Chapter warnings: character(s) in bindings; violence; on-screen death (s); sexual assault; descriptions of injuries

Don't forget that you can find me on tumblr: we - are - all - of - legend - now and that my ao3 account is wearealloflegendnow (even though I haven't posted there yet)!

~TLL~

"Master," Rose said. "Why are you so worked up?"

"It's nearly the holiday season," Master said, pacing his office in a way that made Rose nervous, "and those creatures are up to something!"

"Isn't that a good thing?" Rose asked.

The Huntsman glared at her.

"Not that they're up to something but their timing. Every day, we have more Clan members actually in the city. If they think they know the size of our force, they're wrong. We can catch them off guard and take them down in bigger numbers than they thought possible."

The Huntsman paused by his desk, staring out the windows over the city. Rose allowed herself the brief fantasy of getting up, walking across the floor, and then shoving him out the window with all of the strength that she had. It would be so satisfying, for the glass to shatter at the same moment he realized that she was a betrayer. Rose clenched her hand into a fist, the dig of her nails in her palm reminding her that it wasn't time for that. Yet.

"That's a good point, Huntsgirl," Master admitted, turning back to face her. "I just wish I knew where this damned assassin was. Without them, the creatures wouldn't have the success rate that they do."

"I will get him, Master."

"No, at this point, I don't think you will." Rose clenched her jaw as the Huntsman started petting her hair. "I'm not taking you off your assignment; don't get so worked up. I'm just putting someone else on it with you."

"Will we be expected to work as a team?" Rose asked, feeling her lip start to curl even though she fought to control her expression.

The Huntsman let out a single laugh that sounded more like a bark. "No. You'd kill anyone that you were expected to call teammate. Just know that when you're out there hunting, from here on out, you are no longer hunting alone."

"This isn't necessary," Rose said. "I will bring you the assassin's head."

"You've had your chance and you haven't proven that to be true," Master said. "We just have to up our chances, hmm?"

"Yes, Master."

From behind her chair, Master leant down, his hands sliding underneath her uniform shirt to cover her chest.

"Enough of business, Huntsgirl. I didn't call you here for your mind."

"Of course not, Master," Rose said.

He was touching her more gently than he usually did and Rose moved carefully, not wanting to do a single thing to set him off. She lowered herself to her knees in front of him, knowing what was expected of her. She always closed her eyes during this part, letting Master think that it was because of pleasure, but, really, this was when she pulled herself out of her body, going somewhere happier. In her mind, she was sitting at Maggie's Diner with her friends; Jake was there and the Clan was gone. She clung to that so hard that she could almost trick herself into thinking that she was smelling the homey greasiness that greeted every customer when they walked through the door. She stayed there in her head, even as Master stood her up and undressed her, half of her bandages coming off with her clothes.

When they were done, Master stood, and looked down at her body. He touched the healing whip lashes.

"That is why you need back-up out there," he said. "You can't catch the assassin and you let the dragon get away. You can't keep failing, Huntsgirl."

"Yes, Master," Rose said. "I learnt my lesson. He won't get away from me again."

"I believe you mean that, anyhow," the Huntsman replied. "I've scheduled extra training sessions for you, with me. I don't want any of that independence to make you soft."

"I'm not soft," Rose snapped, bristling at the words.

Rose knew that she was harder than she had ever been. Her body was more honed and muscled than it had ever been, her mind had never been more bloodthirsty. She was chomping at the bit for the holidays to get here because she was going to get to grab her world in her hands and watch it crumble into so many pieces that it would never be able to resurrect. She looked away from the Huntsman because she didn't need him to know the hatred for him that lived in her soul.

"I'll see you this evening for training," Master said.

"Of course."

Rose redressed and then she left him, going to gather all of first aid supplies and the things for Jake. She wiggled back into vents, into the control room, and then she looped the security video. She walked down the stairs stiffly while Jake lifted his head to make sure that it was her. Rose had to admit that Jake was looking a lot better. If anyone was bothering to pay any attention to him, there would be a lot of questions to be asked about how he was building so much muscle mass for a creature that wasn't allowed to move. He looked like he was going to be strong enough to fight his way out of here and she hoped that was true. If she didn't get him out of here, then the whole thing was going to fall apart. She opened the muzzle and then sat in the sand, rebandaging herself.

