Where is she?

When… is she?

Raven stares evenly across what is clearly the battlefield she and Summer had manufactured. She must be delirious because Summer is…

That's right. The woman standing in front of her is dead. The woman with her red and black hair is dead and gone. Her scythe is beyond destroyed, and yet, there she stands with a cocky smirk on her lips, hands on her hips, and the same attitude that earned her every teacher at Beacon's ire.

"Oh hi Rae~!"

That voice is loud and bright. Painfully so, and Raven winces, covering her side with one hand, and one ear with the other.

"Oh? Was that too loud? Should I be quieter for the deadbeat who abandoned her daughter?"

That voice is all Summer, so full of direct cheer and happiness, and yet its as vicious as a jagged, rusty knife. Raven flinches, and her partner and lover only keep going.

"The High Bandit Queen of the Branwen Tribe! Raven Branwen!~ Take a look, ladies and gentlemen~!"

She smiles at Raven, all teeth and sharpened fangs.

"Look at this honest to the gods, damned failure."

Raven flinched again, and Summer stalked closer to her.

"What~? Didn't like that, did you? Well, it's true. You failed to protect me. You're treating Cinder like the next coming of the bitch who tried to drag you back to the tribe in our fourth year."

Raven flinches again, and then blinding pain is her world, as Summer reaches into her stomach wound and pushes her down, straddling the woman, her hand up to its elbows in Raven's gore.

They'd been like this before, and yet Raven felt nothing more than terror as the grinning rictus of Summer wrenched and tore something free of Raven's chest.

"You didn't really ever need this, now did you? You'll just break it, after all, so give it to me, let it be safe with me, mmkay~?"

She stood, dragging the dripping form of Raven's heart with her as she walked away from her.

She tried, she reached out, feeble fingers stretching for Summer, the woman carrying her bleeding heart away, and then her partner was turning back to face her and she was grinning.

"Don't worry Rae, I'm sure you'll ditch that girl too, maybe then, when she's been torn apart by Tyrian and the grimm, maybe then I'll let you have your heart back."

Those lips split her face apart, a rictus smile of fanged teeth below eyes of midnight black.

"Until then~? I think I'm going to keep you right here~ Stuck with me, and we're going to relive every single thing that broke you~ I wonder how long it'll take-"

Raven startled awake at the touch of a cool compress on her head, her left hand has already drawn the knife that Cinder made her sleep with and pressed it against the smooth flesh of the intruder.

"Raven… please."

Cinder, it was Cinder, of fucking course it was Cinder.

Shaking hands dropped the blade to the blankets over her legs. She'd not had good sleep, Cinder had forced her to sit up in bed, wrapping blankets to the best of the girl's ability only around the wound, not covering it, and she changed those bandages frequently enough that Raven had no real idea of how bad the wound was. Only faint pulses of foul stenches and worry creased the girl's forehead.

Cinder looked no worse for wear… to a degree, Raven could see that the girl had been terrified, and the remnants of that fear were still present in her eyes as she stripped away the covers and began changing the bandages.

"I've done what I can, but it's going to get worse before it gets better."

Confidence, surefire and quick, and Raven looks at Cinder with something akin to a new gaze, it doesn't make sense to her. How does Cinder know this? The girl coughs once, gently, and then answers the unasked question.

"I read about it. Also… Iris got really, really sick after a hunger grimm entered the outer areas of Atlas, and… she nearly died, but then got better. It will likely be the same for you."

Cinder's tone and diction had begun to shift, and Raven noted the changes, Cinder no longer cowered, she no longer seemed of that terrified girl, and yet as she stared at the girl, that terror and shyness manifested in slight, ever so gentle steps from side to side.

"May I go now? Dinner will burn…"

Raven let the girl go with a nod, softening her eyes as she thought back on the dream. Summer had taken her heart, violently tearing it free of her chest, and as little Cinder made her way back to the kitchen. Raven closed her eyes and let the tears flow evenly down her head until they gently hit against her lips.

It hurt, it hurt so much more now.

She wanted to resent Ironwood, no, she wanted to hate him. He'd withheld that information from her and Summer, he'd withheld that Tyrian, the fucking bastard, had a semblance that shut down or nullified aura! How could he!?

He'd gotten Summer killed. In her honest opinion. And Raven knew right then that she would never forgive him for that.

She blinked through bleary eyes, trying to fight the urge to give in and just let that sadness swallow her. It was tempting, very tempting, to do that. To let it all swallow her up, but two things stopped her from that.

