Chapter Text
Weiss looks out from a balcony of Shade Academy, while many of its walls and adjacent buildings were damaged and scorched, this one was one of the few that were left unscathed. She isn't leaning over the railing, or touching the bannisters. More so looking out into the dark skies too early for dawn to arrive. The stars that litter them are still visible even as the heavy blues turn lighter and lighter by the hour.
She breathes in the fresh air and wonders about the life expected here. Of the work, her sister had put in.
“Weiss.”
The individual with snow-coloured hair dusted by the rich reds and oranges of the sands around them turns to her. Her gaze kind yet those ice-blue eyes still overpower the colouration around them, stealing the attention from the gorgeous desert in the background, leaving it to fade away. “Yes?” she questions, the query coming with a bounty of patience only she can deliver to unique individuals in her social circle.
“I… I guess I just wanted you to know you are a once-in-a-lifetime kind of… friend. I’m glad you came back with us.” Blake seemed more timid than usual, her hand at the door entrance resting there but knowing her, she may have been wanting to run it up her other arm to anchor herself.
There's a giggle, it's sweet and enticing to Blake’s faunus traits, making her head lift in tandem.
“I feel the same, except I got quite lucky. You came into my life, more obstructively the first time, but at the second chance at life, I was relieved to see you. No. Not relieved, elated. I knew you all would.” Weiss calms herself from the emotions that threatened to expel into her tone and raises her hands taking Blake's palm when allowed.
“ I knew you all would come back for me. But I was so happy in that moment, consciously and unconsciously, and on this. This one life I thought I signed away and allowed to return to. Away to fairytale isolation… I am so happy I get to reclaim it all alongside you.” A blush makes itself known on the shorter and she covers her cheeks as she stares past Blake. “I mean… alongside you all. As a team. Together!”
The faunas smirks giving Weiss more reason to fluster and thoroughly enjoyed the reaction. The poor girl finally just turns away, looking at her feet as she keeps her eyes from the object of her affection. “For the record,” Blake answers out loud. “I like the idea of being beside you… you know, together… as a team.” The teasing is far more evident as she mimics Weiss’s words with her own suggestive tone.
Weiss stands beside her unflinching this time, and lets her hands drop from her face despite its red complexion. The faunus still looking at her with the fondness and warmth a sunset bestows. Then the reflective crystalline blue of the shorter girl's eyes meets hers. “I figured that much. When you told me you love me.”
Blake let out a held breath, seemingly relaxing. “...You heard me.”
She took a step forward and reached out for Weiss, a hand on her shoulder but it only hesitates hovering just above before drawing back to herself. “ All this time, all these battles and loose ends and you kept it a secret that you heard me.”
Despite her head nodding in mock disappointment she is smiling. “Had I ever a hint that you did maybe I wouldn’t have tried so hard to pretend I didn’t say anything at all.”
“There was just so much, with Winter, and Shade Academy…” Weiss trails off, facing the sunrise. “Burdening you with hope and loss would be just another small torture I’d regret subjecting you to.”
They stand in silence finally able to breathe at this odd sense of peace in the desert of Vacuo.
“I suppose, coming back at the exact moment that we had left in search of you didn’t help. We hopped in knowing we left in the midst of a war, a collision between maidens and with the stolen staff of creation no less. However, you came out knowing we had failed Atlas and you still fought with us.”
Weiss looks down for a moment, having put a pause to the dark swirling whirlwind that plagued her mind since… well since the cat, the tree, the blacksmith. And everything that happened after. Hell, she wasn't even allowed the pleasantries of wrapping her arms around Winter and telling her it was really her until after everything. Until Cinder was brought down and Salem was held at god point. Her eyes then dart up and towards Blake once more as the faunus spoke.
“Do you think it was a good idea to leave the staff in Ever After?”
The silence settles. Neither of them knows the answer, for different reasons. And really, that wasn’t what Weiss wanted to talk about. She wanted to be brave. She thanked Jaune for the courage but she still couldn’t do it. Even Nora and Yang were extrinsic motivators.
Yet she had something urgent to tell the women beside her, that just so happened to coincide with her question.
“Blake.”
“It’s okay.” The faunus cuts her off. This time it is Blake who takes her hand. “I know.”
Did she know? No one was supposed to know. Weiss had been so careful when Ruby had explained it to her as Jack. When She held it in her hands. When she planned to do what she wanted in preparation for the day she might…
It near broke Weiss’s heart when Blake continued, “ We can just watch the sunrise on this new day, on a new era of peace.” Then she inhales and slowly breathes out to calm herself. “Then you can go back.”
“H-...You knew." The white-haired ex-heiress shifts, the analytical side of her piecing together the information. " You knew I planned to go back to Ever After. That I could-.”
“Lately you‘ve been stubborn, moody, and a little more anti-social than usual.” Blake teases though it is only slightly above a whisper.
Though Weiss blushes, the small smirk that appears is half-hearted and unsure. She then returns to her original question. “How long did you know I had the staff with me? I was sure I had convinced Ruby that I had stored it within the Crimson Castle before everything else. Before we headed back to Remnant, back here, I had so much hesitance.”