"You look serious," Jake said.

"Thinking," Rose admitted, "about next week."

Jake nodded. "Me too."

She sensed the change in his tone and asked, "What about that optimism you preached about?"

"I have feelings," Jake said, "I'm scared too. I'm scared I might get free just to lose it. Or that this is going to cost my family and friends their lives. I'm worried that this isn't going to be worth it."

"It's worth it," Rose said. "I told you the truth about what the Clan has been doing to the magical community. I told you that them kidnapping you was just the breaking point to form the Magical Militia. This was going to have to happen sooner rather than later but I'm glad that I get to be a part of it."

"Glad? That's the word you're going with?"

"Yes. Glad that I can take this painful life and actually do something good with it, even if it's the last thing I do." Rose scratched the hair along the top of his head, knowing how much he liked it. "I have to go out with the Huntsclan now and probably go meet with your grandfather after. I just wanted to see if you needed anything before I went."

"Nah," Jake said casually.

Rose met his eyes and waited. She knew that there was something that he was thinking about and she knew that she was more patient than he was. It took several minutes of silence before Jake shuffled as best as he was able, looking away from her.

"I want you to talk to Haley because you've told me a lot about Trixie and Spud and Gramps and her but I want to know more about my parents."

"I met your mom. I think she'd come in here and get you herself if your grandfather allowed it." Rose rubbed her arms, feeling Susan's strong grip again. "But, I'll ask about your dad."

"Thanks," Jake said. "It really it hurts to think about what it's been like for them, thinking I was dead and everything."

"You're going to see them again," Rose promised. "You deserve to be. Even if it's the last thing I do."

"Optimism," Jake mumbled, her hands already bringing the straps of the muzzle down to close his jaw.

"That is my optimism," Rose said. "Don't feel bad. At this point, you're worth dying for."

She was relieved that he couldn't answer her as she secured the straps closed.

"I'll see you later," she promised.

Jake nodded slightly.

Rose went into the control room and undid the tapes, then she climbed back into the vents, and back into her rooms, where she dressed for the nightly hunt. There would be what amounted to a planned skirmish between the Huntsclan and the Magical Militia tonight. The Huntsclan had been encroaching a little too far into the magical territory and Master was sending out reinforcements, having gotten it on good authority that the militia were doing the same. Rose fixated her earpiece in her mask, the faint humming of the Huntsclan going in one ear and out the other. She paid no attention to the chatter as she strode into the deployment bay, hoping that Master didn't request for her to be at his side again.

Rose didn't like fighting against those she considered to be on her team, even if Lao Shi had made the best of the situation. She could kill those who were raised to be her siblings without feeling even the slightest twinge of conscience about it but knowing that she and Lao Shi had scarred one another had left a bad taste in her mouth. And, she knew, the other members of her team, particularly Haley. They'd tried not to show it too much but Rose could read it on their faces. They had seen the beast inside of her used on one of their own and they didn't like it one bit.

"Hey, Huntsgirl."

Rose turned at the man's voice. Not the Huntsman, however, but "Huntsboy 47."

It was strange to call a man who was easily fifteen years her senior a boy but there was only one Huntsman – the Master himself.

"I suppose you've heard the news," he said, his tone bordering on formal.

"About?"

"The fact that we're on a team now."

Even though Rose could only see the space of his eyes, she saw how he was smiling at her and she tried not to glare at him. "I work alone."

"So do I," Huntsboy 47 assured her, "so, I suppose this makes it a competition."

"For?"

"The assassin's head," Huntsboy 47 said. "It's a fight I intend to win."

"Hmmm."