One was Yang.

Her daughter, given up to Taiyang and Summer because Raven couldn't raise the girl and she wasn't dumb enough to pretend that she could. Summer had accused Raven of abandoning her, and that was indeed what she'd done. But Raven could… fix things, right?

She could come back, she could try, she could tell Yang and be there every step of the way as her daughter raged and hated and tore at her.

That would be what Summer would want.

But what about Cinder?

The girl she likely owed her life to, and the girl who even now had burrowed into her heart and refused to leave. How would she react if Raven just returned to Taiyang and Yang and Ruby? How would he react at all?

Tai… may have ditched the more problematic parts of his upbringing when he'd been with them, but the man's insistence on blood relations likely meant he wouldn't see Cinder as family, even if Raven, Yang, and Ruby did. That would hurt the girl, even Raven could tell that. Cinder longed for acceptance from someone who was a family member. She longed to be loved in the way that Summer had done for Raven. That was something that Raven could give her, but it was the only thing that Raven could give her. Taiyang would be right in his refusal to treat her as a daughter because she wouldn't be one of his.

She couldn't hate him for that, even if she wanted to.

Or could she?

She'd never had a family outside of Qrow, and he was her brother by blood… and by action. He'd stood by her in school, in the tribe, and in Beacon beyond. He was… in many ways, family.

Summer and Taiyang, too. Taiyang and her had been there, for each other. Summer had… joined them, and her heart, and her sense of self had made her better.

How could… she just deposit Cinder into that family and expect it to work out?

She's shaken firmly from her reverie by Cinder, who gently presses a warm bowl of soup and a small selection of pills into Raven's free hand.

"Eat and drink. Then sleep."

The girl's tone is direct and… almost forceful. The pills in Raven's hands are clearly labeled as antibiotics, and Raven obeys Cinder, swallowing the pills into her dry mouth even as Cinder herself begins to change her bandages once again.

Raven doesn't look as the bandages come away green and yellow and red. She doesn't want to see how bad it is as Cinder sucks in a breath and then begins to change the gauze pads that surround Raven's wounds. She'd done her best to bandage and heal the woman, and it was clear that Raven's aura was pushing back against the raging infection.

But it would take time, and until that time was finished, Raven had a jagged, rough, and vicious hole drilled right through the core of her being. A hole that took up entirely too much of her skin and even now sent shudders through Cinder's body as she finished wrapping the bandages.

She hadn't been asked by Raven how long they'd spent in the village, but Cinder wasn't about to tell the older woman that this had been the fifth day she'd walked in and found the older woman sobbing in her bed, before turning away and leaving before she could be detected.

Cinder didn't… really understand loss, she'd been so young when her parents had died that she even now only barely remembered them. She'd never really had friends at the orphanage… so that option was out, and then Madame and her daughters had spit on her definition of what "family" was supposed to be like.

So for Raven, she just tries to help, she tries to ease the older woman's healing, she tries to assist wherever she can, changing bandages, and dosing her protector with the antibiotics she'll need to fight the raging infection.

Raven is rarely lucid, rarely able to hold a conversation, but she's been invaluable in communicating one thing. How to use the weapons her powers generate.

Cinder's found the most success with a bow that shouldn't work, as it lacked a string, but by exerting in the same way she would with the bow she scavenged from the ruins, the girl found the form of crystalline arrows of pure ice manifested.

Each one was so cold that they could, and would, as Cinder had found out, snap-freeze anything she'd shot at with the weapon. Her arrows also refused to truly behave as she would have assumed, they flew straighter and more quickly than any she shot from the scavenged bow. Something that Cinder was frustrated by, while she valued the weapon that Raven had given her, she'd had to stop practicing only with it after her training with the bow hadn't gone well. She was adapting, but training with both weapons was a problem. Already, a part of the girl's mind whirled at just how inconvenient such a weapon truly was to use. She couldn't generate one on her own, relying on Raven for such a thing was useful in a pinch, however the weapons had limited uses, and the bow was good for only between 10 to 12 shots depending on how much Cinder exerted herself.

On a more positive note, she was gaining weight and muscle mass at a rate that would inevitably help with the training that she was certain Raven would push her through. But… her mind was more interested in what had happened a few nights previous. When Raven placed a hand on her chest and forehead. What had that meant? Why had she felt a flicker like her power was… acting up? As if the spark that felt like her power was going to do… something.

