After what would be known as 'The Ears Incident,' Blake noticed a few things. Over the next few days, some of the younger and/or more vulnerable looking maids would be teased by some of the older and/or more aggressive maids; 'Watch out,' the older maids would say, 'Young mistress Weiss has a fondness of ears; if you give her the chance, she'll gobble yours right up', and then the younger maids would clutch their headdresses and yell, 'nooooooo~'. Blake could already tell some of the maids were Faunus by their smell, but these teasing confirmed many of her assumptions about which maids were (secretly?) Faunus.

Over the next few months, Mr. and Mrs. Schnee would bring up the incident when they wanted to manipulate and/or embarrass their daughter.

And in the potential futures where Weiss ran for public office, when the incident was uncovered by her political opponent, Weiss had to hold many, many press conferences where she explained that she'd never eat a Faunus's ears for real, that she didn't have a Faunus Ear Fetish (not that there was anything wrong with that), that said fetish was in no way motivated by subconscious bias about the role of Faunus in society, that she was fully aware of and a complete advocate of consent and boundaries and that she would never, ever put a Faunus's ear in her mouth without the Faunus's explicit consent, and also that she wasn't gay, and, on an unrelated note, people should just pay no attention to the Faunus ninja who always seemed to be around her.

But within an hour after The Ears Incident, the adult Schnees summoned Weiss into an office, with a point that Blake was not to accompany her. The tone was not friendly. Blake spied on them.

"If I had known that was what you wanted your own Faunus for, I would have had the maids make you a doll," said the other taller Schnee. "Sentient beings have rights and, more importantly, civil liberties unions." She rubbed her brow. "Why didn't you just ask for a doll?"

Weiss's voice was meek and desperate and pleading. "It's not-"

"We are not that kind of rich people, Weiss sweetie. Do you understand?" said the other taller Schnee, as harshly as Blake had ever heard her. "We do not bring people or Faunus into our house to- to molest them. We do not."

"But I-"

"The damage has already been done, but it will not happen again. Do I make that clear?"

"I- yes, mother-"

The other taller Schnee relaxed, slightly. She swirled her wineglass. "Your little pet probably hates you forever now," continued Weiss's mother. "Forever."

And here Weiss's voice was soft and low and broken. "Wha- but- it was only one little mistake-"

"Let that be a lesson to you, then," said the other taller Schnee, and she sounded a little more forlorn this time. "Sometimes you don't get a second chance."

"You will report yourself to the isolation room and reflect upon what you've done. You will not have supper tonight."

"I- okay," Weiss said.

Weiss walked out of the room. Her shoulders were slumped. She was crying.

Blake snuck out of her hiding spot and approached-

And one of the maids- the gaunt one- put a hand on Blake's shoulder. The maid shook a solemn head and led Blake into the room Weiss had just left.

It was a study, there were some decorative plants and the walls were lined with bookshelves and end tables, and there was a large desk, with the taller Schnees sitting behind it. Blake was escorted to a curving laqured chair that smelled like must and admonishment. Blake took a seat.

The elder Schnees looked at her from across the desk. Several other members of the staff stood stock still on either side of them.

The other taller Schnee- the female one- looked Blake in the eyes. She was very serious. "If at this juncture you wish to leave, we can expedite your entrance into the foster care system and grant you a rather generous stipend for the rest of your life."

Blake blinked.

The other taller Schnee pulled out a stack of papers and started thumbing through it. "You would just need to sign- here- " The Schnee pointed to a line at the bottom of the fourth page, "As well as -here- and initial -here-"

"actually," Blake stated, "i'd like to stay."

The taller Schnee, the male one, smiled. He leaned back in his chair.

The other taller Schnee blinked. "Perhaps the situation is not clear to you. Weiss has done something wrong, to you. She has infringed upon your..." The Schnee pontificated.

Blake pursed her lips. "personhood?"

"Sure." The human sighed. "Whatever you want to call it. But regardless of the moral infringement- which there is one, don't think I don't understand that- what she did was illegal. Yes. For that you have... my..."