Rose put on her most casual attitude and tried not to pay any attention to him. She could feel his eyes on her and she was determined not to give him any satisfaction. He wanted to see her upset that the reason he was here because of their Master's doubt in what was widely known to be his most faithful servant. She didn't want him to see how agitated he was that his very presence was going to keep her from doing what she wanted to tonight, which was putting on the red robes of her team and fighting on the side that had chosen her. She didn't want him to see that she was determined that this be his last night on Earth, no matter what kind of careful maneuvering she had to do in the dark. She lifted her chin and let him think exactly what he wanted to think: that she was haughty and proud and considered herself too good to speak to him.

And, really, Rose did consider herself too good to speak to him.

Rose fell in with the rest of the Huntsclan troops as they deployed. They didn't move in a single, marching unit the way that the Magical Militia often practiced, in their traditional military style. Rather, they all faded into the night, skittering like the shadows that they were, finding their way to the battleground, connected only by the static of chatter in their ears, low enough that they could still hear the world around them.

Rose was overly aware of Huntsboy 47's gaze on her as he tried to keep pace. He was barely taller than she was and Rose was more determined with her youth and sass, keeping just ahead of him. She caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye as they were going around a corner, and she saw just how he was looking at her backside. Instinctively, she reached for the spear at her side, and only biting down on the inside of her cheek gave her some semblance of control over her impulse. She couldn't kill him now.

They heard the Magical Militia before she even properly saw any of them, but she knew that Lao Shi was a smart man and would have had his smallest lookouts posted in all the trees, waiting for a flicker in the night that the enemy had arrived. Not all of her brethren were as good at being silent as she was and Rose was sure that someone had given their arrival away. In fact, by the time that Rose arrived, the first of the fighting had already started.

"Are you going to just coast behind me the whole time?" Rose snapped at Huntsboy 47.

"Wouldn't dream of it," he said, and then he actually winked at her. "I'll see you in the morning, when Master is awarding me for catching the assassin!"

Rose watched him go, thinking that Master's rewards weren't that much different from his punishments, and that Huntsboy 47 likely had no interest in either. She tracked his movements into the trees and then she slithered off. She was even able to ghost unnoticed between her fellow Clan members, her eyes lighting upon Cobalt. Trixie was in her usual position, on the field below the dragons, keeping her eyes on the defensive line and coordinating positions through her headset. Rose made her way across No Man's Land and entered the side of the Militia, clamping her hands over Trixie's mouth before she had time to scream.

"It's Blush," she said in Trixie's free ear. "Alert everyone in the know that I'm in Huntsclan colours tonight but I'm still yours."

"You nearly gave me a heart attack!" Trixie exclaimed when Rose let her mouth free. "Girl …"

"Milkshakes when I can to make up for it," Rose promised. "Also, you should really get someone to protect your back. You've got a lot of blind spots."

"Blush!"

But, Rose was already gone before Trixie could finish her thought. She took to one of the trees in the carefully cultivated park. She watched the battle going on behind her mask. Lao Shi was fine, as was expected; Spud and Haley were working in a harmony to fight back Clan members; and Trixie was summoning reinforcements to the line. The ground was already soaked with blood that no one would know had been spilt come morning. Rose tilted her head, studying the Clan side. She could see most of them easily and was confident she was only missing one or two without night vision goggles. They were flinging themselves around like untrained children, caught up in the battle as they were.

That was the problem with the Clan, Rose condescendingly sniffed in her mind, you can't teach common sense.

The Clan had fought this fight several hundred times in the last two years, if not thousands of times. Still, there were always those who got a little too overwhelmed by the simple fact that they were fighting. Rose felt the urge to join them and to do what she had been bred and born to do – kill. Instead, she curbed the bloodlust as best as she could and focused on her enemy: Huntsboy 47.

To his credit, he was actually taking part in some of the action, though he was aloof through it, his eyes constantly scanning for that infamous assassin dressed in red and gold. Rose crawled along the forest floor, getting incredibly close behind him. Huntsboy 47 spun a grim-faced troll away from him and Rose could hear the troll's bones crack as he collided with a nearby tree. Huntsboy 47 didn't look at the fallen creature again, but, instead, toward the main bulk of the fighting, where Rose could see the dark Huntsclan colours were overtaking the Militia's colours. Huntsboy 47 took a step forward and Rose propelled herself forward, knowing that she wasn't losing this chance.

