Word Count: 5,474

EDITED 12/27/2019

Chapter 2 — A Silent Hero

Weiss Schnee, the second daughter of Lord Jacques Schnee, shrieked in outrage as one of her father's men came up behind her and pinned her arms. Another man grabbed her wrist and pried Myrtenaster (her mother's rapier) from her grasp.

Weiss struggled to break free as she screamed, "Unhand me and give that back!" Unfortunately, it was a wasted effort. She had lost this fight the moment the soldiers had gotten close enough to subdue her.

"Settle down, milady, or else we might have to take more drastic measures."

Weiss straightened as best she could and glared. "You wouldn't."

Now that he had her in hand, the leader of the squad (a corporal by the look of the patch on his uniform) dropped any semblance of subservience, and the revolting, noticeably overweight man smirked. "Of course none of us want to but if we must, we must. It's no secret that Lord Schnee's second daughter can be...less than amiable when things don't go her way. I'm sure he'd understand if we had to be a bit more forceful bringing you back."

"I'll have you stripped of your rank and barred from the Schnee Guards," Weiss threatened as she glowered, her eyes burning furiously

The corporal's face hardened, and his smirk faded. "I'd like to see you try, milady. Everyone knows that in a few years time your position as heiress of the Schnee holdings will be revoked in favor of your younger brother, and you'll be married off to some other noble family. You have no power to enforce anything."

He leaned closer, but Weiss refused to flinch or back down. "If I were you, milady, I'd go home and do as your father says. You should be happy. No matter what happens, you'll get to live a life of comfort and ease. All you need to do is bear a child or two and you're set for life, unlike the rest of us who have to work for a living. Don't make my job any harder and just go home, milady. You'll thank me someday." He motioned to the other soldiers. "Tie her up, and let's get going. It's still early. If we start now, we can be back at Schnee Castle in a few days."

"Sorry about this, milady," the white-and-blue-uniformed guard holding Weiss muttered in her ear, "but orders are orders."

Another soldier approached with a length of rope, and Weiss felt her short-lived bravado drain away into frustration and hopelessness.

She had been so close to escaping her father's grasp, but now her efforts were all for naught. There was no way she would get another chance to escape—it had been hard enough this time around. Her father would keep her locked up and watched like a hawk until he found some use for her that furthered his greedy ambitions. Selling her hand in marriage was the most likely, but that was actually the least of her concerns.

Weiss heard what he had been discussing behind closed doors with some of the men on the Atlas Council. She knew what he was planning, and for the sake of the honor of the Schnee name, she couldn't allow his plans to come to fruition. He was not the start of the Schnee family name, and she would not allow him to be the one to dishonor and end it. That was what had given her the courage to finally break away and leave, but she had failed before even truly beginning.

Winter, I miss you so, she thought as she did her best to hold back tears of angry frustration and to ignore the coarse rope coiling around her to keep her arms pinned to her body. Winter, her elder sister of eight years, wouldn't have been caught like this. In fact, her sister had already managed to get out. Somehow, Winter had caught the eye of General James Ironwood, and he had taken her with him to Vytal where the High Council governed and worked to keep the provinces in peace.

Weiss had no idea how her sister was faring since her father had forbidden anyone to communicate with her. The one time Weiss had gotten a letter from her, her father had torn it from her grasp and burned it on the spot. When Weiss tried sending out a letter herself, none of the servants would send it for her in fear of her father's wrath. Klein Sieben, the former Schnee family butler, would have done it, but some sort of disagreement with her father had led to him being fired and thrown out immediately. Weiss hadn't even been given a chance to say goodbye.

That was all her life amounted to, it seemed. Words left unheard. Things left unsaid. Dreams left unfulfilled. At every turn, her father controlled her life, forcing her to go along with his empty family charade while simultaneously preventing her from accomplishing anything she thought was worthwhile.

But no longer.

Weiss still had a few days before reaching Schnee Castle. That would give her plenty of opportunities to escape. She just had to be patient and wait for her chance. She could do this. She had to do this.

In the end, Weiss didn't even need to wait to get her chance. The carriage had barely gone more than a few yards before there were several loud, cracking thuds against its wooden frame. A series of panicked shouts arose from outside which were soon accompanied by the sound of drawn steel.