She nocked a normal arrow, pulling the string back and releasing it in one smooth, even motion. The shaft of wood, tipped with a barbed head, flew from her weapon with unerring precision and violence behind it.

The snowman crudely shaped as a target burst in half as Cinder's arrow pierced straight through the core of the body and punched out the back. Joining half a dozen of its fellows behind the snowman's cooling corpse.

Cinder flinched, her aim had been off, she'd aimed for center mass, and clipped it, but the shot was too far left.

It would have torn clean through the lungs, according to the medical book she'd found in the ruins. A disabling shot against a human, but barely an annoyance amongst one of the grimm. Once more, Cinder found herself sucking in irritation about how impractical and stupid the creatures of grimm actually were.

Beowulf were all but immune to massed gunfire, they had no real organs capable of sustaining damage, and dust was one of the only things capable of putting them down for good. Once more, Cinder desperately wished that she'd found talent with firearms instead of bows of all things.

With a firearm, at the very least, she could fight a grimm on fairly even footing provided she went for the eyes or nose.

But no, her talents were directly aimed at a weapon that was all but useless against both humans, shielded by aura, and grimm, shielded by their bone armor and casual disregard for the laws of organic life.

But that frustration passed quickly as Cinder worked hard to tamp it down, negative emotions could draw more grimm to them. They didn't need that; Instead, she focused on the joy of simple exertion and the rush that hit her as she began a running survey of the village.

The small town didn't appear to have a name and had been encircled at one point by a sturdy wall of pine tree-harvested logs, covered with thick tar and insulated against the weather firmly. This wall had decayed over the years, evidently as the villagers felt they were safe. Cinder narrowed her eyes disdainfully. Out here, complacency would get you killed, and that, that was likely exactly what had happened. As Cinder neared the southern perimeter of the walls, she noted the fresh tar and the reinforced construction. Someone, likely the original residents of hers and Raven's shelter, had worked hard to rebuild this place into something sturdy but hadn't spared the resources to do so for the rest of the town.

She rested a hand against the wood and pushed into her core with her semblance.

Raven had made her promise, but her semblance was something that Cinder was now more confident in her usage. The burn marks on her arms had already fled her skin, and she only had a few scars left in areas that had been caused over the years by Madame.

In some ways, Cinder felt fairly confident that she was capable of calling on that flame within. Raven had told her that everyone's semblance felt different, although some with similar semblances, such as blood relations, might transfer parts of their semblances down. The only exception to such a thing, of course, was the Schnee family semblance.

For Raven, she said that her semblance had felt like pulling a storm apart with her hands, all crackling energy and power. For Cinder, her semblance felt like a raging bonfire, and when she let it run through her it felt oftentimes as though it would threaten to consume every single part of her in flame.

As Cinder touched up against the reservoir of her semblance, she felt that raging flame once more. A moment passed and she withdrew, gasping for air as every part of her seemed ready to ignite. Heat flushed through her body, leaving her sweating in her heavy layers against the cold. Every single muscle in her body tensed and then released with a gasp as Cinder let go of a breath she hadn't realized she was holding in.

Her power coiled in her gut like a writhing snake, all vicious, stealthily concealed rage. Waiting and willing to burst forth with all the presence of a raging inferno.

Cinder cut herself off from the tether to her semblance, turning back to the walls of the village and continuing her run.

She passed back through the hole in the walls, shoving the chunks of wood back into place to obscure her entrance to the village proper. Luckily, the gate on the north side had been shattered by the grimm, collapsing into a massive pile at the foot of the snow within the village after the last blizzard. Now, the only real way in or out for humans was to crawl through the small opening that Cinder had come through.

The girl stared evenly forwards, looking around the piles of snow and ruined buildings, and then returning to the clearing in the center of the village itself. It was clear now, mostly due to Cinder's work over the past few days, barring the snowman shooting range that she'd set up for practicing her archery.

The air was cool, but not quite as cold as it could have been, or as cold as it would be later in the evening. So Cinder decided to spend some time with her semblance. Not activating it, but… merely, touching against the raging flames.

She sat down in the center of the square and began to direct her focus inwards.

This wasn't something that came easily. Fire scared her, it scared her because she knew that where raging infernos were, grimm always followed, and her semblance felt like such an inferno.

She let her eyes slide closed and reached for the flames.

Instantly, she had to stifle a gasp as every single part of her body began to radiate heat. Heat that poured from her like the sun warming one on a summer day.

The fire raged at her, threatening to consume her, to burn her.

