Weiss couldn't help but glance at Blake. Erashan's question had robbed the colour from her face. Her skin was entirely pasty. Her features screwed up in a pained grimace. She looked ill. Ill and vulnerable. Weiss stepped in front of her.
There were two types of people when posturing for a fight. The first type came with raised voices, flung insults, and red cheeks. Two people squaring up and butting chests. Those people were all bluster. They didn't actually want to fight. To actually hurt someone else. They were just making a scene. Generally, if you saw two people like that, you could walk away safe in the knowledge that fists wouldn't fly.
Then there was the second type of person. The person, who didn't shout, didn't rage. The one who remained quiet and still. The one whose face became pale. Who didn't allow their decision making to become needlessly compromised. In the event that they fought, blood would fly. They were infinitely more dangerous, and watched forever vigilantly by bar staff around the world.
Erashan was one of the second. His question had not been delivered with a shout. It hadn't even been said with any emotion. It had been cold and cool. Just like he was. And as he stared at Blake, Weiss knew he was calculating distances and choosing the optimal method of attack.
She wouldn't allow it. Not when she'd only just reconnected with Blake again. It had meant the world to know that she wasn't so alone. That Blake had sought her out with an apology. The gulf left by Ruby's departure had been filled ever so slightly.
Normally it would only have taken an express order to bend Erashan to her will. He was loyal, and obeyed her completely. Today though, she knew a command wouldn't be sufficient. Not for something as large as this. Just the fact he'd locked the door showed he intended to see this to completion. Still, she'd known him all her life. He'd been her steadfast left hand over the past few years. He would listen to her.
"Erashan." She kept her voice soft, comforting. "We can talk through this."
"We can't." He stared at Blake. The emotion in his gaze could only be described as utter loathing. The way he'd been treating her suddenly made sense. It wasn't because she might have been an assassin. It was because she'd been part of the organisation that had murdered his father. It had been a major oversight on Weiss' part not to connect the dots sooner. To her, Blake was just Blake. Not an ex-terrorist.
"We can. Just let Blake leave and the two of us will discuss this."
"No. She stays."
Weiss bit back her shock. That was the first time she could recall that Erashan had outright denied her. Sometimes he argued, but always for her safety, or on what was the most prudent source of action was. Never did he outright say no. In all honesty, his expression scared her. She glanced at Myrtenaster still in its travel case before reprimanding herself. There would be no need to fight him.
"Okay. She stays," Weiss conceded, giving a little bit of ground to him to improve her own position. "But if she stays, we'll need to talk about it."
"I only want to know one thing: did she murder my father?"
"She didn't." Weiss was confident about that. After the initial reveal about Blake's past, she'd harboured the same reservations. Wondering just what Blake might have done? What crimes she might have committed? Whether she should turn her in?
At the time it had seemed a justified concern, but after learning all the sordid details about Blake's relationship with Adam ̶ ̶ Ozpin had copied Adam's journal to her in its entirety. She'd read it, despite how many parts had made her physically sick ̶ ̶ Weiss knew that Blake couldn't be blamed for the White Fang's actions. She'd been as much a victim as anyone else.
"Let her deny it then. Go on Blake. Lie," Erashan said
"She wouldn't be lying."
"Yes, she would. She was there when they abducted my father. When they tortured him. And then when they killed him."
Weiss swallowed. The previous Lord Wache had been one of the first casualties of the newly formed White Fang, and definitely the most high profile. As a board member of the SDC, he was the physical manifestation of the oppression of the Faunus. The White Fang had visited justice upon him.
She'd purposely avoided the videos that had been put on the web; she'd heard enough about them to ensure that she never wished to watch them. Her father had made her anyway. To toughen her up. To make her see what would happen to her if she was ever captured. Only he promised it would be so much worse for her. He wanted to make her hate. It had worked. She'd had graphic nightmares for months. In the long moments after waking, she'd come to despise those who had carried out the act.
"I know you've watched them," he continued, his voice entirely emotionless. He might as well have been discussing the weather instead of his father's murder. "Didn't you ever wonder why one of them was so much smaller than the others? They couldn't have been more than a teenager, a female. The balaclava didn't hide the ears upon her head."
She thoroughly wished she couldn't, but her mind was able to recall the videos in perfect clarity. The gushing blood. The hideous screams. And the terrorists who had done it. Including the one who had been smaller. One standing out all the more in the room full of muscle-bound males. She wished she didn't, but deep down she knew. Blake had only bowed her head, refusing to look at either of them.
