Ruby VIII

I knelt in the snow, praying to god for strength. It was an old abandoned chapel with a hole in the roof that let in the weather. It was not an ideal spot to pray, but I needed space to be alone. Some time had passed since the bonfire in the woods and my duel with Cardin was set to happen later today. Losing was obviously not an option, letting him win would give him an outrageous smug satisfaction and only serve to affirm his belief in the inferiority of the other races. No matter how much blood would have to be spilled, no matter how hard I would have to fight, I would not allow such a thing to come to pass. It would disappoint my mother so much for me to lose to him after insisting on a fight such as this. What would she think after seeing her only daughter pleading for strength she did not have to a god who had long since turned his ears from the prayers of men? Despite all my bluster, I had no plan for how to defeat Cardin. Though I spent some time spying on him, my observations lent no useful information. The nature of his semblance was still very much a mystery to me. As far as I could tell, his powers simply made him invincible.

I heard some footsteps crunching lightly in the snow, "Don't let me interrupt you. My people respect the old god, though we offer no prayers." It was Weiss. No idea how she found me.

"'Old' implies that a new one came to take his place. Have you apologized to Blake yet?"

"No, and for that matter, I don't think I will,"

"And why is that?"

"I've told you before, I was drunk that night and can scarcely remember any of it. Doesn't make any sense to apologize for something I don't remember happening. Hell, even if I did remember I still wouldn't feel any worse about it," Weiss was carrying her sword on her hip. That fact only added to my confusion.

"Unbelievable! You know, your life would be a lot easier if you just kept your feelings about the other races to yourself. I don't know why you people have to be so damned prideful all the time,"

"If you were as strong as us you would be proud too," She looked so happy saying that. I stood up and turned to her. Though I was short and appeared waifish, I said this to her with my entire chest:

"Before this day is over, I will prove you wrong! Now begone with you! I have precious little time to prepare,"

"Ah, yes, about that…" Weiss handed me a letter from out of her pocket, "This is your declaration of surrender. You are to hand it over to Cardin, apologize for questioning his honor, and bury all of this nonsense once and for all," She said. I was baffled, stunned. This was no joke, her eyes were earnest.

Not knowing what to say I just let the first words that came to me escape my mouth, "I wrote no such letter,"

"Yes, I know. I've written it for you,"

"And why would you do that?"

"Because I know you can't win," her words stung like ice, "When that dead god of yours pulled this world out of the muck, it placed us here first, before any other race. The sea and the sky; the thistled vines and the trees that bear good fruit, it was all meant for us. The rest of you were just an afterthought. Cardin will crush you, that's basically already been determined. So, in order to avoid that and keep you alive I've come to talk you out of this,"

"What does it matter to you if I live or die?"

"Well, you can't continue your tenure as captain if you're dead. It would be a great loss if you happened to leave us,"

"My, my… today is just full of surprises. You'd be happy to take orders from a human girl?"

"No, not happy, in fact the idea makes me miserable. I know that I'm better suited to lead than you, but I know for a fact that the others wouldn't take orders from me. That's why I think that you and I should strike a deal, a ceasefire, we'll call it! You lead our merry band of hunters and I'll be your right hand, your faithful servant, whispering in your ear whenever courage fails you."

"No deal. Didn't ask for your help, didn't want it either," I gestured her towards the door before turning around and returning to my prayers. Before I could even kneel down she hurled fire at my feet. I turn around and her sword is already drawn.

"I tried diplomacy," she sighed. An icy spike shot out of the tip of her sword, I dodge to the left.

"You think killing me will change my mind?"

"I won't kill you, I'll beat my point into you. Then maybe you'll understand," she shot another shard of ice at me, I ducked. It flew just above my head. That was the beginning of her cold volley. Shard after shard came flying at me. Eventually standard dodging became ineffective, I learned, as one of her shards grazed my outer thigh. My aura would defend against attacks like that, but not for long.

I should have known she would do something like this. Weiss had no respect for humans so it should have been obvious that she would try to use force when one of us disagreed with her and the circumstances called for it. Even still, who could have predicted that she would choose now of all times to attempt such a thing. In a sense, this was the same as my issue with Cardin, another battle that I could not afford to lose because of ideological reasons. If she bested me here that would place the idea in her head that a physical confrontation could resolve any disagreement she and I had. If the ability of all of us to work together, as a team, was to be maintained then I had to win.

She began to lob balls of fire at me with the swipes of her sword, her thrusts ice. Though the fire was slow and landed with a heavy explosion, Weiss' ice was fast, terribly so. She alternated the rhythm of her strikes; a slash here, a thrust there. Fire and ice danced together in the air. The tempo of it all caught me off guard, forcing me to use my semblance. This could not go on forever. I used my semblance sparingly to buy time.