What's going on? Weiss wondered, as the carriage lurched to a halt. Well, no matter. Taking advantage of the lull in movement, she tested her restraints, but she made little progress. The bonds were just too tight.

As soon as they stuck her in this shoddy carriage, the corporal had shown up with another rope, which he proceeded to wrap around her wrists and then tied to a nearby handrail. He left the rope short—so short there was barely enough slack for her to rest her bound wrists on her lap

"We can't have you trying to jump out when the carriage stops," he had said to her smugly, almost gleefully, in the face of Weiss's anger.

There was more yelling outside, but another series of thuds prevented Weiss from making out any specific words. Cold sweat trickled down between her shoulder blades, and her breathing hitched in spite of herself. Her father was notoriously harsh on bandits and outlaws who dared to attack any of his caravans. His greed would allow for nothing less, so it was rare for any Schnee Guards to be attacked as long as they hoisted a flag with the Schnee family crest. (She had seen the familiar blue pennant with a white snowflake insignia waving in the air above the carriage before she had been forced inside.) The only ones with enough gall to attack any Schnee caravans or holdings were the hopelessly stupid or the White Fang, a militant group of Faunus who hated humans.

The very thought sent a chill down Weiss's spine. If it was the White Fang and they found her here, she was doomed. There was no way they would let her go once they knew whose daughter she was. The White Fang hated her father for his unscrupulous business ethics and exploitation of their people. Even worse—thanks to her father and his like-minded peers—Faunus rights in the Atlas Province had been diminishing with every passing year. No, the White Fang would not be gentle with her.

Wait, why was it so quiet?

Suddenly, Weiss realized just how helpless she was—just how helpless that misogynistic pig of a man had made her by tying her up like this. Anyone could open the carriage doors, and she would be unable to stop them or even protect herself. Her pulse sped up, and there was a tremor in her hands that she couldn't quite quell.

Were those...footsteps? Yes—yes, they were.

Weiss fought to keep herself together. Back straight, chin up, don't show any weakness. Don't give them any openings to exploit.

The footsteps stopped, and Weiss's breath caught. Silence. And then…

Knock, knock.

What in Dust's name?—who knocks on a carriage door after attacking its escort?

Someone fumbled about on the other side of the door, and then it creaked open.

There in the carriage opening stood a brown-cloaked figure whose hood was drawn up all the way, hiding their face entirely from view. A strung bow was draped across their torso, and a quiver of arrows hung from their left side. There was a short, curved sword hanging from their right.

They're left-handed like me , Weiss couldn't help but notice.

They wore a leather vest over a long-sleeved cotton shirt with leather trousers that were tucked into calf-high boots. A heavy looking belt pouch hung just in front of their scabbard, and they had an archer's armguard on their right wrist. Every piece of equipment and clothing the figure wore spoke of long, frequent use.

They were armed. They were ragged and dirty. They were tiny. Well, not really that tiny, but Weiss was quite sure that this person was smaller than herself, and Weiss considered herself average.

Weiss was so surprised that she forgot to school her expression. A Schnee would never be so uncouth as to gape, but she couldn't deny that her mouth had dropped open ever so slightly and her eyes had widened.

However, what was most surprising to her was that this person didn't feel like a threat.

Weiss was no stranger to aggression. She had tasted the physical kind when she was younger whenever she sparred with the castle guards before her father had decided it wasn't proper for young women to learn to fight. If his decision to stop her sword lessons had anything to do with her sister escaping his control, he made no mention of it. And Weiss was well acquainted with non-physical forms of aggression as well, for it was always she who had to weather her father's rages when things didn't go the way he planned now that Winter was no longer around. Thus far, he had never struck her, but he was not above screaming vitriol or slamming his fist against his desk as he railed against whatever had currently earned his ire.

Yes, she knew what aggression felt like, and there was none emanating from the person in the carriage doorway.

The person held their hands up, showing Weiss they were empty.

I am not a threat.

Though Weiss understood the message just fine, she couldn't help but feel uneasy all the same. Who was this person? Why were they here? Why did they attack her captors?

