Down came the door, courtesy of Weiss' shoulder. The thing was basically already rotting off its hinges, so it was easy, but Weiss still felt a thrill of delight race up her spine at Ruby's shocked little gasp. She made a show of clearing the room, despite being certain that nothing would try and bother living in this rotted out hazard zone.

Holstering her gun, she motioned to the creature in the doorway. Ruby didn't move. Weiss cocked her head at her. "Do I need to invite you in?"

Ruby gnawed at her bottom lip, eyes wide with worry. "Y-yes please."

"You seriously need me to? Even though this isn't my domicile?"

The girl's arms enclosed her chest. She shivered, looking away. "It… feels like it is."

Weiss opened her mouth to rebut again, but Ruby's patience fell victim to whatever panic was affecting her.

"L-look— just invite me in! I d-don't need it but— it would make it easier, okay!" Something creaked, as if shifted by the resonance of her anxiety. "Ugh. I hate this place."

Weiss shrugged, waving a hand at the accommodations within. "Then please, come in. Enjoy my vermin infestation, the anomalous refuse, and the small pile of communal needles on my bed. Maybe we can get lucky and score some leftovers."

Visibly sickened, Ruby entered the room on shaky legs. "Why'd you even take me here?"

"To hide."

Ruby moved to sit on the bed— the one with all the needles on it— but Weiss held the idiot back before she could contract any new and exotic blood diseases. She went "Wah!" at being pulled, tripped over her own legs, and fell histrionically into the Huntress' sinuous arms. Weiss rolled her eyes.

"Don't joke around, you dolt. We're here for a reason."

Ruby groaned. "Which is…"

Weiss set the girl on her feet. She stepped back, drawing a polished hunting knife from the back of her belt. Ruby just stated at her, uncomprehending (despite the obvious implications). With her knife, Weiss motioned towards the floor.

Ruby's confusion was not eased. "What?"

Weiss gestured again. More obviously.

"Um… words? Please use them? Cuz I'm not picking up—"

"Get on your knees."

Ruby made a noise, her face immediately drawing taut.

"Oh, shut up. It's not like that."

Slowly, with the indistinct shuffle of fabric solely filling the empty room, Ruby shifted to a kneeling position. She looked up at Weiss. "It's not like what? A-and why'd we have to do this here? This place is gross."

Weiss was taken by the sight. The girl was beneath her again, that distance creeping again, her sense of body separating from her sense of self. The space where Weiss was Weiss felt so short, now, with that creeping, electric chill hollowing out her guts, living in her throat. "S-sorry," her mouth said, even though she wasn't sorry. Nothing in the world would make her sorry, right now. She squeezed her eyes shut hard, shook her head, trying to regain what it felt like to have a face. "Stop charming me."

"Weiss?" the thing below said with its quiet voice, with its ashen throat, with its eyes of silver gleaming. "B-but— the talismans should be working— especially with you as a Huntress, there's no way my passive is strong enough right—"

Weiss' palms itched. Her hands twitched hard towards the girl, making her flinch— her and Weiss both. "S-stop—"

"Stop what?"

"Just stop," Weiss' throat rumbled, words hissing through her teeth. "And— and shut up. I'm trying to think."

Really, she was trying not to think. Thinking is the mind-killer. Thinking would make her reconsider, rebalance the risks, tarry— boondoggle, even— in favor of the action that she needed.

Her thumb rubbed over the leather bands of her knife, ran across the cool steel of its cruciform guard. It was a good thing, her knife: a long stiletto, its steel blade plated with blessed argentum— good for fighting any midnight Malevolence, or as an offhand companion to her pistol, or even as the short and fiesty lover of her—

Ruminating wasn't good. It was a distraction. She needed to do.

"Is Ruby Rose your real name?"

Ruby nodded.

"Rose isn't a Brood."

Ruby shook her head.

The question died behind her lips: no matter the statement, she could see the truth in the anxious, pinhole black of those pupils— along with something else, something deep, something Weiss was strategically missing. "You know magic."

Nod.

"Do you know my magic?"

That red-stained shock of black tipped to the side, one long strand hanging dramatically in the front.

