"Uncle Qrow!" shouted the hearty blonde farmer girl, "Where are you Uncle Qrow!? It's morning, wake up will ya!?" Yang almost tripped on her way down the rickety stairs while she forced her comb through her great mane of gold hair, feet getting caught in her unfastened skirt. To be exact, nothing she wore was fastened. The brown bodice that wrapped around her ruffled chemise was unlaced and ready to slip off, the dandelion yellow scarf she used as a belt for her sand colored skirt was missing, and her boots were untied.
"Father! Are you up yet!?" she shouted some more.
A indistinct groan came from the otherside of the house.
Still a bit groggy, Yang bumped her shoulders into the doorways as she passed through. Almost falling face first as she stepped outside, the farmer stopped fiddling with her hair and picked up a basket for the chicken coop. "Father! You better be ready when the carriage gets here!" The window to her father's room were thin, and with her volume she was sure that he would be able to distinctly hear her. Dozens of white, black, brown, peppered and speckled and spotted chickens clucked and ran circles around Yang while she collected eggs. One of the roosters outside the coop decided that Yang wasn't apparently up and awake yet, so it started it's obnoxious crowing.
Jogging at a excited pace, Yang burst into the kitchen and put the basket of eggs beside the stove top. Checking inside the stove, a few embers from last night still glowing, she shoved in a couple split pieces of firewood, then put a pan on top. With some eggs sitting over the fire, Yang ran to her father's room and saw the man of dirty blonde hair still laying under his covers. Without mercy, the farmer girl reached under the sheets and pulled her father by the feet out of bed and out tumbling onto the floor.
"Aye aye aye aye!" Taiyang protested loudly. "I'm up! I'm up!" Rolling over, he kicked beneath himself and stumbled to his feet.
Yang was already out the door. "You better be father, it's not everyday you get to see your own kin working at the castle under the prince!"
In front of the frying eggs, she laced up her bodice and boots, then found her scarf hanging from the kitchen ceiling. Fetching water from the well, she rinsed her mouth and face with a deep shiver, her father getting his own bucket of water for the same. "Do you think she'll woo the prince yer think?" he jested.
She scoffed with a shake of her head. "She couldn't seduce her way out of pack of boys raised in the Vatican."
They both shared a laugh that creeped into cackle territory. Yang left the eggs to her father while she grabbed a bucket full of feed for the pigs. In the pen, she found Qrow. "Qrow!" she shouted, dumping the feed on him, "Wake up!"
"Quiet down kiddo, it's too early in the morning for shouting." In nothing but a long shirt for sleeping, Qrow let the half dozen pigs swarm him and eat off of his muddy body.
"Come on uncle, you need to watch the farm while we go to see Ruby, get up!" she urged him, laughter catching on as she watched the pigs feast off him.
Largely ignoring her, his eyes crept open to the blinding light of morning. He covered his eyes for a minute until they finally adjusted. Looking around groggily, he pulled a dirty flask from the mud and was disappointed to find there was no more booze in it. "Perfect."
Running upstairs to her room, Yang grabbed her blue and white checkered shawl from her bedpost, then wrapped the warm fabric around her face and neck. Before she went back to the kitchen for breakfast, her body slowed for the first time that morning as she left a lingering gaze at the hammock just above her bed where Ruby used to sleep. As it was, it sagged without weight or swing, a modicum of dust collecting a top it. Her room wasn't her home while Ruby wasn't there.
The two weeks since Ruby disappeared in the night was the longest time the blonde hadn't seen her sister before, and it gave her too much time to think about how she missed her. It was Yang's job to look after her baby sister, and she failed, her and her father thinking Ruby had been dead until they got a letter saying she was at the castle. Yang had no real idea of what happened, but… it killed her inside.
Wiping a wet spot near her eye, Yang ran to join her father and uncle for eggs.
The sun raised higher as the morning progressed, eventually a carriage from Vale painting itself onto the country farm picture. The farmer girl and farmer father stood just outside of the doorway as they waved goodbye to Qrow, Taiyang's double barreled shotgun resting comfortably in the nook of the darker man's arms. "You see any thieves, or any bandits, you make sure and blast them good ye hear?" Taiyang gestured at his brother by law, "I don't want to find no missing pigs when I get back!"
Qrow slouched against the doorway with a grin. "I never make promises. If they make better company than you old man I might have to keep them around, maybe put the farm in their name, who knows?"
"Ooh," Yang looked around the carriage cabin in wonder, "so pretty!"
Her father stepped in after her, also impressed by the red wood lacquering and fabrics, but not as much as his daughter. "Like you, I grew up on a farm, this would have impressed me thoroughly as a kid, but when my father took me with him to Beijing, seeing the outsides of buildings alone from the inner districts left me in a spot of fantasy. Aye but when I stepped inside some of them…" he shook his head in such a way that dismissed the cabin without displaying disappointment but rather apathy, "There are places in the world you can't even imagine."
She shrugged with enthusiasm. "I am dismayed father, do you hold so little faith in my ability to imagine?"
He shrugged back with enthusiasm. It was a mystery where Yang got the habit from.
Down along the country road, they eventually came upon the main road that held most of the traffic in the country, people traveling in both directions from Germany to Austria and visa versa, Bavaria being the middle ground to do so. They for the most part enjoyed the ride, spending a great deal of their time looking out the window at people as they walked along to or through town, recognizing a good number of them and waving. Any stranger would ignore them and eye the horses and the nicely spoked wheels.