The woman coughed once and stared at the wall. "Apologies. My sincerest apologies." The Schnee put a hand to her sternum. "Weiss is still young, you understand. She will make mistakes. It's my- our-" She looked to her husband, "Our job to ensure that her mistakes aren't severe enough to ruin her life."

"This one may be," The other taller Schnee tapped the papers, "Which is why we are taking as many precautions as possible to ensure it won't happen again. But it doesn't change the fact that it happened."

Blake ignored the papers. She stared at the human.

"You would stay with our daughter? Sleep in the same room? After what she's done?"

Blake blinked. "perhaps forgiveness is more common among Faunus."

"Ahahaha." The Schnee laughed. "Send me a meow when that's a fungible commodity."

Blake blinked.

The taller Schnee turned to his wife. "Blake can still be Weiss's bodyguard and, ah, nutritional safeguard. If Weiss learns to comport herself, I see no reason Blake can't stay."

"Very well," The other taller Schnee pushed the stack of papers aside. "We'll draft up a nondisclosure agreement. Just a precaution, you underst- you don't need to understand, but you will need to agree never to speak of this again, in writing."

Blake glanced between the other members of the staff in the room.

"They are already sworn to secrecy. Potentially, ah, questionably legal things may or may not happen relatively often, though never of the nature or to the degree that Weiss has just perpetrated."

The gaunt maid coughed.

Blake nodded in aquiescence.

The taller Schnees smiled. "Good," said mum Schnee, "And if there's anything we or our staff can do for you right now, to help you forget this whole ordeal, we can accommodate."

Blake pondered.

The first thing Blake wanted was obvious. Blake approached the cook and asked for more cooked fishies, as well as some bacon and some eggs and some steaks. The cook brought out the fishies they had bought yesterday and pulled out a freshly slaughtered pig, which some of the maids carved strips off of, and pulled some steaks out of the freezer.

Blake gorged herself. She tried to convince herself that it was a more enjoyable meal without the presence of someone who kept trying to steal her meat or feed her vegetables or get into food fights with her. She could not.

Blake then borrowed a pair of infrared goggles from one of the more extreme security guards, as well as a map of the mansion from one of the more practical security guards. She spent the afternoon mapping out the warmest places in the building. The southeast tower had thin walls and was directly hit by sunlight for most of the day, so it got pretty warm. Blake took a short nap in its topmost room. The only problem was that the windows also let in the sunlight, which, while warm, was sometimes too bright. Then there was the boiler room, which got pretty warm, as that was where they boiled the water for the mansion, but it also had some sort of ventilation ducts that brought in cooler air from somewhere.

The real jackpot, however, was in the closet on the far wall behind the kitchen- a relatively central room, and one that Blake seemed to usually be in close proximity to. It was where the heat outtake to all the freezers ended up. Blake took a short, contented nap in that room, sprawled under the warmth.

And then it was late. One of the maids woke Blake and escorted her to a hallway Blake had never seen before.

Weiss was there, wiping her face on her sleeve. She looked forlorn, and her medical eyepatch was damp. She slumped as she walked along the corridor, ahead of where Blake was brought. Blake coughed to get her attention.

"Blakey!" Weiss turned and ran up to Blake and, pointedly, did not hug Blake. She kneeled at Blake's feet.

Blake blinked.

"Blakey I'm sorry-"

Blake put a finger to Weiss's lips. Weiss looked at her with curiosity.

Blake pulled out a bunched up portion of her dress, where grease had already begun to travel up the threads. She extracted a strip of bacon.

Weiss winked.

Blake put her thumb on Weiss's chin and opened the human girl's mouth. She placed the bacon on Weiss's tongue.

Weiss closed her mouth around the piece of bacon. She closed her eyes as she chewed. After Weiss swallowed, she hugged Blake's legs. Her eye was freshly moist.

"Blakey I'm so, so, sorry, please don't hate me forever-"

Blake blinked.

"Please stay, Blake. Please please please. Anything you want, Blake, I'll do anything to make this right."

Blake blinked again.

"anything?"