"The Schnees."

"No? I only know about ours— I haven't tried to do any."

Another note for later— one of a hundred, at least: Why has she not done magic? Raising the thin dagger, Weiss carved a geometric series in the air. "Invocations. Runes, glyphwork, enchantment, even talismans like yours. I'm sure I could make something better in an hour."

Ruby looked like she had a million questions burning a hole in her chest, her full-moon gaze starstruck, lips parted. She bounced on her knees, even with Weiss now beknifed and hovering above like Azrael come a-reaping. Ruby said, giddy, "You can? Could you show—"

Weiss put the knife against the base of her index finger, as if to unzip it to the tip. Ruby suddenly went deathly quiet. That hot power pulsed, but distant, dull beneath the distancing disquiet in her guts, between her ribs, behind her face. On her lips. In her throat. Yes. This was good. This was her need. Her intent.

"Ruby Rose," she thrummed, the words pulling themselves from her chest. "Open, and with my blood will I Bind you to me."

The girl jolted— clearly to scramble back— so she grabbed her bead-anointed shoulder and held her still. How would she look, with that intent piercing the gloom of this tiny, shitty motel room: like an arbiter of Seraphic will, or like those bright-eyed princes of the furnace below, who both sought brazenly to yoke those ancient, yokeless humans?

Ironic, that one such human would now bind the unholy.

"I— I don't know what that means," the unholy squeaked. "W-What's— what're you trying—"

"I shall Bind you to me, you with my blood as your mark, and mine alone, and to you does this Binding grant an impunity."

"That— I don't— could you say it normal?"

"Refuse, and here your vile presence shall face the cleansing wrath of GOD."

The Seraphic invocation made Ruby wince, as if struck by sudden holiness. Letting the girl retreat from her grip, Weiss pressed the knife into her skin, beading blood onto the point.

"Decide."

The girl's pupils ballooned at the drop of red, and not a moment of hesitation followed before, "O-okay! Okay. Yes. Uh… I agree?"

"Then part your lips, and let us consecrate this Binding."

Ruby's mouth opened for her, the act sealing her to Weiss. The Huntress felt her eyes lose their gleam. The Binding was a string in her brain.

The Bound creature was still below her. Where it—

"Wider, Ruby. It's going to get on your face."

"Wa— aah? Aah!" Her jaw flexed, straining against itself. "I an—"

"I know you can't close your mouth, you dolt, that's the point. That's why I said open wider— that way we can get this done easier, and you can go back to yapping at me." Like the beast you— "So open. Wide."

Begrudgingly (as if she had a choice), Ruby pried her mouth open. She looked up at Weiss. With those big, watery eyes.

Her throat was hollow. Her stomach was hollow. Her heart was in her ears. Mouth too dry— or too wet— what was a mouth supposed to feel like? She couldn't feel anything, save for the cold stab of metal in her hand. Decisively, she opened a seam down the length of her index finger. The blood ran fluently, a thin stream of red that pooled, then separated from her fingertip. Dripping down. Falling.

Landing in Ruby's mouth.

It struck the girl on her waiting tongue, and she made the most delectable (Shut up.) noise of satisfaction.

Kept dripping. The noise drew out. Protracted. A long noise, one with fingers, and hands, and breath— Ruby's hands were clenching over her thighs. (Stop that.) She was moaning. (Stop.) She wasn't moving, or thrashing, or even rising— she was drinking like such a good g(NO).

She closed her lips. The blood splashed lightly over her mouth, wasteful (Quit.), falling in thin trickles down the sides of her full, bright lips. The column of her throat bobbed. She drank of Weiss Schnee.

Ruby's lips parted again, a breathy pant escaping. "W-Weiss— this— thisisn't— hugh—" she sounded like she'd run a marathon with a vi(AAAAAAAAAAAA). "This isn't— the thing— I need."

(Focus. Focus. Stop the thoughts. No. Focus. Vampire. Jarpyre. Flesh jar baby. Wants to eat people (even if she seems really nice and sweet and her eyes are so) WILL EAT PEOPLE.)

"I know. This is to sate your thirst so you won't go overboard."