Erashan saw when she came to her own conclusions. "So tell me Blake. Was it you? Did you torture my father?"
Blake didn't answer. She couldn't. She'd hunched in on herself, attempting to suppress the memories that were being resurrected. She might not have spoken, but her body language was evidence enough for both of them. Weiss had no doubt that it had been Blake, but it hadn't been a willing Blake. That much had been obvious. Whereas everyone else in the videos had been gleeful, the smaller figure had been hesitant. It had taken a firm hand around her wrist for her to make some of the cuts in the bound man.
While Weiss could no longer argue that it hadn't been Blake, she could protest at the severity of the punishment that Erashan wished to mete. The look in his eyes told her only one form of justice would satisfy him.
"Erashan, you don't want this."
"Do you remember what you told me close to three years ago now? That we were going to wipe the White Fang out, root and branch? Under your orders we did just that. Well, there is the final leaf." He pointed a single finger at Blake.
Weiss did remember that. She'd been echoing the words her father had said to her only a few hours before. After Vale, and in her pain, she'd believed it was the only course of action. She still believed it. What she'd overseen had not been pleasant, but it had been necessary. A zealous organisation like the White Fang would never have peacefully disarmed, never surrendered. Ozpin had seen that. They had simply been wiped out.
Had been. Despite Ozpin's and Erashan's insistence, Blake wasn't one of them anymore. She no longer violently fought for Faunus rights, or killed in the name of righteousness. She'd changed, atoned, and deserved a second chance.
"She's not. The White Fang are gone. We saw to that."
"Perhaps, but honour demands only one solution."
Honour. How she hated that concept. Sure, it was useful to exploit, but so often it overrode simple common sense. And woe betide anyone who besmirched their precious honour. It had no place in the modern world and yet, like many of the backward traditions, the nobles clung to it. Honour gave them a pretty name to refer to their much baser intentions.
"It's not for honour that you want to do this, it's for vengeance. I won't allow it."
Erashan barked out a laugh. "You have no right to question me here. You, who tore apart a country to avenge your own father's death. In this, as in all things, I follow where you lead."
"That was different." The cry escaped her before she had a chance to think it through. That had been different. The acts that had been carried out hadn't been ordered for vengeance. Atlas had stood on the brink of civil war. Tens of thousands would have died. She'd had to act to stop it.
"I've never known you to lie to yourself before, or to hide from reality. I'm sure you've come up with a dozen different justifications, but it doesn't change the fact that almost everyone who had a hand in your father's death died."
She wasn't lying to herself. There hadn't been another option. Another way to stop the coming war. It hadn't been because she was hurting, and wanted someone to pay. Erashan didn't know what he was talking about.
But Ruby did. The small voice that had been so active since Ruby's visit spoke from the corner of her mind. Weiss hated it. It forced her to question everything she'd done. Her actions had been justified, and they had been enough to drive Ruby away. Multiple times. Instead of confronting her own doubts, she went on the attack.
"Blake was just a child. She didn't want to be there. You must have seen that. She's innocent."
"Innocent. So were those children who died in the airstrikes. Collateral. Unavoidable maybe, but certainly innocents. We don't hide from that."
As succinctly as that, he'd turned it back on her. Innocents always died in war. It was one of the few constants in the world. She'd just never thought she'd be the one responsible for them. She'd dreaded every new autopsy appearing on her desk, but she'd forced herself to read them anyway. A self-flagellation for her blackened soul.
Either she could accept that Erashan was right, or that she'd been wrong. She didn't want to face that possibility. The chance that all her actions since her father's death had been based on such a morally questionable foundation.
It had always been her belief that what she'd been doing was right. That she'd been making people's lives better. No matter what others said. She wasn't so sure anymore. First Ruby, now Erashan. Who else harboured their doubts about her? And should she harbour those same ones? Had she become everything she'd worked so hard to fight against? Was that why Yang hated her still?
Her world view that had cracked at the Schnee Ball broke further. In those shards of reflected glass she managed to picture just how others would have seen her. The Ice Queen. Maybe a good ruler, but a cold vindictive one as well.
Her subjects wouldn't doubt for a moment that she'd hand over one of her friends to be executed if the crime fit the bill. This crime surely did. Blake was a terrorist. But even so, even with the self-realisation, she couldn't.
