Penny was stuck between two activities, both of which spanned the spectrum between absolute joy and dreadful embarrassment.

First, she had a keen eye on a lovely woman working the docks— one who she planned to have working a different kind of dock come sunset.

Second, she was chasing a seagull that had stolen the local dessert she'd acquired— sugared squares of what was apparently fried milk— but the bastard creature simply would not find its way into her hands. Worse still, the lovely docklady, along with every other worker in the area, was staring at her like she was a one-Knight circus act.

As the gull mockinglyflapped away from her clutches, she pondered the heights from which the great Penny Polendina had fallen. Her rise to knighthood, her march of conquest against the Sandstone school, her heroic sacrifice and subsequent resurrection in the climax of the Mistral Reconquista— days full of life, beds full of admirers, hands full of either blade or booze, sometimes both.

Then she met Ruby, the girl who forged her the perfect sword, and everything fell apart.

The smith plagued her mind. Constantly. Her incredible talent, her striking beauty, her combat prowess, her stature, her eyes. She couldn't even bear sleeping with men anymore— not when she couldn't close her eyes and pretend they were Ruby. It was pathetic.

Then came everything with the tourney, then all the rumors of Weiss and "Rupert"— her Ruby! Then there was the news that she wasn't even on the pursuit team, where she'd hoped to convince them to let Ruby live off her penance with the Knights. She had wished to assume responsibility for Ruby, making the smith a squire under Penny's own command, forced to heed every whim, fulfill every need, and indulge every desire. Was that wrong? Yes. Did Penny care? Not at all.

Now here she was, chasing a seagull in circles, arms flailing as she screamed demands in a language the feathered prick would never understand. All in front of a woman who should be the one fawning over her, not the other way around!

Perhaps this was her penance, some labor granted as the Shepherd's recompense for the misdeeds of her ancestors. In the grand scheme of the gods, she probably deserved this.

Just as she was beginning to consider letting the bird go, a rock struck it perfectly in the head, sending it crashing to the stones. Penny scrambled after it, snatching the fried treat out of its mouth.

"I sincerely hope you're not going to eat that."

The voice shot freezing water into Penny's veins, locking her stance mid-step and forcing her balance to teeter. Why in the Shepherd's warm embrace was the Knight Captain here? Her mere presence was a funeral bell, tolling through Penny's bones. "C-captain!" Her voice cracked three times over just two syllables. "What a… pleasant surprise!"

She didn't even get the chance to turn; Pyrrha encroached from behind, and Penny felt her belt jostle as the Knight Captain slipped her sword from its sheath.

Penny seized, her muscles going rigid. Pyrrha held the blade in front of them, angling it so the day's glare burned straight into Penny's eyes.

"Who made this sword?"

Oh.

Oh, fuck.

"Answer me, Polendina."

Her voice was hot blood pouring directly into Penny's ears. "I, uh… I don't remember."

Pyrrha laughed, deep and rich like a cake made of meat. "Oh, Penny," her words were tendrils lacing the folds of her brain, ensnaring her throat, wrenching the air from her lungs, "it's adorable that you think you can lie to me."

She didn't, she was just desperate. "I got it from a, uh… shop. In Vale."

Pyrrha angled the sword down, making the light bend around a series of marks in the ricasso: a rose— amateurishly engraved, but clearly illustrating the creator's care.

"This isn't Rainart's mark."

Penny gulped. "It's his… daughter's?"

"Not his son?" Pyrrha shot back instantly. "Smithing isn't a very common trade for women."

"R-right, of course," Penny backpedaled. "I, uh, misspoke."

"I can just make you talk, you know."

She didn't know, actually, but nothing had ever sounded truer in her life. "Patch," Penny squeaked, "the island."

"A smithy, I would guess?"

Penny nodded, her neck so stiff that it barely moved.

"Whose?"

"The, uh…" Penny rifled through every name she'd ever heard, scouring the oldest paths of her mind for anything. "Arc family's shop!"

"The Arc family, you say?"

Penny vigorously nodded. "Yes!"