"Waow," Ruby breathed, downing another small mouthful. "You're— really smart, Weiss."

(Static. Think of static.) "Just drink, Ruby."

"I— I think—" she coughed, excess blood spraying onto Weiss' skirt— she should pay for that. "I'm— I don't need—"

Weiss swiftly pulled her finger away. Ruby, even though she'd specifically requested it, whimpered. "Shut. Up." Weiss reiterated, grinding her teeth as she squeezed her bleeding finger in her fist. Ruby tried to rise, hunger visibly fighting restraint in her eyes, but Weiss' foot pushed her back down to her knees. "Stay. I have some questions, first. About you."

"Please," Ruby begged. "Ask— anything. Please."

"The silver beads."

"Containment," Ruby answered immediately. "I'm powerful. I'd be worse without them."

"Do they hurt?" (Stupid question.)

"Yes."

"Bad?" (Who cares? She'd deserve it. (Even though it's not her fault.) Living is a choice.)

"Y-yeah." Ruby said like a beaten puppy. "You get used to it."

(Stop doing that with your face.) "Who gave it to you?"

Now came the hesitation— Ruby's face, taut.

"You're mine now, Ruby. Tell me."

"My, um… uncle."

"Is he a—"

"No."

(Don't believe her immediately.) "And if they were removed?"

Terror: it ripped out of Ruby's expression. The girl twitched. She gaped. "That— that would— pleasedon't."

"How would I?"

More terror. Wide, her eyes. Tight, her lips. Her horrified face was covered in stark red. Her lips were plump and bloody, her teeth visibly stained. "I— Weiss—"

Weiss bent down towards her. All the way. Nose-to-nose. Ruby's mouth smelled like blood. "Tell me. It'll be that much easier when I… disclose you— and our Binding."

Such a weak, pathetic thing. "D-d— disclose?"

They were speaking into each other's mouths, the creature panting as if to hoard every bit of air the Huntress' words touched. "Yes. Disclose. To the Parley."

The words hit the atmosphere like a criminal faux pas, like a glass dish falling in a busy restaurant, like an arguing couple making the world silent in their wake.

Ruby. Fucking. Beamed.

The room lit up from her crimson-tinged smile. The light in her eyes could sear a Seraphim. The cheer in her face could outshine the sun.

"You will?"

Weiss winced. "Uh— yes?" she blinked. "Yes. You… should be scared—"

"Scared?" the creature bounded up and threw its skinny arms around Weiss' neck, cheering, her words hitched with giggles. "Why— w-why would— I— be— scared? This is what I wanted!"

The contact froze Weiss to her bones— to her soul— not that Ruby was cold, moreso just distinctly not-warm, and her face was tucking dangerously close to Weiss' neck. The Huntress' fingers twitched, her body stiffening as Ruby's breath ghosted over the side of her throat— adrenaline.

"I just told you I wanted that," Ruby stated, invoking hazy memories of a bathroom, of whiteboards, of propositions— why did they seem so hazy, like some other Weiss had lived them? "Don't tell me you weren't even listening— again."

The breath. The mouth. The teeth.

Weiss shoved the girl to the floor and drew her pistol, her finger bleeding over the trigger as she aimed it at the creature. It yelped as its rear hit the floor. It hissed in pain. It looked up at her, everything peeling from its features until the only thing left was desperate fear. It splayed its hands out suddenly, making Weiss jump back and jerk her trigger once. The report was deafening in that small room— the monster screamed at the sound— but the results were impotent: a hole in the carpet, between a burnt cigarette butt and the creature's right kidney.

"Do— do not," forced itself past Weiss' lips. "Don't touch me. Not unless I say so."

The beast named Ruby stayed perfectly still.

"Ever. Ever," Weiss repeated, knuckles white against her weapons. "Don't ever. You. Are. Mine. I— I am going to use you. You are my trophy. This— this is how—" she glared down at her hands and demanded they stop shaking. They didn't. "This is how I get what I deserve— don't you understand? Y-you can't— you can't hurt me— you can never hurt me— you are Bound beneath me— so— so—"

She was losing it. Or she'd lost it. Or she'd never had it.