Except one.
The blonde spotted this stranger who seemingly glared at her as they rode along. Wild black hair framed the face of this young lady and went down her back, the tips dipping in the quiver she wore. Amber eyes stared back, angry for a reason Yang might never know. Possibly. She noted that the girl was walking in the same direction as their carriage, and might be going to Vale for all she knew.
Where ever she was going, those angry eyes would not be forgotten soon.
Later that morning and inside the manor grounds, Ruby stood motionless. Left foot forward and rifle sights up to her cheek, she stared down her next victim. Exhaling slowly, her finger squeezed the trigger, and the gun cracked to a puff of smoke.
The ceramic disk shattered into a fine powder which drifted along into the head wind.
"Adequate shot, my lady," commented the butler Ren, whom of which offered her another paperwad.
Ruby, donning her hunter's clothes, took the paperwad graciously, but looked to the man with a uncomprehending stare, mouth hanging to the side.
"Pardon me, I mean to say you have the requisite marksman skills to justify having a rifle."
"Uhm…"
Ren faintly sighed.
"It was a good shot, my lady."
Understanding traveled her face. "Oh! Thank you sir!" Happy with herself, she began the process of loading the next bullet. She dropped the rifle's stock to the top of her boot, put the paperwad to her mouth, and bit off the marked end. She mindlessly spat the crumbled piece away, Ren catching it effortlessly and pocketing it. Ruby tipped the open wad over and into the muzzle, the powder tapping along on its way down, then the lead ball plopped in and sat still an inch inside. Grabbing the loading rod, she shoved the ball down until it would go any further. Refastening the rod, she lifted and leveled the rifle, drew the hammer back, pulled a blasting cap from her pocket and placed it on the hammer, and aimed.
"Forty four seconds is quite good for a beginner, my lady," Ren noted, nodding.
"Heh, thank you sir. Say… I never caught your name."
"Ren, my lady."
"That's… that's a pretty name."
"Thank you, my lady."
"What was your father's name, or maybe family name?"
"Lie."
She lowered her rifle and looked to him sympathetically. "No, you don't have to lie about it, it's okay."
He blinked twice. "Pardon me, my lady, my name is Lie Ren."
A little flustered, the girl dropped her head to hit the top of her rifle. "I'm so sorry, I'm still adjusting to all of this," she resumed her firing stance and fired, another clay target disappearing. "I never thought I would be doing… any of this, it is all quite frankly beyond me."
A small smile. "But it would seem your current target is not beyond you," he glanced to the ever decreasing targets. "Your progress in weapons has been smooth and brisk, something you might've not thought possible just a week ago. It might be apt to say that within time, the other new facets of your life will fall within your scope of expertise should you give time the chance to first arrive."
Ruby covered her mouth, even more so flustered. "Oh sir! I do not deserve such praise!"
The butler chuckled as he handed her another paperwad. "That remains to be seen, my lady. My lord chose you, and my lord is a very picky person." He then held a finger to his mouth and leaned in somewhat, "But don't let Weiss know I said that."
She giggled. Her giddy laughter came from a place of genuine warmth, a place that relished the thought that perhaps she made a new friend. Every other time she had seen the man, he had been dead still and even more still dead quiet, but he seemed to have just opened up to her in confidence. That meant one more person she could pass in the hallways that she didn't feel was looking judgingly in her direction.
Her thoughts didn't travel too much further when a familiar voice screamed her name. Yang was running to her.
Ren walked away from the scene, and took a spot behind the just arriving Jaune. Both watched as both of the girls cried into each other's shoulders, hugging tightly and fighting to spin the other around. "She hit three clay pigeons in a row at 20 yards."
Jaune sighed as he scratched his forehead. "You don't have to rub it in."
The smaller man suppressed a chuckle. "Sir, I misunderstand what you imply, I simply state she is overperforming, at the very least, compared to the efforts of a particular knight you are acquainted with."
"Hold your tongue you musty nook-shotten jack-a-nape." They both chuckled. Ruby and Yang were talking over each other about missing the other through tears. "To be fair, my dear Ren, she performed better than you, aye?"
"It would be rude and above my position to speak less than perfectly of my superiors, but to say otherwise would also be a falsity."
"I need not look Ren, but I know if I did, I would find the cheekiest smirk on your clever little mouth. Correct me if my understanding is less than true… never mind. If I were a gambling man, in a gunfight, I would bet on you then, correct?"
"If you were a gambling man, my lord."
At this point, it seemed that Yang was already gossiping in hushed whispers to her sister about all the handsome noblemen, possibly Jaune included, that she had passed on the way here, and was teasing the younger of the two about her technically living with them.
"Before I forget, butler whose name escapes me," Jaune shot the asian man a mutual sly smile, "whatever you do, don't correct Lady Ruby on the gender of our lord."
"I wouldn't dream of it, lord of questionable lineage, it would be a grievous sin to prevent the world from witnessing our lord Weiss' reaction to 'his' protege's continued misconception."
Jaune shook his head with a tired grin. "You're a terrible butler."
Ren shrugged. "Wasn't my first occupation. Still adjusting. You're a terrible knight."
-End Chapter 6-
Sorry I disappeared there for a while. If you happen to enjoy my stories (craziest timeline confirmed) you should check out my new story, "Miracles of Ancient Wonder." I already have it written out to like, 10 chapters, but am only now posting. Seriously, plz, check it out, I beg of ya, thank you all for your continued patronage.