The figure continued to approach Weiss slowly, giving her ample time to stop them. She didn't. Why, even she wasn't quite sure herself, but at the moment, this person had done nothing to threaten her and so she would wait and see.

Finally, the figure was all the way in the carriage and within reaching distance—well, for Weiss, kicking distance anyway. Still entirely silent, the cloaked figure reached out and deftly began untying the ropes binding Weiss's wrists.

Weiss let out an unintentional sigh of relief when the ropes fell away. They had been tight enough to cause discomfort, and she could see red abrasion marks twining around her wrists from when she had tried to loosen the bindings earlier. Pins and needles prickled at her fingers so she flexed her hands a few times to get rid of the uncomfortable sensation.

Her apparent savior gave her a moment before motioning for her to turn around. She did so eagerly and soon the ropes around her arms and torso came undone as well. She was free!

In her excitement, she spun back around rather quickly. Apparently, too quickly. Her savior flinched, and suddenly they were standing as far away from her as possible without actually leaving the confines of the horse-drawn vehicle. Weiss blinked in shock. How did they do that? She didn't even see them move, and were those...rose petals? Where did those come from?

A heavy silence fell over the two of them before Weiss finally cleared her throat and said, "You have my thanks."

There was another long silence. Then her savior finally gave a jerky nod before turning and leaving the carriage. Weiss hastened to follow after them.

"Wait!" she cried out.

Either they didn't hear her or they were ignoring her because they didn't turn around or stop. To her shock, they were already halfway to the forest even though she had just seen them exit.

A mixture of panic and annoyance filled her chest. Panic that she was about to be left behind by the only person who seemed to be on her side, and annoyance that they had the nerve to ignore her. She was Weiss Schnee, a noble daughter of one of the most powerful houses in Atlas. Then her emotions did another flip, and she grew angry at herself. Who she was didn't matter anymore. She had given it all up the moment she decided to leave because once her father discovered what she was truly planning to do, he'd disown her and likely exile her from home. Not that it had even been a home. It had stopped being home the moment Winter and Klein left, the only two people who ever showed her affection anymore.

"Please, wait!" she cried out again, doing her best to swallow her worthless pride.

The cloaked figure didn't stop. Soon they would enter the trees, and Weiss would lose sight of them. She couldn't let that happen. Already she had discovered that she was woefully ill-prepared for life outside the castle. She thought she could do it, but she had run herself ragged just trying to get this far. What was worse? Her father's hounds had already caught up to her. Weiss needed assistance, and this person was as good as any.

Or perhaps the best I could have possibly ever hoped for , she thought as she gazed in shock and more than a little awe at all the soldiers lying around the carriage. There was very little blood, meaning, they're all just unconscious? How? A pained groan from one of the men only further reinforced her supposition.

Weiss gave herself a shake. She could spend all the time in the world wondering later. Right now, she had to retrieve Myrtenaster and (if possible) what little luggage she had managed to sneak out with her, and follow after her mysterious savior before she lost sight of them.

Weiss had been too slow.

It took her more than a few minutes to figure out where the soldiers had put Myrtenaster and a few moments more to find her luggage. Precious minutes that she needed to follow after the small warrior who had freed her. She had taken too long. Now she was lost, and the person she had tried following was nowhere in sight. All she could see were trees, trees, a shrub, and of course, more trees.

An all too familiar pang radiated out from her chest and against her wishes, her eyes began to sting. She gripped the hilt of Myrtenaster far too tightly and fought the rising urge to scream.

"Enough, Weiss. You're just a girl."

Yes, she was just a girl but that didn't mean she was powerless—that she couldn't accomplish anything on her own.

"Go to your room. This doesn't concern you. Why don't you practice your music? You can perform at the next dinner party. You know how much people love to listen to your voice."

But the Schnee Dynasty hadn't been founded on music. She loved it, but it wasn't something that could help their people or the province of Atlas. Weiss wanted to do something real with her life. She knew she had the skills for it; she was her mother's daughter after all. Both Weiss and her sister had inherited the Schnee Glyphs, a Semblance unique to those of their bloodline. Only time would tell if her little brother would show an aptitude for it as well—assuming he ever unlocked his Aura and put enough training in to discover his Semblance. Weiss wasn't fully trained either, of course, but that was her father's fault for alienating his eldest daughter to the point where she left as soon as she could, even if that meant leaving her little sister only partially trained. All Weiss needed was just one chance to prove to everyone she had what it took.

