she said.

"... That was you?" Oscar asked. She nodded.

"I told him it would be a sign of good faith, a demonstration of trust. He said he trusted me to make the arrangements. That's technically why I'm here. I'm to approach you and invite you back to the palace."

Ozpin sighed. "He still thinks I would join him, after all that's happened."

"Yes, sir."

"No sirs, please," Ozpin said, gesturing for Winter to sit. "I'm not your master."

"No, sir," Winter said, "But you are still the greatest soothsayer-"

"-of a generation, I know," Ozpin said, motioning for Oscar to sit across from her. "Before we start, may I ask a personal question I didn't want answered in front of the others?"

"Yes."

"How many are left?"

Oscar froze, feeling his stomach drop in sheer anticipation.

"Fifteen, including myself," Winter said, eyes downcast. "Lady Amber was found in the streets, shot in the back. Lady Fria gave herself up, and she had a heart attack while she was being processed. Vernal…"

"I understand," Ozpin said, his voice low. He took a long, slow breath. "Very well. What is your question?"

"I… I don't know what to do," she said, eyes on the reader. "I'm supposed to return to the general by sundown with an answer from you. But…"

"Of course. Oscar."

"Should it be me?" Oscar asked, turning to look at his father. "I know Winter, isn't that too close?"

"No," Oz said, touching his shoulder and squeezing. "You will see as much as you need to. I'll observe."

Oscar nodded, opening up his magic and placing his hand on the fulcrum. "You can hold my hand if you - oh."

Winter nodded, carefully unbinding her arm and using her good one to place it on Oscar's offered palm before putting her hand on the fulcrum. Oscar mourned at seeing her like that, and it took a minute to close his eyes and clear his head. His father squeezed again, and the pendulum started to move.

Pain in big, broad strokes, and inside the pattern for heart and thought and body. Winter was hurting not just physically. Tracing around the pain were other patterns: father, abuse, escape, choice, inspiration. She had thrilled to know she was a soothsayer, a profession her father hated and she took pride in making him upset. Training with Lady Fria, choice and inspiration twined together, the training pattern for self-reflection. Then, warrior - the pattern often used for the military, the pattern for iron and wood taking up a large part of the pattern. Oscar saw the night of blood and fire, both patterns emerging in the sands. Injury circling back to the original pain. This was what had brought her to her paradigm shift, the sands shifting with it as it looked to her new path.

Inspiration, she would still be a soothsayer. Deception, inside, wisdom. There was a complicated pattern he didn't immediately know, but Ozpin hummed in recognition, and inside it was the pattern for relief, and the word swept over Oscar in a way he hadn't experienced since Oz made him read his various Grimm activations. The relief made him exhale, and after it came justice, balance, freedom. He opened his eyes, seeing Winter studying the patterns with intense concentration.

"You don't want to go back to the general," he said. "But, if you do so you will free yourself from him in such a way that his influence over your life will break. You would be there for… this," he said, pointing to the pattern he didn't know yet, "and something big will happen then. I don't know what, but the choices you would make then will give you nothing but relief. If you go, going back to him will bring justice to him, and freedom to you."

"That was beautiful," Winter said, looking up from the pattern. "It was like Lady Fria… You really do have the gift."

"The pattern my apprentice does not know," Ozpin said, pointing, "Is the pattern for negotiation. I assume it has to do with the negotiations up the hill. Is he a part of the table?"

"No," Winter said, frowning. "He is the table."

Oscar frowned, confused. "What do you mean?"

"I mean the emperor died the night of the battle. The imperial quarters caught fire. General Ironwood has been handling the negotiations exclusively."

"Oh, James…"

Author's Notes: So much for two tiny little scenes. She's not a main character but this id unabashedly Winter's chapter as we speedrun her arc in the show and give her a softer ending to her arc than a dead Penny. Oscar, in turn, finally confronts his trauma in a safe environment, anchored by his father and very carefully guided through the memories. As he said, his emotions are high, but they're no longer overwhelming, and he can chose how to react to the emotions.

Also James rears his head as antagonist again. He's been busy while everyone else was recovering.

Next chapter: Haven't seen Qrow in a bit, better check in on him.