It wasn't enough, she wasn't focused- it hurt it hurt it hurt.

Her veins were enflamed, and she had to let it go.

Instantly, the fire was tempered low, the heat suffusing from Cinder with a rush that felt intoxicatingly good.

She gasped out her breath, staring up and around, her hair soaked through with sweat.

With some consternation, she noted the low position of the sun. Had it been hours since she'd sat down? Then… her eyes alit on the near circle of snow that had melted all the way down into the grassland beneath.

Shock colored her expression, more so as she felt no burns, no… nothing. Her skin was unmarred, unaffected.

It should have come as a total surprise when flickers of faint, brilliant orange suffused her skin.

What was happening to her?

Cinder marveled at the flickering field as it faded, then clenched her fingers tightly. She had to ask Raven about this. Had to talk to the woman about what had happened to her, what had begun to happen to her!

What was she going to do?

Was this her aura?

By the time she'd barged into the house, Raven was awake and looking at her, she'd remained in bed, but very clearly missed Cinder, the woman's voice, weak and haggard, pouring forth after a moment.

"I was wondering if you'd been hurt."

She didn't say "I was worried" but Cinder could hear it and see it in the way she looked at her. The girl looked down at herself and winced.

She was soaked in sweat and looked like she'd walked through a thunderstorm.

"I… can explain."

Raven arched an eyebrow and spoke, in a completely deadpan tone.

"I didn't hear a storm."

Cinder winced again, why did she feel like she was in trouble?

"I… wanted to practice with my semblance… Not using it! Just… touching against it, letting that power flow through me, I thought that maybe I'd be able to channel it without it burning against me!"

Raven didn't say anything, but a tiny part of her lips seemed to quirk up as Cinder rambled, until she couldn't hold it in any longer, and a soft, barely there chuckle passed her lips.

"Relax. What did you learn?"

Cinder freezes as she hears the chuckle and then relaxes visibly in front of Raven before she answers.

"It felt like a raging bonfire. As if I were to burn away to ash in the face of it."

Raven considered this, then spoke quietly.

"I've heard someone say a similar thing before."

She paused, trying to remember the circumstances… she'd been in Vacuo, for the second Vytal Festival… had Summer been with her? Had Tai or Qrow?

She couldn't… remember.

Why couldn't she remember!?

But she remembered the woman who'd spoken to her in regard to her semblance.

"I… remember someone speaking to me about a similar semblance, she could generate pulses of severe and extreme heat from her hands. She described it as a blast furnace, threatening to burn her away completely. She tamed it by letting the heat out through her hands in slow, measured pulses. Perhaps you could do the same?"

Now it is Cinder's turn to think and consider, she only tried to gently touch against her semblance, but it felt as though it would consume her whole when she'd done so.

"Next… time?"

Raven nodded to Cinder, continuing to speak after a moment.

"Yes. You are not incorrect that training with your semblance, even without aura, is beneficial. But, you must be careful, little kite, your semblance is a powerful one, and it could seriously injure you if you are not careful."

Cinder nodded, her eyes focused on Raven's midsection as she advanced forwards and towards the bedridden woman.

"Should I change your bandages?"

Raven nodded gently and winced as Cinder brought out the antiseptic and antibiotics for the wound. Cinder's smile, though, was much more positive as she looked up at Raven, the bandages deposited gently into the bucket at the foot of Raven's bed.

"It's getting better, your aura is working on it, closing the internal injuries. It just looks like a really bad cut now."

Raven knew this, but it was refreshing to have Cinder tell her such a thing. But as she studied the girl's hands, Raven noticed a telltale flicker.

"Your hands…"

Cinder flinched.

"Yes… my semblance… reacted? I'm not sure."

Raven stretched her hand down, taking Cinder's hands in her own, she reached into the core of her chest, where her aura resided, and pushed it outwards.

The sparking contact that crackled against her hands confirmed her suspicions. Cinder hadn't awakened her aura, yet. But it was coming to the surface in response to the events the girl had participated in. The traumas and events of the past few weeks had begun the process of naturally awakening Cinder's aura. It was pushing to the surface of her skin, likely shielding her from the worst of her semblance's powers.

But it wasn't a complete awakening. At the current moment, Cinder's aura would be handicapped, only protecting her from the worst injuries she'd endure. It would do for training purposes. It would be important for both of them to consider as they would leave the village.

If she wanted to train Cinder to be her better, she'd need to very carefully do so, tempering her blows while teaching her that Raven was more than capable of dispensing lethal force with such attacks.