"I'm not going to let you hurt her."
"You deny me this?"
"I absolutely deny it. She's my friend."
"And he was my father."
"I don't care." She did, but she didn't. Not when it was Blake.
"Weiss," Blake spoke for the first time. She laid her hand gently on Weiss' shoulder and came abreast of her. "It's ok." She turned to Erashan. "What do you want from me?"
"I want you to admit it."
Blake nodded and made to speak, but Weiss interrupted her. "No."
Blake turned back to her. "It's ok. I need to do this." She took a deep breath and looked Erashan right in the eyes. "You want to hear my confession? You have it. You're right. I killed your father."
It was somehow a million times worse hearing it from Blake's lips. The anguish and serenity in her tone. Blake accepted what she'd done and, in that moment, Weiss knew she would accept the punishment as well. Whatever it may be.
Despite all of his actions leading up to this moment, Erashan barely reacted. He just stared as Blake continued, a vein pulsing at his temple.
"I cut his throat while he was tied to a chair. I tortured him. I gave him the most horrific death imaginable. And I'm sorry."
"You're sorry?"
"I am, truly. But I know it doesn't excuse it. Doesn't make up for it. I could tell you that I was forced. That Adam made me. Or I could say that I'd just lost my own parents. I could offer any number of excuses, but I'm not going to. Ultimately they would be worthless. The truth is simple. I killed your father. I murdered him. And nothing will ever change that."
The pain in her voice was palpable. She was baring her soul to them. Part that she had buried deep within her so she hadn't had to think about it. Suffer from it. Now she was. Erashan might have lost his father, but the act had hurt Blake as well.
Weiss couldn't imagine what it must have been like. To be forced into torturing someone by the person you thought you loved. What a gross perversion of passion.
"You want me to forgive you?" Erashan ground his teeth together. Honour and empathy battling within.
"No." Blake's voice cracked. What good was his forgiveness when she was clearly unable to forgive herself? "I don't deserve it. I just… wanted to say I'm sorry. I didn't realise who you were when we first met, and after… I was too much of coward. Too afraid. I'm not going to run anymore." She took a couple of steps forwards, tilting her head to the side and baring her pale neck. "Whatever you want, I'll accept."
"Blake no!" Weiss dragged her back. She'd always sensed that Blake had a martyrdom complex, but she'd never known it was this bad. She wasn't going to watch her friend get her throat slit just to satisfy some twisted definition of justice. "I'm not going to let that happen."
"It's not your choice to make." Blake's voice was quiet, tranquil. Almost as if she'd finally made her peace.
"It is. While you were in the White Fang you hurt me. I've forgiven you. Recognised that you've changed. Now Erashan will just have to do the same."
"Will I?" Erashan demanded.
"Yes. You will."
"And if I don't?"
"Then you will have shown me the true extent of your honour." Weiss spat the word. "Your father was murdered, yes. We punished those who carried out the act. I refuse to believe that you think a teenage girl culpable. You're better than that. I know it. You swore an oath to me. An oath to protect those that I protect. And Blake is my friend."
He still wasn't convinced. Still listening to the foolish ghosts of his ancestors. Those who had invented the concept of honour, and those who had died because of it.
"Think of all you'll have to lose. Your lands. Your title. Where would your son or daughter grow up? And what would Lobelia say? Would she praise you for managing to avenge your father by murdering a girl who was a teenager at the time?"
"You'd bring them into this?" He seemed angrier at that than anything so far.
"Why would I not? Your actions here will affect them. I like Lobelia. I know her. And I can't believe she would want you to be a party to this. Blake has apologised. She's explained herself. It's not much, but it was sincere. Please accept it. For them. For me."
Erashan clenched his fists, his fingernails digging into the skin of his palms. He was at war with himself, and the personal appeal didn't help either. He'd always cared for her. Treated her like the daughter he didn't believe he and his wife were capable of having. Now, with her being the head of the house he was sworn to, his loyalty to her had only increased. And now she was putting it to the test. She'd never had cause to doubt him before, and didn't want to think she had now.
Eventually, after an age, Erashan nodded, his jaw still clenched.
"Thank you." It was only through great practice that she didn't let any of her relief show on her face. If the situation had deteriorated, it would have gotten messy. As it was, she'd managed to win Erashan around. She would have said more, but he stalked from the room without another word. Normally permission was required to leave her presence, but she let him have that small victory.