"For the last time, no! Don't be foolish! Young women aren't supposed to partake in such pastimes. It's unbecoming. Do you think your future husband would want you if he knew you spent your time swinging a sword around like common soldier? You already have one scar—any more and no one will want you."

The scar was his fault to begin with. What kind of father orders his men to attack his own daughter again and again to the point where she could barely stand? He'd done it to try to prove to Weiss that there was no way she could hold her own against a real warrior. Well, the joke was on him. He hadn't realized that the reason she could use her family's Semblance was because Winter had unlocked her Aura for her, and Weiss had no intention of informing him. With her Aura unlocked, she could easily outlast a normal warrior, several even. Of course, that had done nothing but further anger him to the point where he ordered his men to keep attacking her even after she had gotten a kill point. He had only called them off when her defensive Aura had faltered, allowing a single lucky blade to break through and slice towards her left eye. She'd carry the scar for life.

The memories of her father's critical, loveless words slammed into her over and over again, belittling her, criticizing her, trying to break her so that she really did believe that she had no value beyond being paraded around like some object.

She was not an object.

Suddenly, her foot got caught on a tree root. She tumbled forward, and her knee scraped against a tree trunk as she went down. Weiss hissed at the stinging pain and realized she'd not only bruised her knee, but it was bleeding as well. She tried to get back to her feet, but her injured limb refused to cooperate.

That was when she heard a rustling of leaves nearby. She froze and then slowly drew Myrtenaster from its sheath. She was not going to go down without a fight.

She waited, straining her ears to see if she could guess which direction the threat would be coming from. She shouldn't have bothered for after a few moments, a familiar cloaked figure stepped out of the trees in front of her.

Weiss nearly sagged with relief. Nearly. It was unbecoming of a Schnee to show weakness in public. Her relief quickly turned to anger at having been surprised and caught in such a shameful display.

"Enjoying the view? If you had an ounce of decency, you'd come over here and help rather than just stand around and watch," she said acidly. However, even in the midst of anger, Weiss regretted her words immediately, especially when the figure suddenly froze.

What's wrong with me? At this rate, I'll be no better than my father.

Her harsh words were uncalled for and unjust. So caught up in her inner chastisement that she didn't realize the figure had slowly started moving again until they were nearly to her. Again, Weiss felt anger at being caught off guard but this time, she made an effort to hold her tongue. If she didn't say anything at all, she wouldn't say something she might regret.

With surprisingly strong yet gentle hands, the figure helped Weiss right herself and sat her down on one of the larger roots at the foot of the tree. Weiss frowned at the thought of getting her clothes dirty but managed to stop herself from complaining. Gloved hands motioned toward Weiss's injured leg. Her brow furrowed as she tried to make sense of the series of incomprehensible hand gestures.

Finally, more than a little frustrated, Weiss spat out, "I don't understand. Why don't you just say what you want?"

The figure froze at that, and Weiss had the distinct impression that she had said something wrong. She just had no idea as to what. Then, the figure turned to rummage through their knapsack and pulled out a soft-leather pouch. They opened it and showed Weiss its contents. There were several small glass vials that had been carefully packed between thick rolls of cloth and two squat jars that had been equally padded to prevent breakage. It looked like...a medical kit? Had the figure been trying to offer to see to her injuries? Then why didn't they just says so in the first place?

Weiss shifted uncomfortably, feeling decidedly out of her element. Schnees didn't accept help from others. They were strong, superior even. Accepting any sort of assistance, especially in public, was admitting to weakness, and a Schnee couldn't be weak. It simply wasn't allowed. Her father would have left her to her own devices for an injury like this, stating that it was an injury caused by her own foolishness and therefore she should deal with it on her own—that she should take responsibility for her actions like a proper Schnee—as if he didn't have his own personal physician and team of healers waiting on standby in case anything happened to himself or heaven forbid, his only son.