She winced and hissed in pain as a tender spot on her stomach shifted with Cinder's careful application of gauze. The girl looked up apologetically but only caught Raven's hand resting on and ruffling her hair.

"It's ok. Keep going. The sooner it heals enough to stitch closed, the better."

Cinder had the gall to look horrified by such a realization. Only for Raven to hiss in pain while chuckling softly.

"My body cannot heal this naturally, we'll have to stitch it closed. And yes, you'll be helping hold my arms steady while I do so."

Cinder looked just a little green, and stepped back, breathing in deeply for a moment, before she stepped forwards and continued to bandage the wound. Raven's traitorous mind reminded her, in that moment, that once more, she looked so much like Summer.

Her heart squeezed and ached.

Her lover was dead and gone, and she'd have to tell Taiyang and…

And her daughter.

Yang was her daughter.

Cinder was a family member by action and creed.

She'd not run, she'd stuck by Raven's side, even after Raven had been so badly wounded that she would struggle to take care of her. Certainly, a part of Raven acknowledged that the girl would likely die on her own out here, but she could easily have robbed Raven for every penny, then run crying to Ironwood, who would have jumped at the chance to advance his own career.

Instead, she stuck by Raven, taking care of her wounds and soaking up her knowledge like a sponge as much as she could. She was eager to train, and Raven had promised her, well, Summer had promised to train her.

She'd be trained. She had to be trained.

Days passed into weeks, and weeks into months before she knew it, Cinder training her semblance in the mornings and changing Raven's bandages in the evenings. It was on the second week there that she'd been able to stitch the woman's wounds closed, finally closing Tyrian's wounds.

It had been another week before Raven was moving comfortably, but in that time she'd become a fearsome monster of a training officer.

She'd made Cinder run and exert until she was exhausted, then made her keep going until she collapsed. Archery drills, fighting with melee weapons, studying her semblance and its effects on everything she could.

Forcing the girl into fights against Raven felt brutally unfair to Cinder, Raven was not only vastly more experienced, but used it too, leveling her superior speed, strength, and skills against Cinder's pitiful ones.

They fought for hours, sparring until Cinder looked more like a walking bruise than anything else.

Drills included tracking Raven through the forests, killing minor grimm, and stalking her mentor to the best of her abilities.

She was rewarded with half smiles and contentedness from Raven when she did well.

Praise was rare but valued deeply by Cinder. The first instance came when she'd been able to forge an arrow from her semblance alone.

That glass arrow now hung above the mantle and fireplace in the small cabin she and Raven shared. It was a smoky color, shot through with flecks of light grey ash, remnants from its creation. Cinder felt something akin to pride every time she looked at it, every time she saw that single, simple, slightly misshapen arrow, she was reminded of Raven's agreement and Raven's pride.

It was always a subtle, gentle thing. The firm feeling of Raven ruffling her hair after a training session left them both sweating after Cinder had scored her first real hit against the talented, strong maiden.

She remembered the fierce smile when Cinder had infused her semblance into an arrow and detonated the snow and target with the resulting explosion. She remembered the look of pure pride on the woman's face when Cinder had taken down a beowulf single-handedly while remaining unharmed.

Strength filled her every time that Raven praised her, every time that she landed a single hit on the woman, every time. It was always a rush of pure bliss that ran through her. Always something powerful and to be cherished.

It was surprising how little it took for Cinder to lose track of time, until more than a few months had passed, and the winter was now beginning to give way to spring. It was easy for the days of training, learning, and healing to blend together until Raven had fully returned to form. It was only later, towards the beginning of spring in earnest, that Raven asked Cinder a question that the girl didn't have an answer for.

"How did you mask our presence?"

Cinder shook her head, the pair had brought down a large buck the previous week, and the slow-roasted shoulder had been delightful, especially when combined with dried vegetables and the like, scavenged from the ruins of the other houses' root cellars. Cinder paused to finish her bite of the thick, rich meal, before stating simply.

"I didn't. I tried for a few weeks, but I wasn't strong enough to get far enough into the forest for it to be sufficient. Eventually I just… stopped."

Raven wanted to rip her apart for her stupidity, and based on the way her mouth had set into a hard line, and she'd placed her silverware down, she was about to do so.

"That was stupid. We are either incredibly lucky or incredibly unlucky, I do not know which is which."

Cinder shrank in on herself, her shoulders clumping together at the forefront of her body.