Weiss jerked her shoulder up, realigning the gun to look down the barrel, her whole arm stiffening. It— the creature— the thing— the monster— lie perfectly beneath her sights.

The monster with huge, pathetic, full-moon eyes. The one who winced, shrinking, hiding them. The one who looked so scared.

The trigger resisted, pushing back against her wounded finger. As if to beg her to stop. As if to deny her the shot if she chose wrong. If there were a spirit in the gun, it would be praying for a dud round.

She was the only one with power. She was the only one who was a threat. What was Ruby, here?

The one without an ounce of power.

"Why. Me."

"W-what?"

It always had such an annoying voice. "Why does it need to be me— why not someone else— why— why not anyone else."

"I— I told you, cuz I like—"

"No!" The thing jumped as Weiss thrust the gun towards her. "No, you— you're lying about— about something— it's not just— it can't be that simple! You— you wouldn't—" Whoever the fuck invented speaking, she'd murder. "You don't make any sense! There's something else!"

"Weiss, I lo—"

The Huntress roared, "I swear to Christ, Ruby, if you say you love me instead of the thing you're hiding I am gonna blast the fucking teeth out of your skull!"

It closed its mouth. Silence wasn't what she wanted.

"Tell! Me!"

Words. Whispered. Quiet.

"Speak up, Rose."

Not loud enough.

"Ruby! Look at me!"

"I heard!"

Weiss held steady. "Heard what."

"A-about high school."

No she didn't. (She couldn't have.)

"My— my sister, she was on the volleyball team— Yang."

Weiss' arms went slack, pistol and knife falling to her sides. (The middle blocker?) "Your… sister?"

"She told me."

It knew. The creature— Ruby— knew.

"Weiss— I'm so sorry I didn't say anything, but— but what would I even say?"

"So… that's… why you're… here."

Ruby looked like she wanted to get up so badly. It was a good thing she didn't.

"You just— you're here to— to comfort me? O-or— or— or to take— advantage of me?"

"N-no, Weiss, I— I mean—" the girl breathed deep, then let the air slide out her mouth in one shaky exhalation. "I want to make sure you're okay, because I like you. I don't want you to get hurt anymore— even if I'm at risk. Because you're my friend."

"I'm not— I don't have—"

"You didn't, once I left, but now you do." The girl— the thing— the girl— gestured to her own heart. "I'm here."

Weiss grit her teeth. "I— we are not friends! I beat you up all the time! I abused the shit out of you— that's why you went away, I chased you—"

"Weiss." Ruby's voice was at the lowest, most serious depth of her register— a tone Weiss had never heard before. "Come on. You know that's not why."

She did. In her brain, she did, but the heart was an impossible thing to convince. "Why, then?"

Ruby sighed. "So I could learn about… us," she motioned over herself. "A-and also, yknow, get regular homeschooling— but all in preparation for me to… to fledge."

"To… fledge?"

Another deadpan, in her voice and across her face. "Bite. Drink. Someone— a person."

"O-oh."

"We, um… we had it lined up so I'd be around graduation, so it won't look weird when I come to college, but, um… it— it came up. You. You came up, and— a-and Yang was with us for once, and she was like, 'Oh, yeah, she—'"

The method was static from Ruby's mouth. The details didn't parse in Weiss' ears.

"A-and— and, l-like—" Ruby's voice cracked, wet and thick. "Weiss, you— you can't do that! Don't you know—"

That people care about you? What a fat load of—

"How fricking pissed that woulda made me!"

There was fury in those silver eyes: a taste of the promised pissening. "W-what?"

The girl threw up her hands. "Could you imagine coming to terms with having this girl you liked— and I say 'coming to terms' because you were a real friggin' ass back then— and you kinda are now! Only to learn that she—" words like shuffling fabric: meaningless. "So basically screw you for figuring that whole thing out, woulda been super romantic for you to swoop back into her life— so it's kinda your fault since you left! So I'm friggin' sorry, Weiss! I'm sorry I left you all alone cuz I know you friggin' suck balls at being a normal person! So yeah! I— I…"

Ruby fell back on her haunches, wracked with exhaustion, hands landing limp in her lap. Weiss could only watch, her eyes feeling like they were showing pictures from a drive-in theater, and Weiss was only watching it from the other side of the fence.