Flying from one side of the room to get away from her attacks before reappearing, I managed to get behind her. I brought my scythe down on her, she jumped, I kicked, and missed. She disengaged far, her body parallel to mine with her left foot back. This posed an issue. I recognized her style of fighting, fencing. Though it started as a form of military training, the modern art of fencing was little more than a passtime for the noblesse. Even in its heyday, fencing was a bizarre way to train because semblances made the battlefield wildly unpredictable. As a result, I never gave it much consideration and never cared to learn more about it beyond the surface details. I had no clue how to fight a fencer and Weiss exploited that weakness viscously.

She quickly lunged at me, clearing almost the entire room. Trails of fire were following behind her as she flew towards me. Then, instead of attacking with the sword she twirled to my right. The fiery afterglow that had been following her crashed into me. It knocked me down. I lost the air in my lungs along with my footing. I laid there gasping, then she came and tried to stab my hand. This was my chance, my one and only chance. Embracing the rose and becoming a haze of petals, I swarmed around her. In my amorphous form I took her into the roses. Weiss was shocked when her body dissipated into white petals and came to join that of mine. When she had fully become a part of my cloud I began to fly. We soared through the hole in the chapel's roof. I took her high above the ground before bringing her back down with a thunderous crash. We hit the ground with such force that the snow was raised. The air was thick with the white powder, but through it all I saw Weiss on the ground.

She was curled up on her side. As soon as she could move again she reached for her sword. I kicked it away. She scrambled to her feet to try and grab it. I grabbed her by her ponytail and threw her to the floor again. My aura was completely exhausted. Left without a semblance, or any defense against her attacks, I loomed over her with my scythe. I picked and stabbed and slashed at her. Though she wailed after each strike, her aura was still thick and vibrant, shi. When I slashed her I saw shimmers of her aura fly from her body and hit the ground. It was like butchering a cow with a trowel. I thought I might never cut through all of it. I brought my weapon down on her again, but Weiss grabbed it.

"Enough!" She shouted, conjuring a gargantuan black glyph on the floor. The glyph pulled me to the ground, but Weiss somehow managed to stand. She took my arm in hers and put her foot on my back, "You put up a good fight, but it's time to put an end to this foolishness," She said, dislocating my shoulder in one fluid motion. I could do nothing but cry out in pain. She took her foot off me and dropped my arm. It hit the ground limply. The snow had begun to settle, a good portion fell on me. I winced and groaned, it hurt so much. "Please, Ruby, just say the words. Tell me you yield so that we can be done with this!"

Was this all I had? Could I not do more? I begged my legs to move, but they refused me. My back ached, my arm felt like it had been torn clean off, and the cut on my leg was stung by snow. All the while, Weiss looked down on me nigh unscratched, like we had never even fought at all. She told me how much of a fool I'd been and about how much easier it all could have been if I had just listened to her. My wounds and her pity both stung in equal measure. Oh how happy it would make her if I simply chose to submit to Cardin's false peace and thereby affirm all of his ignorant fantasies. Oh, what joy it would bring to those knife-eared bastards to see me bending the knee, to see me laying down my arms with my head hung low. I won't have it! I pulled myself off the ground enough to barely kneel. Weiss sighed, "I would have already given up if I were you. What compels you to such stubbornness?"

"A long time ago, a man loved a woman, and I am the unfortunate sum of their matrimony. What's a motherless girl like me to do other than fight?" I said, placing the palm of my limp arm against the ground with the help of the other. I held it steady, pushed my shoulder down, and forced the arm back into socket. It brought me nightmarish pain, but I forced my screams down until they were only a whimper. "Don't ever offer me your help again. I don't want it," I told her. There was a strange sympathy in Weiss' eyes, a bit of shock as well. She looked as though she was about to say something, but I left before she could speak. Whatever she had to say could wait until later. I walked through the streets of Beacon as the snow started to come down more heavily, my arm still stung but at least I could move it.

Though just because it moved didn't mean I could use it. My scythe demanded two hands and at the time I was sorely lacking in the dexterity necessary to twirl it about. What was I to do? I hobbled down the streets looking absolutely pitiful. Dried blood stained one of the legs of my breeches, getting that stain out would be a miserable thing. Most of the common folk were busy going about their day and trying desperately to make their way back home. I sympathized, the snow had shown no sign of letting up and cruelly threatened to turn into a blizzard. Though, in the sporadic procession of people, I noticed a few people who broke their shoegaze to look up, just briefly, and when they did they saw me in the worst of ways. They saw me shuffling through the street and nursing a half-broke arm, who could help but feel sorry. One old woman stopped dead in her tracks to ask me "Are alright, dear?"

"Yes, I'm fine, give it a day or two and I'll be good as new," I reassured her, though she did not look satisfied with my answer.

"Right, let's hope we both get home safely then," she reached into her pocket and gave me a piece of caramel. It was the sweetest thing I had tasted that day.