17

The next few weeks passed quickly for Geralt.

He and Ozpin sent the Grimm Oil formula to a patent office in Vale, then quickly to a pharmaceutical plant to begin production. The first batches reached the hands of Huntsmen in Vale in just under a month.

Now that his alchemical research project was done, he was able to throw himself into researching Remnan fairy tales and legends. With the revelation that the Grimm Titans were not only real, but might be frighteningly close to the Kingdoms, he began compiling all he could find on myths surrounding them, trying to get a solid grasp on their numbers and identities.

The results were not encouraging.

"I think she makes more of them," he told Ozpin grimly one evening. "Not often, but before airships were invented and inter-Kingdom communication became commonplace, new legends showed up every couple of centuries."

Ozpin slowly rotated his chair so that he was looking out the window at Beacon's courtyard, twinkling with lamplight. "I was afraid of that," he said softly. "I am, however, not surprised. I certainly don't remember Grimm Titans existing during our heyday, or before the gods left." He looked Geralt in the eye through their reflections in the glass. "Do you have an estimate on their numbers?"

Geralt grimaced. "At least two dozen," he said. "Probably a handful more than that."

Ozpin closed his eyes. "Blast," he murmured. "If she chooses to deploy all of those against us, it won't matter if we have a plan—every Huntsman in Sanus won't be enough to save this Kingdom."

"I doubt all of them are on Sanus," Geralt said. "In fact, I know at least a few aren't. The Leviathan is probably somewhere north of Anima, and Jormungandr is probably in the Menagerie Sea, if the occasional sightings are to be believed. According to Ren and Nora, Hela also destroyed the village of Kuroyuri in Anima about a decade ago."

"Their hometown," murmured Ozpin. "I should have thought to investigate further." He leaned back in his chair. "So many villages and townships disappear without any trace at all," he said. "I've grown complacent with that fact. Too accustomed." He looked at Geralt. "Have there been any other sightings?"

"The Thunderbird was possibly sighted near Vacuo a few years ago, but it could have made it here by now without too much trouble," said Geralt. "Other than that… most of the legends have Titans appearing at the head of hordes of Grimm of the same subtype. It's probably a way for Salem to ensure that there's a swarm to disperse and let the successor escape. So we can expect the Valean Grimm subtypes to have Titans somewhere around here, but we probably don't have to worry about the Mantellian ones, like Nidhoggr."

"You believe Nidhoggr to be a Teryx Titan?" Ozpin asked.

"I can't think of any other Grimm it could be," Geralt said. "Then again, not all of the Titans are based on subtypes. There's no ordinary Grimm that resembles the Leviathan."

"That we know of, at least," Ozpin said. "Well. If you're right, the Grimm we will most likely encounter are the Titan forms of the Taijitu, Deathstalker, Ursa, and Nevermore Grimm."

"Amphisbaena, Scorpio, Nanook, and the Thunderbird," Geralt listed. "As far as I can identify, anyway. Obviously, some of them have a few names. The Thunderbird has at least five. I'm just hoping they all refer to the same Grimm."

Ozpin sighed. "Even if by some miracle we—you—manage to stop Salem," he said, "we will likely still have all her monsters to contend with."

"They're beatable," Geralt pointed out. "Regis took down Fenrisulfr mostly by himself, with a little help from me and our pilot. If we can stop Salem from making more of them, we have a chance."

"If they continue to transfer and grow, how will we keep them contained?" Ozpin asked. "We don't yet know how their transference occurs. Is it the same as the Maidens, transferred to a seemingly random individual who fits the vague description of someone 'compatible'? Or is it something more specific? Were we lucky that Fenrisulfr transferred to one of the nearby Beowolves, or is that guaranteed?"

"Insane luck, if that's what it was," Geralt said. "But I don't know. Wonder if Salem keeps research notes."

Ozpin's lips twitched. "She did when I knew her, long ago," he said quietly. "Perhaps she still does. If so, then we will have to see if we can find them once she is gone." He chuckled, shaking his head slowly. "Gone. I can scarcely imagine it. After all these centuries…"

"I don't like to believe in destiny," said Geralt, "but I can't help but think that if I'm really the only person who can stop her… it feels almost inevitable that I will, right?"