"I… um… found out your classes and, um… swooped… in. Or, um… stumbled. Cuz the torpor." She laughed at herself. A sad, pathetic laugh— all breath, no humor. "Kinda figured you'd still be single, lol."

Thoughts— they clunked, stumbled— a mental lapse.

"I— I wasn't there for you, and you really—" she looked down at Weiss' hands, up her hands, to the— "You really needed me. I wanna be here for you, cuz despite all the times you put ghost pepper extract on my chips and hit me, I, unfortunately, like you."

More static. Everywhere. Over everything. Her lungs flexing and unflexing, her heart vibrating, despite the distant stillness of her unshaking hands. The electricity was gone, but the distance wasn't. Weiss' form was a ship without a pilot— unhosted.

"I— I just wanted to, um… make sure you were okay. Right then. So I… ran away. To here— to you." She pushed her fingers through her bangs, tugging nervously. "Kind of, um, counting the chickens before the carriage— before the— the horse— before they hatch—" she shook her head. "Whatever. Y-you get what I mean. I just… really wanted to get to you. Thought, um… there'd be, like, an apprenticeship… thing. For your people. Maybe, like—" she was babbling, stuttering. "L-like, you could, um, like, look past the Vamp thing— or like I said, I'd be useful— so I guess you got that?"

Blue eyes stared down, the girl's words resonating with the empty vessel of Weiss. Like a singing bowl. Like a bell. Like a lap to rest your head in.

"I— I, um— I just thought, like, um, it'd be… romantic? Like— woah, opposites attract, Vampire x Vampire Hunter, woah, t-that's— that's hot— or romantic— and— and like my uncle, he's, um— n-nevermind— Ijustthoughtit'dbecool? Kinda Romeo and Juliet?"

Such… such a stupid, stupid fucking thing to say. Ruby was such a stupid girl. Such a dumbass. Such a fucking idiot. It was…

"Or— or, um— that's, like… insensitive… uh… s-sorry, Weiss— I didn't mean it— um— like the romance yeah, but not um— not—"

Funny.

"W-Weiss? What— what'd I say!"

God, she was such a dolt.

"Is— is this good or bad? Weiss? I can't tell if this is a crazy laugh or a good laugh!"

Romeo and Juliet? Romeo and fucking Juliet? Has she even read Romeo and Juliet? Wait— she'd begged Weiss for help with it! She'd whined about it like a baby because 'This isn't how English should work! When am I even gonna use this as an adult!'

"You're starting to—"

"You— R-Ruby, you— you—"

"Yes?"

Weiss scrubbed her eyes with the back of her wrists. She breathed deep, hitching as another chuckle tried to force itself out. "You are such a— a dolt."

"I'm… an adult?"

Weiss snorted again, holstering her weapons. "God…" she sighed. "I cannot believe you."

Ruby's face became tentative, hopeful— a mote of brightness shining in her eyes. "Y-yeah?"

"Ugh. Just…."

The Huntress closed her eyes, breathed deeply again, in and out until her face was schooled back to neutrality. Slowly, she rolled up the sleeve of her right arm, pushing her lips back into a stern downward line. "Ruby."

The girl was still on her knees, beneath her, as all fetid creatures of the night should be. This one especially. Because it was special— by virtues explicitly literal, of course, not for anything else.

Ruby parted her lips, still stained with the blood of the Schnees. Her breathing became visibly labored. Her pupils grew to saucers. By the bright moonlight filtering in through the room's solitary window, Weiss' well-trained eyes could just barely pick up on the hint of warmth finding the girl's cheeks.

It was Ruby. It… it really was Ruby. It was Ruby, as a Vampire, and she wasn't leaping up to bite Weiss' throat out. She wasn't sinking her teeth deep into Weiss' carotid. She wasn't cursing her with vile blood magic.

She was kneeling. Subservient. Bound.

"So… what," asked Weiss' mouth. "All this… submission, is just to gain my trust?"