A hand clasped over Penny's pauldron and slowly pivoted her around, just enough to set her eyes on a ship, the bow of which had been emblazoned with giant letters spelling 'ARC'.

"The traders?" Pyrrha drawled.

Penny stiffened.

"You will show me to Ruby's shop."

All the tension left her body, not from relaxation but from there being so much that it simply snapped, leaving her chest a void. "Yes, ser."

Penny slotted the sword back into its sheath, the movement smooth and quick as if she wasn't using someone else's scabbard. "Perfect. Shim! Get over here!"

She barely managed to scrounge together the wherewithal to turn at Pyrrha's shout, catching sight of what the Knight Captain was calling for. It was a fay, clad in the usual Binder's accoutrement: an asymmetrical tunic of Schnee navy, hewn clean around the left shoulder and leaving only one arm sleeved. The long stretch of exposed, spindly skin gave a clear view of the dark iron chains coiled tight around the entirety of its left arm. The other arm was sleeved to the wrist, and the hem of the tunic fell just short of the fay's knees, which were covered in plain burlap breeches. Its shoes were little more than ragged leather socks loosely fit around their feet.

Penny genuinely couldn't tell the fay's sex— Binders' heads were traditionally shaved, and they all seemed to have a degree of femininity in their features that made it hard to tell at a glance. This one was much the same, though its features were even sharper than Penny was used to seeing.

A long strip of parchment fluttered from its neck as it ran; a writ of conquest— the closest someone could get to saying they own a person, essentially declaring the battle in which the fay featured, the date of its capture, and to whom it belonged. No name, of course. Trophies don't have names.

"Why do you have a Binder?" Penny asked, unable to leave her curiosity be.

The Knight Captain quirked an eyebrow and— wait, something was different about her. Penny may not have interacted with her much, but even she could tell that not all was right in the Knight's head.

First of all, she… twitched. At least one part of her was tweaking almost constantly, as if her skin wasn't quite right for her muscles. Even under her armor, the incessant movement was distinct— a jolt of her arm, her hand flexing suddenly, facial features pinching and relaxing with no warning.

And her face, something just wasn't right. Penny could see the faintest line arced across it, and she was certain that she would've heard about the illustrious Knight Captain getting such an injury. Plus, it went directly over her…

Her eye was wrong.

Penny stared. It was wrong. Even if she'd only ever seen Pyrrha in a few Knightly assemblies and the incident at the tourney, she could never forget those brilliant emerald irises, and now she only had one of them. The other was green, but not the right green. Half a shade from correct, barely noticeable at a glance, but from this distance? It was glaring.

Pyrrha scoffed, jolting Penny out of her thoughts. "You hesitate to answer my questions, then have the audacity to pose your own?"

Penny stumbled back, her lips a spout of poor excuses. The Knight Captain permitted her groveling for a couple moments before silencing her with a sharply raised hand.

"I have a Binder because I intend to be gating somewhere," Pyrrha intoned, as if she were tryingto make it obvious that there was something more to that.

The fay flinched at its mention, its skin a bright purple flush as it bit down hard on its lips. Sweat poured down its brow; it was clearly trying not to cry out, judging by the desperate flicking of its cream-colored irises.

Penny watched Pyrrha shuffle awkwardly on her feet, her expression held tight against… something. Did she… did she want Penny to ask? Trying to read the Knight Captain was as easy as reading a book— if she were Ruby, because Penny couldn't understand a damn letter of it! "Gating… somewhere?" She tried.

Pyrrha nodded, far too enthusiastically for a grown woman. "Of course!"

Well, she hadn't been killed for asking, so… "Anywhere in particular?"

"The Shimmer!"

The declaration was so loud that Penny and the Binder flinched, and it drew most of the eyes on the docks. Gone was the Knight Captain's murderous tone, the blood dripping from her tongue, replaced by something even more disturbing: childish glee.

Penny tried backing away, desperate self-preservation blaring in her ears like cathedral bells, but the Knight Captain grabbed her arm again. She pivoted the lesser Knight back towards the boat she'd taunted her with, leaning close to her ear like a wolf on a rabbit's neck.

"Do you think he'll take us to Patch?"