"I cannot shake the same sensation," Ozpin agreed. "But we must not rely on that. How goes Yennefer's research?"

"It's going well," said Geralt. "Actually, I was going to ask if you could send a team to pick up a few reagents from Forever Fall…"

The next few weeks passed slowly for Ruby.

The pain from her missing leg diminished faster than she would have expected, before it happened. It felt like eons.

But each day, she woke up in less pain. Each night, she had an easier time sleeping through to dawn. A week in, she was able to graduate from the IV-drip of narcotic painkillers to hefty, difficult-to-swallow pills. Two weeks on, she was no longer waking in the dead of night. Three weeks on, she was able to downsize her pain pills to something more manageable.

She started coming back to classes. First she came in a wheelchair, rolling herself along with her arms, or being pushed by her teammates once her arms grew tired. Then she graduated to crutches, which left her sweating and aching for the first few days before she grew accustomed. Weiss took to bringing her wheelchair with them, ready to offer Ruby a break if she needed. Ruby never took her up on it.

It wasn't some sort of perverse machismo, or masochistic self-flagellation, that made her refuse her partner's help. She'd let Weiss push her in that wheelchair many times while she'd been in it. But the only way her body would grow accustomed to being upright again was to be upright. She kept a careful eye on her stump and her pain, ready at any moment to sit down if she seemed at risk of hurting herself and setting back her own progress. She never did, and so she never returned to the chair.

She grew used to the looks from her friends and peers. Pity was the most common reaction in the dining hall and the library. She understood, finally, why so many characters in books and shows complained about being pitied. There was a condescension to it—an implicit sense that the people shooting her those wincing, sympathetic looks thought themselves somehow better than her because they were physically whole. They didn't mean it maliciously, and she tried not to resent them for it, but she couldn't help the angry flush that crept up her neck after a long stint in the common areas, or after another gaggle of students suddenly grew hushed as they passed her.

Her friends never looked at her like that. Yang's eyes were sad and worried when she saw Ruby struggling, but they shone with pride when she threw herself into the things she could still do. Blake did her best to treat Ruby no differently than she had before, except to offer help when it was obviously needed—Ruby knew she, of all her friends, knew how to be there for someone who had been so wounded.

Nora often seemed to forget Ruby's injury entirely, only to be reminded by Ren when she made a suggestion that was obviously impossible for Ruby, now. Honestly, it was gratifying to think that in at least one person's eyes, nothing important had changed at all. Jaune was awkwardly helpful, but it wasn't pity that made him stumble on his words around her. If anything, it was a sort of awe. She saw it in how his eyes drifted to her when he was spacing out in class, in the way his hands would sometimes grip his own knee as if he was imagining what it would be like to be in her place. Pyrrha's reaction was similar, if less awkward.

Weiss' reaction was strange. She looked at Ruby, not with pity as though she had been lessened, nor with awe as if she had done something incredible, but with a sort of reverent fear, as if she was suddenly, terribly afraid that something worse would happen and take Ruby away from her entirely. She was a lot more prone to touch than she had been before, always ready with helpful arm, a gentle hand on Ruby's own, a hug. She still disagreed with Ruby almost as often as before, but never with the shrill indignation of before. Now their disagreements were soft discussions, held with mutual respect, where sometimes she swayed Weiss and sometimes Weiss swayed her.

She still sat in on Professor Goodwitch's classes, but wasn't expected or allowed to participate in the combat exercises. When she asked the woman if she could take an incomplete in the course, Glynda looked at her with an odd expression on her face.

"I think," she said, "that your actions in Mountain Glen served as an acceptable final exam for this material."

"Oh," Ruby said. "So… do I pass?"

"Yes," said Glynda. "Not with flying colors—you did make mistakes, as I'm sure you are aware. But I think an A-minus is entirely warranted. And if you want to improve it further, I will accept an essay analyzing your own actions on that night, and what you will do differently in future, to bring you up to full marks."

