"So… when did you come to the Shimmer?"

"I haven't."

Blake wasn't an idiot, and Qrow was a bad liar. Even with his face hidden as he hacked at the vines, now marginally more healed, his voice was thick with smoky deceit. "Yeah…" Blake drawled, picking under her nails with a dagger. "I can hear you lying, just come out and tell. What, did ya kill somebody here? I've done that."

Qrow's scowl radiated around him fully. He didn't say anything.

"Oooh, fay lover?" Blake hypothesized, poking him in the back. "Forbidden love, how scandalous; like father like daughter, I suppose."

The Huntsman sent a stupefied look to her. "What? I don't have any kids."

Blake smirked. "Oh yeah? Not the girl who looks exactly like you, and almost nothing like her sister?"

Qrow fully turned, absorbing his bone-blade back into his forearm. "You… you mean Ruby?"

Blake proudly nodded, confident that she'd solved the puzzle.

Qrow sneered. "Uh, no. You're wrong, fay. I…" he shivered. "I wouldn't do that. Not with that woman."

Blake wasn't convinced. "Then why does she look like you?"

"She doesn't. She looks like her mother," Qrow turned back to the vines, his voice taking a bitter edge. "Like a damn portrait of her."

"Except she's not fay," Blake pointed out.

"That's how half-fay work, yes."

"So was her mother medius, too? Or fully fay?"

Qrow went back to cutting vines, harsher than before. Pink vine-fluid sprayed over his front. "Full," he answered gruffly.

Blake hummed. "Anyone famous?" she asked jokingly.

"No," Qrow said, hitching his breath, bobbing his throat the way he does when he lies.

Blake stopped in place, unnoticed behind the lying Qrow. Ruby had a fay mother— a famous fay mother— and Blake was wracking her damn mind thinking up every named female fay over the scant history lessons her parents had shared over her younger years. She couldn't remember any silver-eyed gens, but her parents hadn't exactly been scholars. Even if she'd seen part of that historical fay on Pyrrha's face, there weren't any names she could attach it to, and she'd never gotten the opportunity to see the famous busts in the capitol— it'd been razed before her birth.

And what famous fay would… wait, no, that was a stupid question. As someone who actively laid with a particular human, she had no leg to stand on. There were plenty of excessively pro-human factions before the civil war, seeing them as either fashionable oddities, suitable concubines, or actual people.

But Ruby the Red was of a famous fay dynasty. Of all people, Ruby the Red—

No, wait, that wasn't her name. Her last name… shit, she'd learned it so long ago and forgotten so quick.

"Qrow…"

He didn't turn, as if he could hear her thinking and didn't want to encourage it. He just kept hacking at the vines.

"What is Ruby's cognomen?"

He kept chopping away, pink vine-guts coating his bony blades.

"I can just ask when we reunite."

Qrow's swinging arm stopped, but only briefly before it continued cutting.

"Either you tell me and control how the information comes out, or I ask her and figure it all out myself— loudly."

Qrow stiffened, half-turning towards her. His bone-blades remained, jutting parallel to his forearms and connected by scaffold of bone and sinew. He looked at Blake, opened his mouth, then shut it again. He returned to cutting the vines.

Blake was left standing dumbly, her bluff called, until she risked getting lost if she didn't follow.

Ruby received a small cube of ice directly to her forehead, making her triumphant pose falter as she whined at her paramour. "Weiss! That hurt!"

The girl in question stomped down towards Ruby. She leveled an accusatory finger at the girl's eye-level. "Good, the only person for whom you may use that word is me."

Ruby went bright red, stammering apologies that flopped over each other fruitlessly. Yang watched with a mild look of amusement.

Much to her own chagrin, Weiss eventually gave in to Ruby's feverish, devoted apologies, and had to assure her it was okay before the smith threw herself prostrate upon the dirt.

"So, finding Blake?" said Yang.

"And uncle Qrow!" Ruby added.

Weiss huffed. "As much as I want us to be reunited—"

"You do?" Squealed Ruby, far too cheerfully.

"Of course I do," Weiss admitted. "Your uncle is an actual Huntsman—"

"Hey!" Objected Yang.

Weiss ignored her. "And I don't know what to do with this Binder; Blake's the only one who would know how to free him."

To Weiss' surprise, Ruby didn't acknowledge her acceptance of their fay companion. Instead, her features pinched tight, and she pushed her hair back with a stressed sigh. "You're seriously going through with that?" Ruby asked, in a tone much more exasperated than Weiss had expected.

Weiss crossed her arms defensively. "Of course I am! We struck an accord and I will abide by it!"

Ruby raised her hands. "Sorry, sorry, I didn't mean— I mean, are you sure it's a good idea right now? This is a bad situation, and having this fay with us only makes It worse."

Yang spoke up with a scoff. "What, are you suggesting we kill him?"

The ashamed wince from Ruby was enough to bare her teeth, but she still shrugged in tentative affirmation. "I mean… we can't really take him with us, can we?"

Yang looked away, but Weiss held her chin high and spoke with conviction. "Ruby, we are not killing him, not while I am sworn to his freedom," when Ruby opened her mouth to ask, Weiss preempted her question. "I can encase him in ice while we search for Blake and your uncle. Yang could knock him out on top of that."

"That doesn't sound so bad," Yang said. "I mean, do we really wantto kill this guy?"

Ruby looked away. "I… I guess not. Weiss, do you think you'll be able to keep him frozen the whole time?"

Weiss nodded confidently.

"You don't need to concentrate on it or anything?"

Weiss shook her head. "Only if I plan on dispelling it immediately; the ice will stay if I just leave it."

Ruby steepled her fingers against her lips and sighed. "Okay, so we're just going to leave this guy— who almost ripped Weiss's face in half— frozen in a block of ice in this kind and generous family's house, without being able to tell them why we're leaving him there, withtheir children?"

Yang winced, saying, "Well, when you put it like that…"

Weiss suddenly alighted as if struck by an idea. "I can tell them!"

"How?" the sisters asked simultaneously.

Weiss smirked. "Well, you saw my sword talking through me. He's a fay, so we can tell them everything that's happened!"

Ruby pinched the bridge of her nose. "And where do we get all that water from?"

Weiss didn't immediately answer, but Yang did. "The barn!" she announced with a snap. "They're one pig short after all, they can spare the water."

Weiss stared at the Huntress, confused. "What… what do you mean by that?"

Yang opened her mouth to make a proud announcement, but Ruby took it first with a heaving sigh. "We exploded their pig."

A/N: WOW i am so sorry for that unexpected hiatus, i didn't expect it to happen either. Didn't even take a break lol, ive just had a hard time writing through this lately. it's not becoming a slog thankfully, i just caught myself between five projects at once: this, Twilight Conterto, and my original works Daemonivore, Silver & Bone, and Vitae. Having 5 separate things to write between certainly keeps my creative juices from being wasted, but man does it make it hard to stick to one thing. Especially Twilight Concerto, its next chapter is about 20 pages long (not impressive for most, I know) and it's a huge shift that's taken so much of my focus.

Anyways, super sorry again for letting yall down with my schedule, then following it up with a tiny-ass chapter. id love to promise my regular schedule will return, but i really can't do that until I get this TC chapter out, which should be soon. A million apologies, ill pour one out for the readers i lost in that time, but i wouldn't just drop this story without letting yall know. I've got chapters written ahead, my attention is just split. sorry again, love yall, thanks for sticking with me.