"Fortunately for you, I already have a suitable punishment in mind."

Cinder can barely meet Raven's eyes, and she sees a look that might be described as smug on the tall woman's face.

"Pack runs. For the next week."

Cinder's forehead hits the table.

She hated pack runs, it was effectively an excuse for Raven to fill a backpack full of rocks and make Cinder run, while she chased her.

Cinder despised them.

She couldn't argue with the results, admittedly, and a part of her knew that she really was getting off comparatively light, given that they'd been unharmed for their tenure within the village itself. If they'd been forced out, or if Tyrian had come back… she suspected Raven would have been much harsher had that occurred.

Luckily… she'd be able to survive this, and she'd only come out of it stronger.

A part of Cinder relished how much her training had presented results.

She was stronger, faster, and tougher than she'd ever been before, she could run for miles through the snow, scale cliffs and trees covered and sunk in ice. She could hit a silver lien card from over a hundred feet with both Raven's magic arrows and her own. She could carve through bark, wood, and stone in single blows with the sharpened forms of twin blades. They were crude, cruel implements, weapons designed to maim and twist flesh even as they scythed through it like butter.

Cinder would be the first to admit she'd taken cues from Dawning Rose when constructing the weapons, each one represented a short blade, curved like the sharpened half moons that had made up that weapon. They were cruel and primitive, but neither she nor Raven had the experience necessary to forge a superior item, let alone the tools.

So they made do. The two had long since moved beyond basic training, and now the clashes looked, for all intents and purposes, as though they were trying to kill each other.

Blows were thrown that cracked against bone and smashed and cut skin, weapons were bared with all the intensity of violence and murder.

And Cinder loved every single second of it.

There was something in the exuberant declaration of your intentions to harm another, manifested through drawn weapons and bared, hissing teeth. Her aura had partially activated, as Raven had said, it had given her a shroud, a potent one, for lethal injuries, but her training was progressing so rapidly at this time that she personally would have astounded her old self.

She flipped backward, balancing on her hands for a half second, and earning a strike to the calves for her trouble.

They'd been going at it since sunrise, and Raven and Cinder both looked worse for wear, Raven was still blearily blinking from when Cinder had thrown dust into her eyes, and Cinder had what felt like dozens of minor cuts and nasty bruises.

"Too slow!"

Cinder growled, coiling her muscles and extending her left leg forward into a kick that nailed Raven in the wrist. Against any other human, it would have disarmed them.

Raven had aura and retaliated by kicking Cinder in the stomach and throwing her backward across the snow.

"How many times have I told you…"

Cinder cut her off.

"Not to try and disarm you, yes, your aura is reinforcing your strength and muscles. I can feel it."

Her guardian chuckled, a half snort before she stifled it and advanced towards Cinder's prone form, extending a hand down to the woman.

"Up you get, one more bout?"

Cinder nodded, stepping back and kicking out her hands for a moment, noting the position of her weapons, one to her right, up a small hill where Raven had tossed it, the other to her left a scant 5 feet from her.

Her eyes narrowed, and with an explosion of fresh snow, she and Raven launched themselves at each other Cinder going to the right, and Raven launching to block her.

Cinder ducked and rolled, skidding under Raven as the woman launched herself like a panther over Cinder. Unfortunately, she wasn't fast enough to entirely dodge the swipe from Omen, and the blade's flat slapped against her knuckles as she threw herself to one side.

But, she'd guessed her position correctly, and, skidding up the hill, one hand latched onto the front of her blade and she pulled, hard.

The sharp jerking of her body hurt like a bitch, but it stopped her skid and let her pick herself up. A month ago, she likely would have felt her arms twist and shatter for such an offense, but now? Corded with excellent musculature and strength? She held on tight and stood, one curved blade leveled off, and pointed to Raven.

"Good recovery, still took a hit to the hand, but that's better than the last dozen times."

Raven's smug arrogance wasn't undeserved. From what she'd been doing and training with Cinder, Cinder knew one thing.

Raven was good, probably the best fighter that Cinder had ever seen, even with the televised exploits of the ACE-OPS and the like, Raven was simply faster, stronger, and tougher than them.

She'd seen and experienced all of that over the past few weeks and more. However, there was one thing that she'd almost never seen Raven use.

The maiden powers, as she'd called them. The strange elemental ones, nor her semblance, Cinder wondered why, if she could generate portals at will, why wasn't she exploiting them.