Ruby took her up on the offer, and spent the remainder of the combat classes that semester alternating between watching her teammates and friends fights to offer critique and working on her analysis. When she finally handed it in on the day of the exam, it was twenty-one pages long.

Glynda blinked as the stack of papers landed on her desk. "That is… rather more than I expected," she said, looking at Ruby. "I apologize, I should have given you guidance on expected length."

"There was a lot to think about," Ruby said. "I wanted to be sure I learned everything I could. I did make mistakes, but there are also things I did right, and some things that weren't correct or incorrect but that I'd do again in a heartbeat."

Glynda gave her an assessing look, then looked past her at her classmates. "You may begin the exam," she told them, then turned back to Ruby. "I do not think you made the right decision, putting yourself at such severe risk to save enemy combatants," she said quietly. "Obviously, this is not an ethics course, and I do not intend to grade you on that. But it was a terrible risk taken for what I would not consider a warranted reason."

"I understand," Ruby said. "I don't agree, though."

"May I ask why?"

"It's in there," Ruby said, pointing at her essay.

"I'd like to hear it from you in person," Glynda said.

Ruby took a deep breath. "If I did nothing, thirty-four people were going to die, for certain," she said. The final count of White Fang prisoners had been forwarded to her by Headmaster Ozpin, with the simple heading For your information. "If I did something, there was a chance we'd all get out unhurt. I had the lowest Aura out of my teammates, and I was pretty confident any of them would be fine getting knocked around Weiss' dome. The only people I weren't sure about were Raven, whose Aura levels I couldn't see but who could always teleport to Mom if she needed to, and me. I decided the risks were worth the chance at saving all those people, because saving people is my job."

"Even if those people were trying to kill you, and many others?"

"Being a Huntress doesn't give me the right to decide whether people deserve to die," said Ruby. "The only time I have the right to do that is if I have to kill someone to save myself or someone else."

"Some would argue that this was exactly that situation," Glynda pointed out neutrally.

"I was pretty sure I'd survive," said Ruby. "Admittedly, I didn't count on just how bad my injuries might be. But I still think the odds of me dying were really, really low. The only way I would have died there, given that we had a teleporter with us, was if either I was losing blood way too fast to get to a paramedic, or if I hit my head. Without any sharp edges in Weiss' dome, I didn't think that level of blood loss was likely, and I was careful to protect my head. That's how I dislocated my shoulder."

Glynda considered her for a moment. "We should discuss this further," she said, "since I don't think you have the training necessary to judge the likely outcomes of such a situation—how likely certain injuries are to occur in a given situation. But if you really did consider all these factors in the moment, then you are to be commended. Though I disagree with some of your assumptions, the logic you based upon those assumptions is sound."

"Thank you," said Ruby. "May I be excused, Professor?"

"You may."

Ruby turned and walked away, the servos of her new cyberleg whirring beneath her.

It was more than a month before the limb arrived from Atlas. Penny had actually been the one to give it to her, after giving her a big hug. "My father made this for you," she said. "He said to tell you to be careful not to overuse it for the first few weeks. It might chafe."

"I'll be careful," Ruby had promised.

Other than Professor Goodwitch's class, she was able to sit for all her finals. Since she hadn't had to take time to practice combat, she'd had plenty of time to study for all of them. She couldn't remember ever having better grades since her first term at Signal.

She even aced Geralt's class, despite an incredibly difficult final, which quizzed them on everything from his bestiary to the formulae for what felt like more than half his blade oils. When she handed it back to him at the end of the two-hour block, he took it without looking, holding her gaze with his slitted, golden eyes.

"You've been getting better fast," he commented as Jaune handed him his test and fled the room.

Ruby knew he wasn't talking about her performance in class. "Yep," she said, lifting her new leg and stretching it out, reveling in the thrumming hydraulics.

"Don't push yourself more than you can handle," Geralt warned. "The worst thing you can do now is go back into the field before you're ready."