Ruby shrugged. "Yeah. Kinda. And I'm into it."

"W-what?"

"What?" Ruby said, far too easily. "Oh, please, who develops a crush on their bully without being at least a little into it?"

Weiss made an embarrassing sound. Ruby snorted. "J-just shut up, Ruby," the Huntress bade. "And— and stay there. Hold still."

Graciously, Ruby did shut up, and relaxed into her position on the floor. She waited. She waited silently. Patiently. Still-ly.

But her eyes, slowly, came to rest on Weiss' bare arm, and the Huntress could feel the rake of that gaze. She could feel the tines of it scraping up from her palm and wrist, noting each little freckle or mole until the cuff of Weiss' rolled-up bolero sleeve was the only thing in the way of her sight. Her eyes flickered from the arm to Weiss' face, at first a starved steel, then a desperate quicksilver, then a hungry and pathetic argentum, twinkling with want.

Those huge, watery eyes glistened up at Weiss all over again. Just like they used to: wanting, needing, begging the Huntress for something that only she could give— that Ruby would only come to her for— even if Weiss had deprived her of that thing in the first place. She always came to her. Always. Even now. Especially now.

In the silence, the room thickened, the air becoming dense, as if the surroundings themselves were trying to push Weiss to her quarry— but Ruby was obedient, and stayed still. Even if the hunger was frenzied in her eyes. Even if the growing, tense heat between them was enough to drive one mad.

It was like the charm, seeing Ruby like this— so close to it that Weiss almost second-guessed not shooting the girl— but it wasn't quite the same. The charm was animal, aggressive, demanding: she wanted to fuck Ruby into an early grave like she deserved, to kill and revive and kill again, to take and take until her body could grant no more.

But this feeling was… higher. More glorious. Hierarchical. Deserved.

She was simply above the girl. In virtually all senses, she was superior: she was human, she was skilled; she was intelligent, and her strength and endurance came from training, from effort— enough to match something like Ruby. Weiss Bound the girl because Ruby knew she was meant to be Bound. She fed the Vampire because she was responsible for the girl now.

And now it would imbibe of her.

"W-Weiss, could you h-hurry?" Ruby whimpered. "The blood's gonna come back up if I don't do it."

There it was again, that warm power, embers in Weiss' guts that carried heat up her chest, radiating down her abdomen. Her lips spread wide— a grimace or a grin, she couldn't feel the difference. "Are you trying to rush me?"

Ruby's knuckles clenched. She whined. The tightness in Weiss' lips morphed into a sneer.

Weiss deigned to present her arm. Palm up, she displayed her wrist. Ruby watched the languid motion, mouth ajar, hands shaking with restraint as they drifted towards her gift.

Her fingers wrapped around Weiss' forearm like it was gold or glass— perfect, sacrosanct, but precious and fragile. One hand cupped the back of Weiss', her face lowering to the palm with the look of someone who had already deliquesced in their worship. Her other hand drifted along the Huntress' milky pallor, admiring the firmness of flesh and each fine, vellus hair, the movement gentle and languorous until she was holding Weiss' elbow like a rich chalice.

Her eyes dared to meet Weiss' for only a moment, fleeing to instead admire the pad of her thumb curling around the Huntress' wrist, pressing the radial artery. The quickening beat of that heart bade the monster's eyes flutter shut, demanding the girl devote her utmost attention to each resonant thump against her skin. Weiss watched her listen.

Her own eyes graced Ruby's hands. Her gaze appreciated the silver beads, the silver crosses, the complement of ash-pale skin with divine argentum. She traced the beads up, all the way to the place of their disappearance beneath the sleeveless top, and it would only make sense that they were a full harness. It was simple logic. It would only be reasonable for them to criss-cross over her chest, her waist, her back, a silver web of… shit, what was it called?

(Shibari.)

Right.

Fuck.

Ruby's eyes were on her again, as if she knew the Huntress was due a lifetime of Hail Marys, but she remembered her place as soon as Weiss met her look. She turned her attention back to the Huntress. Without any subtlety, without a hint of shame, she indulged herself the scent of Weiss' wrist, and the rush of sanguine succor beneath. Again, she closed her eyes to appreciate the scent, though it did nothing to hide the girl's literal eye-rolling ecstasy at the aroma of her better.