Instead she rounded on Blake. She hadn't moved. She was just stood staring dumbly at the door Erashan had slammed in his wake. Blake had offered herself up like a sacrificial lamb. All for what? To make things right by dying, or some other ridiculous notion? Weiss grabbed her arm and gave her a rough shake. "What in the world were you thinking!"
Blake blinked a few times in confusion before her mind seemed able to register Weiss' glowering face. She pulled out of Weiss' grip and turned away. "I knew he wasn't going to do it."
"How? How could you possibly know that!" Even she hadn't been certain that Erashan wouldn't cut her down.
"I just did." She said slowly, looking anywhere but Weiss. "He wouldn't with you here. As much as he might have wanted to. His loyalty to you was stronger." She shrugged as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Otherwise he wouldn't even have brought me to you. He would have just killed me in his room and you would never have even known I was here."
She was lying. Blake usually was pragmatic, but Weiss couldn't believe that Blake had put that much faith in Erashan. There had to have been more to it. The look of calm on her face was nothing more than a mask.
Weiss had to know one thing. "Were you telling the truth?"
For a moment the mask cracked and Weiss saw a flash of anger in Blake's amber eyes. "Of course I was!" The anger was gone in an instant, only to be replaced by sorrow. "I wish I wasn't. What I did that day changed my life… It's haunted me for years. It still haunts me. I still dream about it. Do you know what it's like to torture a bound man?"
Weiss swallowed. She did. Technically. It hadn't been her hand on the tools, but it had been done with her express order. Blake said the act had haunted her. It only showed how different they were. Nightmares would have been the normal reaction to have to witnessing such a scene. She hadn't had any. At least not about that. If the information they'd gleaned hadn't been so useless she would have viewed the act as a sad necessity.
Weiss held up her hands in a placating manner. "Sorry. It's just… you scared me. It was a stupid thing to do."
"Perhaps. But it felt right."
"How was that right? What would have happened if he'd killed you before we had a chance to react? How would I have told Yang?"
The pain of the knowledge of Yang's rejection was still acute. She'd known since the phone call, but to have it confirmed again, to know that Yang was in the same building and didn't even want to look at her. That hurt. But on top of that having the first words said in years be about her girlfriend's death? She didn't even want to think about that conversation.
At Yang's name, Blake's face fell. What little colour that had come back to her skin disappeared as her eyes filled with something akin to shame. "Don't tell her." Blake didn't seem to realise how irrelevant the request was, but the fact she'd felt the need to make it was telling.
"Why?"
Blake blew out a breath and sat down heavily. "She's got it into her head that I constantly put myself in danger. That I want to get hurt."
"Don't you?" Weiss might not have been aware of what events over the past two years had resulted in Yang voicing concern, but she'd noticed it even back at Beacon. Blake seemed to value everyone else's wellbeing over her own. Normally it would be an admirable trait. In a huntress it was just dangerous.
Blake groaned, burying her face in her hands. "Not you too. Why does everything think that?"
Weiss resisted the urge to say 'because you do'. Instead she took a seat next to her. "Blake… you just offered to let someone kill you."
"I told you. He wasn't going to do it." She sounded even less convincing than before.
"Perhaps, perhaps not. But there was no way that you could know for certain."
"First Yang, now you… I don't have a death wish."
"But you do want to make amends?" It was a desire that Weiss could relate to. More and more since Ruby's departure she'd looked at some of her decisions and seen the possibility that a different one could have been made.
"Well… yes. I can't ever undo what I did, but I can make it right. Have been making it right."
"Yes, you have. Would dying here have made it right?"
"I told you I wasn't planning on dying."
"I know, I know. But from my perspective that was what it looked like." She swallowed, unsure of pushing Blake too far. "I'm sure Yang would think the same."
"She doesn't know what it feels like. The guilt." Weiss kept her face passive. Whether intentional or not, Blake obviously thought that she would know what it felt like. Weiss hoped that Blake had only guessed. She didn't like the idea that her internal conflict had begun to show in her words. "It just gnaws away at you. Constantly. I try. I really do. Over the past two years I've helped people. I've gone beyond what we were paid to do to help people. But that's not going to bring anyone back. It's not going to undo everything I've done. Nothing ever will. So I cope. I live with the nightmares and the memories as best I can. And little by little I try to balance the scales. But I'm not going to die to do it."