"That's why I'm pushing myself," she said. "So that I'll be ready when it's time to go back into the field."

He nodded. "Just be careful."

"I am."

The next few weeks passed painfully slowly for Summer.

Her slight was slow to return. Two weeks became three, and three became four. First her ability to distinguish bright lights returned, then her ability to see colors.

Taiyang came to Beacon on the weekends so that she could stay in the care of the best doctors in Vale without having to travel. Raven made herself scarce whenever he was about, and Summer didn't try to meddle. She was surprised enough that Raven hadn't already left; she didn't want to do anything to jeopardize that.

During the first two weeks she spent a lot of time with Ruby, both in and out of the medical wing. It was hard to look at her daughter and see the space where her leg should have been; it was harder to shake some sense of guilt over it. Summer couldn't stop wondering if Ruby would have been more ready, or made different decisions, or even been somewhere else entirely if Summer had been there to raise her for the past twelve years.

There was no reason why any of that should be the case. It didn't stop Summer wondering.

But the worst part was seeing the brave face Ruby put on every single morning—not as though she was donning a mask so that Summer, Yang, and her friends wouldn't worry, but with such ease that Summer could only assume she really was as optimistic about her future as she seemed. It tore Summer in two, because half of her was cheering her daughter on, bursting with pride that she was able to bounce back even from something as awful as this with barely a handful of weeks to recover; the other half wished Ruby would let this be an excuse to take it easy, to step back or step away from this work, this terrible duty that they had all taken up.

And that made Summer feel ashamed, because that was exactly what she was doing.

When over a month after her injury, the doctor stepped away from her lying on the examination table and pronounced her sight to be as recovered as it was going to get, and approved her to return to work, she tried to feel relieved. She tried to join in with Taiyang's celebration, with her daughters' excitement.

But when, the night after she'd been cleared, Ozpin asked her to visit his office after dinner, all she could muster up was dread.

As she boarded the elevator, she found Geralt waiting for her. "Summer," he greeted, arms folded, leaning back against the compartment wall.

"Were you waiting for me?" she asked.

He nodded.

The door slid shut behind her. Summer made no move to key the button for Ozpin's floor.

"You don't have to jump right back into this," said Geralt quietly. "No one will fault you if you take some time to recover."

"The doctors say I am recovered," said Summer, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice. She did it almost perfectly. Almost.

"Physically, sure," Geralt said. "But it's been a rough few months for you, Summer. In a lot of ways. You've more than earned a break. You can go home, spend some time with your husband and daughters."

"I did that for weeks after you brought me back here," she pointed out.

"Was it enough?"

Summer's next words caught in her throat. "I thought it was," she said quietly.

Geralt was looking at her with his usual grim expression, but his eyes were sad. "You really have earned a rest," he said. "If the only reason you're considering going back out there is because you feel it's your duty—don't. You have a place to come home to. Enjoy it."

She quirked her lips. "Because not everyone does?"

"Even if everyone did, they should enjoy it," said Geralt. "Because it's something to cherish." He grimaced. "They said no Witcher ever died in his bed," he said. "I plan to be one of the few. There's no shame in that, Summer. After everything you've done, there's no shame at all in it."

Summer took a deep breath. "You really think so?" she asked.

"I do," said Geralt.

She sighed. "I'm going to talk to Oz," she said. "We'll… we'll see."

Geralt nodded slowly, then stepped past her and opened the elevator door. "I'll see you in the morning," he said.

"See you," said Summer, watching the door close behind him.

Two minutes later, she stepped into Ozpin's office. The man was standing beside his desk, hands clasped around the head of his cane behind his back as he stared away from her, looking out the window at the glittering courtyard below. "Summer," he said. "Welcome. Please, have a seat."

She sat. He joined her, slipping into his chair and steepling his fingers, looking at her over his spectacles. "So," she said, keeping her voice as light as she could. "I assume you have a new mission for me?"

He considered her in silence for a moment. "Yes," he said. "And I was prepared to coax you into what I thought would be one of the more difficult missions I would ever try to convince you to take on, but I suddenly have the impression that you won't be reluctant at all."