Unnoticed, she got her arms around him with a blade at his neck. She forced him backward into the forest with her, out of sight in darkness.

"The assassin?" Huntsboy 47 said.

His tone was casual for someone who was sweating as profusely as he was.

"Yes," Rose said in his ear.

"You're dressed as one of us!"

"I am," Rose said. She put her lips by his free ear. "Goodbye, 47. I win."

Then, he was dead, before the realization of who she was could even sink in.

Rose stepped over his body and let herself get lost back in the fight. She had to work overtime not to give into the dagger in her hand and the urge to just tear at the Huntsclan. She was one of them today and she needed to be able to see the battlefield for the whole and not just the piece that she was part of – the way that Master had always instructed her to. She tried to help magical creatures without anyone noticing her interference and when she had the chance to slip her dagger between a Clan member's ribs, she took it. The dark of her Huntsclan uniform hid the blood much better but Rose still felt the weight of it when the sky began to noticeably lighten.

A hesitance set in on both sides, neither of them wanting to be the ones to sound the call to end what, in the end, had been a draw – neither gaining ground or losing it. If they didn't, though, the human world would soon be awake, and as brutal as the streets had become at night, once the sun rose, both the Huntsclan and the Magical Militia knew that they had no place in it. Rose watched as Lao Shi, from the air, started to control a push back, always watching the Huntsclan. Rose's earpiece crackled with the command for the Huntsclan to start gathering the dead to transport them back to the Clan.

It was then that Rose left. It didn't matter how much sun was peeking over the cold horizon, she was a child of the darkness and she moved unnoticed to her storage locker, freeing herself of her bloody robes. She scrubbed under her nails and all over her arms, knowing that she'd never feel clean but at least wanting to look like it. Then, she put on her normal, every day clothes and walked to Lao Shi's shop. She had beat the rest of them back there and so she just went and sat on the couch, hanging her head down between her knees and letting her body droop.

In the silence of the shop, Rose let herself feel just how exhausted she was.

If they didn't already have plans to march on the Huntsclan in six days, Rose didn't know if she could have the strength to make it. The spine of steel and heart of iron that she'd been so proud of and prided on were falling to bits, crumbling into a person that she didn't know. She didn't know how many lives that she had taken and she was only nineteen! She had been denied innocence her entire life but then any semblance she might have kept for herself had been torn away by the man that she looked up to the most! Rose didn't even have it in her to curl her hands into fists anymore. She was just so tired. It would be such a relief when the siege of the Huntsclan happened because she knew that there was no way that the Magical Militia wouldn't win and that there was no way that the Huntsclan would recover from it. Once Master had seen her true colours and what he had made of her, she would kill him, and then it would all be over for her. No matter what happened to her once the Huntsman was dead, Rose knew that she would be able to rest.

She heard the sound of footsteps and picked herself up, hiding her emotions behind a blank expression. If she was breaking, only she was allowed to know.

"Rose!" Haley exclaimed when she saw her. Haley rushed forward and hugged Rose's waist. Rose dropped her hands protectively to Haley's shoulder blades. "I think I almost toasted you tonight!"

"But you didn't," Rose said, managing to find a laugh for Haley. "I'm okay. Barely even a scratch."

Haley pulled at the edge of a bandage sticking out from Rose's sleeve, her fingers grazing the edge of Rose's Huntsmark.

"That's not from tonight," Rose said quickly, shaking her hand away from Haley. "Don't you worry."

"Ah, Rose!" Lao Shi said. "We were hoping to see you."

"I don't have a lot of time today. I have to get to the Huntsmaster before they count and identify the dead."

Lao Shi raised his bushy eyebrows but it was Spud who asked why.

"I have to convince him that I killed Huntsboy 47 because he was the assassin for your side and not because I am," Rose said. "If he doesn't have an assassin, they're just going to send someone else after me."

"In five days?" Trixie asked.

"It only takes five seconds if you're not paying attention and I need to survive the next few days, otherwise, Jake's not getting out of Sector 1."