The thought caused a familiar boiling of anger and more out of spite towards her father than logical acceptance that she could use the medical assistance, she straightened her injured limb towards the cloaked figure, silently acquiescing to letting them look at it. Her father was no longer here to control every aspect of her life. She was finally free to make her own decisions, no matter what he might think of them.

The figure went to work immediately and moved closer, clearly examining the wound from beneath their darkened hood.

Meanwhile, Weiss got caught in another torrent of thoughts and anxieties. Just that one movement had hurt her leg more than she expected. What if it was broken? She had never broken a limb before, but she had heard it was rather painful. Her knee was stinging like no tomorrow and seemed to throb with increasing pain with every beat of her heart.

Stop, she told herself, knowing that she was just getting worked up over possibly nothing. It was a bad habit of hers and the main reason why she hated when things didn't go according to plan or caught her by surprise. Such things always filled her with feelings of inadequacy. It was probably why she wasn't always the best with people on a personal level. In a one-on-one conversation, she couldn't predict which way the conversation would go and even the smallest social gaffes on her part filled her with panic. Winter and Klein were the only people in her life who always knew what she meant to say even if she botched it or even worse, let the cold, unfeeling, often overly harsh heiress her father tried to mold her into take over her mouth, making her say things that she always regretted after.

Conversely, she always knew exactly how to act and what to say in front of her father's friends and business partners. Interacting with them was a farce—an exchange of predetermined, meaningless words in a certain order that somehow showed you had class and were of high-breeding—a game of insincere compliments about the expensive food, the lovely venue, and the out of season flowers, mixed in with snide, passive-aggressive remarks if even one hair was out of place. By no means was it easy—one had to keep on their toes to ensure every cutting remark was skillfully overturned so as not to lose face—but as much as she hated it, it was predictable and therefore something she was reasonably good at.

Yet she didn't want to be good at something so meaningless and empty. She wanted to do something worthwhile, to be better than what little her father expected her to be—not because it would irritate her father to no end although that did make it ever so alluring in her eyes—but for herself.

Weiss wanted to break away from her shackles, the gilded cage her father fashioned around her to make her believe in her own impotence. She was just a tool to be used; thinking for herself was the height of foolishness. She should just do as she was told and be seen rather than heard. So much of her childhood had been devoted to making her believe that there was no other life than the one he presented to her and that she should just be grateful for whatever he gave her.

Well, no longer. Weiss wanted to throw off the crushing sense of worthlessness and self-doubt he had instilled in her over the years. Then maybe, just maybe, she'd be able to discover who she truly was and what she could accomplish because right now, she was nothing and would continue to be nothing if she let herself remain a pawn in her father's power games.

A flash of white caught her eye, and Weiss looked up to see a pair of pale hands emerging from their leather gloves. So there was a person under that cloak after all. A young person. With tiny hands. Surprisingly beautiful tiny hands. Who would have thought such a ruggedly clothed individual would have had such fair hands? Calloused to be sure, but still beautiful in their own way. This was the person who had taken out nine armed soldiers all on their own? No man would ever have such dainty hands so her rescuer had to be either a young boy or…a woman?

But that couldn't be right. Women weren't allowed to be warriors in Atlas—not since her father had started using his influence to place other men (who generally agreed women shouldn't be allowed in positions of power) on Atlas's governing council. He had even had the gall to use her mother's death to further his political agenda. She had died from illness, plain and simple, and definitely not because women simply aren't made for the rigors of the battlefield and her mother's insistence to continue wielding Myrtenaster sat at odds with her womanly nature, causing her to tragically pass away before her time. (He had started spreading that bit of drivel while Weiss had been recuperating from the injury that he had indirectly caused.) By the time her eye had healed enough to resume her usual duties, she found that her father had taken Myrtenaster and locked it away in his study where she couldn't reach it. That marked the last of her rapier lessons though she had done her best to stay in practice using the poker from the fireplace in her room.

Not privy to Weiss's inner thoughts, the figure gently lifted Weiss's leg with warm hands and used their own knee to prop it up so that it ran parallel to the ground. They pulled out a canteen, removed its stopper, poured some of its contents onto a cloth they pulled out of their med-kit, and dabbed at her sluggishly bleeding wound.