She blinked. "What?"

"I want to ask you to stay in Vale for the next few months," he said. "At least until Yennefer finishes her work or until the Vytal Festival, whichever comes first."

Her mouth worked soundlessly for a moment, but all she managed to get out was, "Oh," in a small voice.

"I suspect we will have need of a trained Silver-Eyed Warrior in the coming weeks," said Ozpin quietly. "Your daughter is immensely talented, but she has yet to unlock her powers. Whether Salem attacks us or we attack her, your abilities will be sorely desired. I was hoping I could convince you to stay in the area, where we could call on you whenever the need arises."

Summer swallowed. "Is Patch close enough for that?" she asked.

"I should think so," said Ozpin. "It's less than two hours from Beacon by airship. If we end up needing you with less than two hours' notice, then I expect we will have rather larger problems." He considered her with a frown. "You expected me to have a field mission for you," he said, "and you were dreading it. Weren't you?"

There was no sense lying. Not now. She nodded, throat tight.

He sighed. "I am sorry," he said. "I've asked so much of you. Of everyone. Sometimes I… I forget what it was like, before I fully merged with my predecessor, when I was still young and unused to the weight of this responsibility."

"I'm not—" Summer began, then stopped and started again, choosing her words carefully. "It's not that I don't want to help," she said. "I just…"

"You want to rest," said Ozpin simply. "I understand. And as far as I am concerned, Summer, you've earned a lifetime's rest. If you wanted to hang up your weapon now and never pick it up again, I would not blame you in the slightest."

She couldn't shake a sense of déjà vu. "Did Geralt talk to you about this?" she accused.

He blinked at her. "No. Should he have?" His face fell. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that you felt you could approach him with this, and not me."

She grimaced. "It's not… like that."

"No?" he sighed, looking down at his desk. "I have sat at this desk for decades, asking children and adults alike to go out into the world to face dangers they're barely ready for in the name of a cause they barely understand. I should not be surprised that I seem callous. Yet, somehow, I always am." He looked up and met her eyes. "You are important, Summer," he said, speaking slowly and clearly. "Not because of what you can offer to me or to Remnant, but for no other reason than that you are you. I fight this war so that everyone can live out their lives as they choose. I am honored and humbled that so many choose to live them joining me, but I will never take it for granted."

Summer rubbed at her stinging eyes. "Thank you, Ozpin," she said. "I—yes. I'll stay around. Spend some time here, some in Patch. Thank you."

"There's no need to thank me," he said quietly, sounding sad. "I'm sorry I ever made you feel there was."

The next few weeks passed alarmingly quickly for Raven.

She intended to stay in Vale long enough to see Summer well on her way to recovery before returning to the tribe. But Summer's recovery stalled, and before she knew it a month had slipped by, interspersed by weekends spent avoiding Taiyang. The only thing she wanted less than to deal with him was to examine why.

Fortunately, Summer didn't seem inclined to make her discuss it. Unfortunately, Raven's dear brother did.

There was a flutter of feathers as he alighted on the rooftop beside her. "Hey," he said.

"What is it, Qrow?" she sighed without looking at him.

"Tai's heading back to Patch in a couple hours," he said.

Raven kept her face neutral. "Yes. And?"

"And that'll make four weekend visits of his that you disappeared for," Qrow said. There was a faint clinking sound as he fiddled with his flask—a nervous habit he'd started to pick up, now that he was swearing off alcohol.

"Will it?" Raven asked caustically. "I hadn't noticed."

"Right, right." She could hear the roll of his eyes even without looking. "So you're planning on just hiding out here until he leaves?"

"I'm not hiding," growled Raven.

"No, of course not." Qrow snorted. "How silly of me. You're meditating on the intricacies of interpersonal relationships, I'm sure."

She finally turned her head to shoot him a flat look. He gave as good as he got. "You need to talk to him, Raven," he said.

"No," she said, "I really don't."

"Why not?"

Raven sneered. "I don't owe you an explanation."