She darted to the right as Raven came in once more and immediately regretted her decision as Raven planted a boot into her ribs and sent her tumbling butt over kettle into the snow. By the time Cinder had extricated herself from the snow pile, Raven's blade was at her throat, and the woman wore her ever-present, cocky smirk.

"Do you always have to use Omen? She hurts my throat."

Raven didn't even remotely let that cocky smirk fall.

"Of course, Besides, don't be demoralized over this loss. You lasted approximately 4 seconds more than yesterday, and 12 more since last week."

Cinder tried to take her words to heart, but… something within her still hurt when she thought about it.

"It would be rather insulting if you could actually defeat me, don't you think?"

Raven's voice is gentle, and her hand has already moved to ruffle Cinder's hair, the girl trying, and failing to stop her guardian from doing so.

"I've had over a decade and a half of experience as a huntress and huntress candidate, you can't beat me in a fight, because I have that experience, and because the powers of the maiden effectively give me a cheat code."

Cinder looked up in shock. Raven smiled that half smile at her, though from the way her eyes moved, Cinder could see that the expression was tired and wan.

"The powers of the maiden strengthen my aura and slow my aging."

She flexed her arms briefly, flaring her dark red aura for Cinder to see, before continuing to speak.

"As far as I'm aware, I am roughly 24 years old physically, though I am nearing the age of 31."

Cinder's eyes widened instantly, Raven was young… but she'd not expected that, would the maiden powers give her that too if she were to inherit them!?

"It's a curse… little kite. An awful curse, that steals who you are as a tribute for its powers."

Raven rarely speaks about what the maiden's powers are, instead always stating that they're nothing more than a curse and that if she had her way, no one would ever receive them again, simply because of how much of a curse they were. Cinder isn't entirely sure she believes Raven in that regard, but the woman seems to be fine with making her magical weapons for Cinder's training, and on more than one occasion when they've fought Grimm. So why was she so insistent on such a thing? Why deny Cinder such power? Wouldn't it keep her safe?

"But… enough talk of curses, let me give you the gift I promised you."

One hand was on the side of her head, the other on her chest, just over her heart. A part of Cinder feels an almost song begin to sing through her, a melody that sets her teeth on edge and tears at who she is.

It feels like her semblance, yet different. Her semblance is a roaring blaze, threatening to consume everything in its path, this is a warmth that is hers and hers alone. She is only barely listening as Raven begins, but her mind parses the chant even as Raven says it.

"For it is at our weakest and most vulnerable that we achieve the strength to do what is right. Through the pain and agony, our walls are ripped away, and we are remade in a crucible of our past mistakes. Infinite in potential, bearing our past mistakes upon our brow, I release your soul, and by my legacy, set you free."

It started as a warmth, a glow, and then Cinder is inhaling deeply, and her body is alive and her senses are sharper than they've ever been before. Every detail on Raven's face stands out, every single fluttering motion of the birds in the copse of trees around the village, every single thought, a scant moment is all it takes for Cinder to see what she wants. Her muscles strengthen, her body stronger, tougher, and now refining to near the peak of who she was. Everything is in tune with her motions and thoughts, and as she raises her arms and steps back, breathing hard, she sees that Raven is letting a small, genuine and gentle smile cross her face.

"How does it feel, little kite?"

Cinder breathes in once, exhales, then clenches a fist.

"It feels… good."

She purrs. Her voice is a ripple of water moving through the air as she concentrates. Her semblance no longer feels untamed, no longer feels impossible to assert her will over.

It has gone from a vast, impassable, and distressingly powerful bonfire, to a vast reservoir of pure, total power.

She holds a hand out, and heat haze forms across her fingertips, her aura not sparking, but instead shifting and twisting around the heat. She can feel it, but it will not harm her, she will not have any issues with such a power at her disposal.

"We need to test your strength, speed, and endurance with aura. You'll be able to go for a great deal longer, but we need to know that now."

Cinder nods, and then, at Raven's prompting, she leaps directly into the air, clearing just below the edge of the roof of the house nearest to her. Fingers latch onto that leading edge, and then she's pulling herself up to the roof with nary a wasted breath.

Cinder lands like a cat, on her legs and haunches, and then, once more with Raven nodding, she takes a running jump off the edge of the roof, aiming for the snow flats around Raven.

The impact jars her, but it doesn't hurt, and as she rolls to break her fall, Cinder snaps a hand out, grabbing tight to one of the wooden poles, deeply embedded in the snow, that serves as her impromptu training area.