And there went Weiss's attempt to hold her tongue.

"Ouch! What are you doing?! That hurts!" she hissed.

She jerked her leg away—or tried to anyway. The figure had a good grip on it and better leverage, so all Weiss ended up doing was almost pulling herself off her seat. The figure lifted their head and lightly smacked Weiss's shin, and suddenly Weiss had the strangest impression that she had just been wordlessly scolded. Her face flushed, but she didn't try to pull away again.

Once the figure seemed satisfied that the injury was clean, they rinsed their hands with more water from their canteen and pulled out one of the stoppered vials. They uncorked it and held it over the wound. They shifted slightly to face Weiss more directly and held up three fingers. Weiss looked on with a mixture of confusion and frustration that the person under the hood refused to say a word. She watched as the fingers disappeared one by one. When the last had fallen away, The figure grasped her leg securely and let a few drops fall from the vial onto her open wound.

It hurt. It was like someone had taken a hot frying pan and pressed it against her open wound. Weiss jerked and let out a muffled screech through clenched teeth. So that's what the whole finger thing was about. They were counting down so I wouldn't be caught off guard. Except that I still was because they didn't bloody just say what the countdown was supposed to mean.

A few seconds of agony later, the figure took a clean cloth and lightly dabbed at the wound yet again, causing Weiss's hands to curl into tight fists as she fought the urge to pull away. Then they cracked open one of the jars, releasing a cool, mildly minty scent into the air. They dipped a finger into the jar and spread its contents over Weiss's knee. The pain lessened almost immediately, and Weiss's shoulders loosened with relief. Maybe they weren't trying to torture her after all. A few moments later, Weiss's wound was neatly bandaged, and the cloaked figure was already packing up their things and shrugging their knapsack back on. White hands disappeared back into those unsightly gloves, and the figure rose to their feet.

Wait, were they leaving already? They couldn't do that! Weiss hadn't even explained why she had chased after them in the first place! Plus it was partially their fault that she had gotten hurt. If they had just stopped and listened to her, she wouldn't have been floundering around in the forest and therefore wouldn't have tripped over that stupid tree root.

Weiss struggled to her feet. "Wait! Please. I need your help." She hobbled forward a few steps, determined to grab the figure if they tried to leave without at least hearing her out. Her words were met with utter silence.

The silence stretched. Weiss's heart dropped. Then the figure suddenly shuffled their feet and gave her a jerky nod. Weiss almost couldn't believe it.

The figure shuffled over to where Weiss had left Myrtenaster earlier, and she panicked. "Don't touch that! It's mine!"

They raised their hands instantly and practically leaped away. If only the soldiers had been half as obedient , Weiss mused as she reached down to pick up her mother's rapier. She checked it over carefully before returning it to her side. The next time she looked up, the figure had Weiss's luggage over their shoulder and was holding out a sturdy looking tree branch.

Weiss stared at it dubiously. Seeing that she didn't know what it was for, the figure mimed limping and used the branch to steady themself. Weiss flushed. She should have been able to guess that.

She grabbed it less graciously than she knew she should and took a few practice steps with it. It helped more than she expected, making her feel like an oaf when she realized just how entitled she was acting. Like this, she was no better than her father who always acted as though the world owed him so he needn't show anyone a shred of gratitude. He was a Schnee; of course, they were to bend over backwards to suit his every whim.

Weiss knew better—wanted to be better—but why was it so hard? It was just two words of gratitude, but somehow she couldn't bring herself to say them outright. But she had said something like them before, right?—when her savior had freed her from the carriage? Or hadn't she? Now she couldn't remember. If she hadn't, what a horrid person she must seem. Yet before she could properly talk herself into saying anything, the figure started walking away much more slowly than they had before. After a good fifteen or so steps, they turned around and looked towards Weiss expectantly.

Well, it didn't seem like they were expecting her to say thanks. Maybe they didn't mind? Still, Weiss thought, I ought to say something. Eventually. As soon as I get to relative safety. She hobbled towards the cloaked figure and as soon as it became clear she was coming, they turned and continued walking.