"No," Qrow agreed. "But you owe him one. And you really owe Yang one. Speaking of which…" he looked over the edge of the roof at the training field below, and the sparring students on the green. Yang's hair was a stream of gold among the grass. "I guess we can talk about why you decided to come watch her, if you'd rather."

Raven clicked her tongue, annoyed. "Just go away, Qrow," she said.

"No," he said.

"I'm not going to talk to Taiyang," said Raven flatly. "Give it up."

"Then talk to me," Qrow demanded. "Why are you so against it? What even happened between you two?"

"Three," Raven said before she could stop herself.

Qrow didn't answer for a moment. "Summer blamed herself, you know," he said quietly. "For years she blamed herself. I thought she was just being hard on herself."

"She was," said Raven flatly. "Leave it be, Qrow."

"Raven. Rae."

Raven winced.

"Please," her brother said. "I want to know. I'm tired of feeling like I'm constantly playing from half a deck with you. With all of you. I can't be there for any of you because none of you ever tell me what's happening."

Raven took a deep breath. "I don't know what to tell you," she admitted.

"The truth, maybe?" Qrow suggested wryly.

"I'm not sure what the truth is," Raven said. "I've told myself a hundred stories about what happened over those three years. I don't even know if I was right about any of them."

Silence fell between them for a moment. She could feel the weight of Qrow's gaze.

She sighed. "When we graduated, I thought I knew what the rest of my life was going to look like," she said quietly. "I was all ready to follow you and drop the clan forever. Forget about them. When Taiyang told me that we could be a new, better family, I believed him. I still believe he wasn't lying. He was just a fool.

"They day we got married should have been the happiest day of my life. Everyone seemed to think it would be. Everybody seemed to think it was. When it wasn't, that was when I first started to wonder if I'd made a mistake. If I'd misunderstood something—misunderstood myself.

"Do you know what my strongest memory of that day is, Qrow? It's not the vows, or the temple, and it's definitely not Taiyang. It's Summer's face, sitting in the front row, looking up at us." Raven let out a slow, careful breath, remembering those silver eyes, full of tears—that smile, so sweet and so bitter.

"You thought she was jealous?" Qrow asked quietly.

"Wasn't she?" Raven grimaced. "Over the next two years… Things piled up. I got pregnant and suddenly Tai wanted me to stay home with him. Yang was born and I was ready to go back out there, but he wanted to settle down. And Summer was right there with us, helping raise her, and I just…" Raven squeezed her eyes shut. "I felt unnecessary," she admitted. "I felt wrong. I felt like the third wheel in my own marriage, which I wasn't even sure I wanted."

"So you left," said Qrow quietly.

"So I left," Raven agreed. "And Summer married Tai and they had Ruby, and that girl is stronger than any of us were at her age." She shot him a sudden glare. "Tell no one I said that."

Qrow didn't smile. "Of course not," was all he said.

Raven looked away from the unreadable, soft expression on his face. "I was so angry," she murmured. "At Taiyang, at Summer, at you and at myself. I kept my portal links to you and Yang, but I broke them to Taiyang and Summer. I never imagined—I assumed they'd stay home, like they had been when Yang was a baby. That they'd take safe jobs. I didn't even think about the possibility that Summer might need me one day." She shook her head. "I still don't know what changed," she murmured. "Why did Summer start taking away missions again? Why did she get back into Ozpin's war? She seemed so willing to stay with us, that first year, even though I know it must have been killing her to watch me with Taiyang."

Qrow let out a quiet breath. For a moment, she thought he would offer some grand insight, something she had never considered, but all he said, in a soft, wistful voice, was, "You should talk to Summer about this."

"No," said Raven, shaking her head. "I made my choices. I won't pretend I don't regret some of them, but Summer and Taiyang have each other now. There's no need to dredge up old bitterness. Not for her. She deserves better."

"Yeah, she does," said Qrow, but somehow it didn't sound like he was agreeing with her. Before she could ask him to elaborate, she heard a rustling of feathers, and when she turned around her brother was gone, and a black bird was darting away from her into the sky.