The only warning she gets is the sharp crack, as her hand closes too tightly on the pole, before with a splintering CRASH it snaps free and sends Cinder plummeting into the snow, head first.

She should have been hurt, an impact like that would normally do damage, and yet, instead, she feels a sharp, stabbing pain, but running her hands over her forehead shows no signs of injury. She looks to the pole, trying to locate the area where the wood snapped, and then, she's pausing.

"Did I do that?"

Deep finger indents are carved into the wood itself, nail marks left behind around a tattered splintered hole. Raven, softly chuckling, extends a hand to Cinder and smiles down at the girl.

"What did I tell you? You're tougher and stronger than you were, and to an extent that seems to be a little surprising, hmm~?"

Cinder balls up snow, and throws it at her. Which only makes Raven laugh harder.

"Now, draw up your blades, little Kite. We fight until you can no longer walk."

Cinder, slumped across Raven's shoulders, really should have seen this coming. A part of her had wanted to beat Raven at her own game, land a strike on her that would make her do… something out of the ordinary.

How wrong she'd been.

If anything, with aura allowed and the kid gloves off, Raven had been even more vicious. Cinder's chest and back, she was fairly sure, were a lovely shade of purple and blue, and she'd failed to land a single hit on the woman. Failed to land even a single, slight hit. She'd gotten cocky, and overconfident in her new power, and Raven had promptly reminded her why she was a huntress.

Cinder's hip still hurt from the impact of Raven's boot against it, and her face was flushed with embarrassment as her guardian carried her like a sack of potatoes. She didn't like relying on Raven for this, and yet, she really couldn't move, her legs were too sore.

Raven hasn't spoken in some time, and Cinder wonders why she's not said much.

"I am such an idiot."

Raven's internal monologue reminds her repeatedly of that fact.

She'd said after the girl landed a hit on her! Not before! Yes, she'd technically nailed Raven in the eyes with some grit, but that wasn't a hit! Not by most definitions!

She'd given an eleven-year-old girl her aura. Yes, she'd have received it at 11-12, like most other huntress candidates, but they weren't at a safe place for that to take place, at all! She'd have to watch for symptoms of aura poisoning or worse, and she wasn't sure she could cure the instability.

Again, they'd nominally do this in a city, where the students and fellow peers attending the school with the prospective candidates would easily be able to note any symptoms, but for now, she'd just have to make do.

Her plans changed as she reached the cabin she and Cinder shared. There, in the snow, were fresh tracks, human tracks.

Raven's eyes narrow, and she runs quickly over the plans she and Cinder had made.

"Cinder, plan delta, make for shore."

The girl nods once, adrenaline spiking her body as Raven sets her down and jerks her head towards a cabin on the far side of town that was little more than a ruin. It contained the bug-out bags the two had placed there months ago, containing weeks of rations, extra warm clothing, kindling, and all the other survival essentials.

As Cinder made her way towards the bags, Raven concentrated and drew a perfect replica of Omen, save it being made of her maiden's powers. Strangely, the powers hadn't taken a memory this time, and Raven had a moment to wonder why before she chose to shove that concern aside. She had a murderous scorpion to track first, and that murderous scorpion had to be nearby.

They'd spent perhaps 5 months in this small village, so when Raven came out, looking for the trail, she found it leading to nothing more than a slight dusting of snow and tracks that seemed to vanish.

Tyrian.

Raven turned and saw that Cinder was already gone, good, the girl had taken the broom as well, and was obscuring her tracks as she made for the coast. Raven, for her part, could rely on Cinder's aura-enhanced strength to carry both packs, while she quickly scouted the area.

She'd gotten frighteningly good at rapid transformations with Ozpin's magic.

A moment later, a large raven took to the sky, searching around the village and finding little to no evidence of anyone nearby.

That made no sense, it hadn't been their tracks, so where was Tyrian?

Raven circled back, orbiting Cinder's position as the girl made her way towards the shore, likely half a day's travel from their current location.

She circled down after another hour of scouting, Tyrian couldn't catch them now, even if he was still after them. Transforming midair, the woman landed in an easy crouch near Cinder, straightening up and turning to face out and over the expanse of the Atlesian seas in front of them.

A/N: We are reaching the end of the first arc soon, expect many things to begin to shift or be set up as we enter Arc 2 with Cinder and Raven and the ongoing journey back to Anima.

As always, leave a comment, kudo, etc if you like what I do, and I'll try to reply to comments when I get a chance!

Next Chapter: July 31