Her lids parted again, and this time, she finally was who she really was. With her irises limned in stark scarlet, and with the edges of her sclera turning to lustful darkness, she looked as she should. The parting of her lips, with canines lengthening into distinct fangs, only confirmed what she was.

For some reason, there was satisfaction in seeing her at her truest, and there was relief, too, though it shone too deeply in Weiss' mind to decipher. As if to taunt her, as if to act for selfish indulgence, as if unable to control her own base instincts, the monster named Ruby Rose ran her warmthless, wet tongue along the clamoring pulse of Weiss' artery.

"Thank you," the girl whispered onto Weiss' skin, making her prickle. "Thank you, thank you…"

"Just do it," Weiss hissed, forcing command through her teeth— this despite the fact that her own eyes fled Ruby's when they sought her confirmation. "Quit your adulating and hurry up. We have to—"

And there were teeth in her wrist.

"Oh—"

Yes. Teeth. Inside her, past the skin, deep.

"O-oh—"

Then the fangs evacuated, and Weiss got the briefest glimpse of the puncture marks in her wrist as Ruby parted for breath.

"Ru—"

But she was back on. Her lips latched around Weiss' wrist again, and Ruby was sucking. She was pulling with all the force her small, weak mouth could offer, then lapping it with—

"Oh!"

Her tongue was hot, and textured, and grooved, and something odd was happening where Ruby's lower lip was locked around Weiss' skin, but the Huntress couldn't pay attention to that. She couldn't pay attention to anything. She could barely breathe, standing was becoming herculean, and all the nerves in her body were seemingly packing their bags and moving to wherever Ruby's tongue was.

It was everything. It was everything. The world was falling away, darkening— until it was just her, pale and tall and so, so weak, and Ruby, ashen and kneeling, pitying the Huntress so much that she thought it was love. And worst of all, it was the best thing Weiss had ever felt in her entire life. It was a million shameful, lonely sessions beneath her own sheets. It was a billion fantasies that she lashed into the recesses of her mind. It was what everyone had that she didn't, that she couldn't, because she was past being on thin ice. She was in the lake, up to her chest, clutching at the edges of the hole she'd already fallen through— unable to escape, but unable, even, to die.

It was the day after her test, all over again. The day after her dad, as soon as she left the Parley ceremony, had taken her into his office, and verbally flayed the flesh from her bones. When he had called her useless, an affront to God, a disgrace, just like her hero. When he had dragged her half-alive mother into the office to berate her, to hit her, to show Weiss that a woman's job was as a factory line for heirs, and mother had simply stood there, limp— a dead, drunk doll. It was the day after she had been allowed no sleep. It was the day after he had forced her to drink, and drink, and drink, since she wanted to be so grown, since, when you were grown and female, you made yourself a useless puppet thing until you were granted the purpose of parenthood again. It was the day after her achievements, and her worth, and her place as a person, had been shot dead like a lame horse. Taken behind the shed like a bad dog. Left for the vultures like a dear sister.

It was the day after. Only this time, she was allowed her peace.

The hair between her fingers was soft. Taut, slack, taut, slack, her fingers flexing against the scalp. Her throat was awake. She was moaning, and Ruby had since backed her against a wall. She was in her neck, now, and her hand was between Weiss' legs. She was rubbing through her panties: small, focused, slow circles. She was gulping Weiss down by the mouthful.

It was a dream she'd never had: Ruby, of all girls, practically fucking her against a wall, sucking her neck. Maybe once, maybe twice in freshman year, but soon to be forgotten beneath the Coco Adeles, the Yang Xiao Longs, the Noras and Pyrrhas, and all the other girls she didn't dare talk to, because there would be father, and she'd never live it down. She just had to be perfect. Even if, in the end, it almost killed her.

('It.')

"Weiss?"

Why was she stopping? She— she didn't want it to stop, she was almost done. She was almost okay. She was almost—

"W-why are you crying?"