It was probably a little too glib but Rose didn't know how else to say or do it.

"Anyway, I came to talk to Haley," Rose said, putting her arm back around Haley's shoulders. "One on one."

"Okay," Haley said, "Let's go upstairs."

Upstairs of Lao Shi's shop, where he lived with Fu Dog, wasn't somewhere that Rose had been before. She looked around with interest at the sparse furniture but glorious decorations, detailing his pride in his Chinese culture. Rose would have loved to have spent the time actually talking to Lao Shi about the beauty of the silks and the meaning of the dragon sculptures but she didn't have the time. She wasn't the type of person who had the type of life where they could just sit and talk about beauty.

"What do you want to talk about?" Haley asked, playing the part of hostess and getting Rose a glass of water before they sat at the table.

"Actually, Jake wanted me to talk to you," Rose said. "He wants to hear more about your parents, especially your dad."

"Oh! Well, Dad, he's … um, Mom hasn't told Dad that Jake's alive," Haley confessed, staring down at the tabletop. "She doesn't want to get his hopes up in case of, you know, the plan not working and all. And, holidays and stuff are always harder. They fight because Dad thinks that they should still make Jake a stocking or get him a birthday present because it's how he should be remembered but Mom doesn't agree. They've been fighting more this year because Dad's grieving like he always has but Mom isn't. He doesn't understand it and she won't tell him."

"Haley, that must be so hard for you, keeping this a secret."

Haley chuckled humourlessly. "He doesn't even know I'm a dragon so I'm used to it."

Rose wished that she had something to say but she didn't know how to be comforting.

"Dad wanted to get Jake a headstone and Mom never let him, saying that if there was no body, then there was a chance. I don't think Dad ever really wanted to think that Jake was dead, either, I think that he just wanted a place to go and remember Jake. Like, Jake's room still looks the same as he left it. Mom and Dad both spend a lot of time in there but not really together." Haley shrugged. "They're not happy. I don't know what he wants to know or what he expected."

"Me either," Rose admitted. "I think he just needs a reminder of what's at home for him. I think there's a lot of feelings of nervousness because we have one shot at this."

Haley nodded. "Yeah, I get that. I feel that way too, I think. But, um, don't tell Jake any of that."

"Why?"

"Because he'll be distracted and you just said we only get one shot."

Rose stretched her hand across the table. "Haley –"

"No! Tell him that I still wake up every morning to Dad singing in the kitchen and that he hasn't learnt any new songs. Tell him that Mom's finally planted that vegetable garden that she's always wanted and she's using more and more of her own produce for her catering. Tell him that his room is still the same because we never thought he wouldn't come back. Not for a single second." Tears streamed down Haley's face and she made no move to wipe them away as she gazed at Rose. "Tell him only that. Promise?"

"I promise."

Rose got up from her chair and gave Haley the hug she knew that Jake would want her to have.

"One shot or no, we're all going to be ready," Rose said. "We're going to do this right."

"I think I believe that."

"You should. Jake does. I have to go but I'll see you again before, okay?"

Haley nodded. "Okay."

Rose let go of her and hurried downstairs, sending Trixie and Fu Dog up to tend to Haley. She set a final meeting date with Lao Shi and said her goodbyes to Spud before emerging into the dawn. Her breath fogged in front of her as she raced to her storage locker, getting redressed in her sins before returning to the Huntsclan. She was able to join on the end of the caravan of the dead.

"How many?" she asked Huntsgirl 92.

"Eighteen of us," she replied, shaking her head sorrowfully. "Most stabbed in the back. Those creatures have no honour."

"None," Rose agreed.

She walked through the deployment bay where the bodies were being diverted to the morgue under the watchful eye of the Huntsman.

"Where have you been?" he asked, not even looking at Rose.

"Behind enemy lines," she replied. "Master, there's something I have to tell you."

"What?"

"There was a traitor among us."

The Huntsman finally looked at her, eyes keen with interest. "Tell me everything, Huntsgirl."

Rose nodded and then she recited the story that she had practiced on her way over, hoping that it sounded like the truth to the Huntsman's ears.