It was possible that Blake thought she was telling the truth, but it was more likely she was just in denial. Guilt was a cruel beast. It never tired, and it never stopped. The way to slay it was unique to everyone, and Blake would have to find her own. In the constant struggle it appeared to her that Blake had decided on only the most extreme.
"Do you think the scales are balanced?"
"No." Blake was certain about that.
"Would Erashan have balanced the scales?"
"No," she snapped, glaring at Weiss.
"Can they ever be?"
"N—" Blake bit off the denial and looked away. She didn't want Weiss to see just how lost she really was. That she truly believed redemption was beyond her.
Weiss let the silence hang between them for a moment. "You're wrong. You were in the White Fang. You had a vendetta against my family. I used to live in fear of you. But you're not the same person any longer. You've changed. You don't need to balance the scales because that Blake is dead. And I've forgiven you. I consider the scales balanced."
It wasn't much, but it was the most she could offer. She had more cause than most to demand recompense and yet, despite everything Blake still blamed herself for, she didn't consider that any was needed. Regardless of her past, Blake was a good person now.
Blake was silent for several long minutes, mulling over what had been said. Weiss let her contemplate. Being able to think silently was an enviable trait. Far too many people seemed entirely unable to disconnect their brain from their mouth. Blake had always been someone who didn't say three words when one would do, and in this moment she needed time.
Eventually Blake's pursed lips turned upwards. It wasn't a broad smile, the topics they'd discussed were too serious for that, it was barely a subtle curl, but Weiss recognised it for what it was.
She had helped. That knowledge spread from her stomach in a cloud of warmth. It was rewarding. Unlike the futility she normally felt at the end of her day ̶ ̶ knowing that someone else was sure to pervert her intentions ̶ ̶ here at least Blake would take their conversation to heart.
"Thank you. It means a lot to hear you say that."
"You're welcome. I'm only glad that you're here to hear me say it. I missed you." In her pain she'd convinced herself that she hadn't. That friends were for the weak and entirely below her, but Ruby had reminded her so thoroughly as to what she'd once had.
"I'm sorry about that too."
"There's no need to mention it. Just like everything else that is in the past. Just… stay in touch. Please."
She didn't want to be so alone again. Ruby's brief calls had meant the world to her. No matter what she was doing, who she was meeting, Ruby's name lighting up her scroll would be her sign to drop everything.
They were painful, ever so painful, but it was a bitter-sweet pain. She loved the sound of Ruby's voice, every word and subtle inflection. She loved hearing about her adventures and about what she'd done in the day, even if it was just walking. And, on the rare occasions that Ruby's signal permitted it, she loved seeing her again. Just staring into her eyes, at her lips, wishing they could be together. Maybe they couldn't. Not right at this time at least. But while Ruby still talked to her there was a chance to win her around. She just had to be better. To try to live up to Ruby's lofty ideals while juggling everything that pressed at her. It was difficult, and she was trying, but the prize would be worth it.
"Of course," Blake said. "Do you have something to write on?" They traded their details. Weiss treated the loose scrap of paper far more reverently than the monogramed business card she'd given Blake.
Her eyes stung as she attempted to commit the number to memory. It just wouldn't happen. Her mind was clouded by the emotional turmoil of the past few hours and having been awake for what must have been approaching an entire day.
Blake noticed the yawn she didn't quite manage to suppress. "I think we both need to get to bed."
Weiss didn't try and lie. "Yeah," she said through a wider yawn. "I'll walk you out."
"That's not necessary."
"I want to."
"Well, thank you. Before we go… do you want me to say anything to Yang?"
The question had been hesitant, as if Blake had reservations about mentioning her. Weiss couldn't help thinking of when Ruby had asked her that same question. Back then she'd said 'no', too proud to grovel to either of them. Now though, with Blake standing there, with her friend back, the longing for the other member of their old team was close to overpowering.
"Just… that I miss her." She did. At times Yang had infuriated her until she desired nothing more than to scream. But so much more often, Yang had been kind, funny, a strong shoulder to lean on, and the life of their team. "And tell her I'm sorry."
Blake hugged her again. "I will," she whispered into her ear. Weiss clutched her tightly. As a visiting dignitary she'd had far too many impersonal handshakes today, but a hug just conveyed so much more. A hug made the Ice Queen feel.
A/N: Maybe the Ice Queen is thawing. A little bit of angst and a little bit of fluff in this chapter. Let me know how you found it.