Blake turns to her fully now and leans in, Weiss winces but when she feels the light meeting of the faunus’s head against hers she opens her eyes to meet golden eyes looking at hers. “Jack made me aware. You were speaking and hiding as you do. I just paid a little more attention to you since then. You didn”t seem inclined towards leaving. And I figured since Ruby told us she entrusted you with storing the staff of creation.”
Their hands are held together between them and Weiss leans in a little closer, thanks to Blake she barely has to tip-toe. Her lips are graced by the warmth of the faunus's and she lingers for a fraction of a second longer than she intended. “Come with me. I will only be gone for a few days, but I can’t imagine wanting to be apart from you.”
“Maybe I want you to come back faster, maybe I want to be sure you have reason enough to come back at all.”
This response caused the shorter woman to slouch a bit, sagging her stance with brows furrowed in worry. "Do you really think I wouldn't return?"
"I think you tend to follow your mind rather than your heart, and I want you to try listening to what your heart tells you." Although Weiss rolls her eyes making a face, she is listening. Then she rubs Blake's knuckles.
"You'll be happy to know. I've been listening for quite a while. And right now I'd like you to come with me, logically and from my heart."
Blake skews her mouth as her faunus ears swoop downward. Unsure but unwilling to back out just yet.
“Please?” and just like that Blake relents with a laugh.
“You promise it will be short?”
“It will be, but I doubt you’ll be saying that when you get to look into the red prince’s collection of books, I must have read a dozen just because I had the time to do it, so you have plenty to catch up on.”
“Weiss, as much as I love fairytales, I’m going for you. Not the promise of books.”
“The world of Ever After is as a part of me as the frigid air of Solitos. ”
“I’m going. To learn all the parts of you, and still love you.”
"And we will return, Not because Winter would find and kill me if we don't, or our team would hunt us down at rapid pace, but because I know this is where I want to be, to build a home here. Build a name I am proud of... with you."
"Maybe living in a fairytale got to you."
There's a huff, and Weiss barely pouts before the words leave her. "What's that supposed to mean, Blake Belladonna?"
___ ___ ___
Epilogue
The toy soldiers scramble as they line up, greeting a trio of royal guards that had our two heroes in tow.
They stood tall and with pride but in a moment of weakness waved to their friends on the side. The main one dressed in a fine gilded uniform more embellished than the rest and a half cape. His uniform mimicked that of the red court's Jack, reds and black complimented by white accents. His hat unlike the other soldiers' taller hats was red, not black. And had a card caught on it depicting a bishop chess piece. He turned to the visitors behind him for a second and gave them a reassuring smile from his painted mouth now slightly deterred by the mustache that decorated his upper lip.
“It is a pleasure to see you again, Jack. We welcome you and your star-fallen friend to our court and I am sure the King would love to see you.”
“King?” She questions. Has it really been that long, does time traverse differently in this realm? Weiss immediately shoves that thought back into the depths of where it came from, the last thing she needs to know is she lost a few months or years here. Time discrepancy can stay where it is, and if she was really curious she can compare with Winter later. Maybe even pretend to be shocked when someone points out signs of ageing.
Then she hears it. The bright and brassy laughter fills the air, a large porcelain man with long pale hair, a full beard and a moustache accents his face. The painted rosy blushing circles were partly hidden and his crimson eyes practically glowing. His coat was much bigger and much more luxurious. In his hand, he held a sceptre that was brilliantly crafted with golds and scarlets. The top of it had a mounted monde and cross with flared curls to it. Within the monde was a white chess piece, the knight visible through the gaps.
His laughter starts again with him in view of them. Only blocked by the three royal guards that had been leading Weiss and Blake through the Crimson garden. As he opens his arms, his guards immediately move aside so that Weiss and Blake have an unobscured route towards him. Weiss walks forward almost instinctually, and he takes a few steps more though he is obviously keeping himself professional.
He is eager though, just as eager as Weiss feels.
Up until the shorter woman crashes into him he is able to hold himself regally. He engulfs her in his embrace and she is entirely hidden as his royal cloak falls over his shoulders. “Had I any less patience I would be angered you took your time to visit!” his voice booms in nothing but joy.
“Your Highness, I hadn’t expected so much time to pass.” came the muffled voice from where he held her. He laughs once more and releases her, stepping back once and keeping a palm on her shoulder. His crimson eyes glitters with joy and a single pearl is wiped away as he fixes his gaze on Blake.
“I remember you.” He smiles, “But, go ahead and introduce yourself to me, it is not my place to assume.”
“I’m Blake Belladonna, and I am a Huntress.” Blake greets, playing the part of a welcomed guest amongst royalty and curtsies toward the King. He raises a hand signifying her to stand normally once again and then turns it waving her to come closer.
“Surely there must be more, Jack, your visit is always welcome whenever you like but I had hoped you’d enlighten me with your travels, I feel as if all the change has only come from me and my lands.” He glances down at his knave, the one he held so dear in his youth.
“There is”, she meets his eyes and walks out of his reach towards Blake as they meet in between their paths. "I have much to tell you, your Highness. Much to talk over tea and a game of darts or chess."
Her left hand links with the faunus. “Blake and I. We found each other here, and so I wanted to see her once more. Here. Before I tell her."
She seems to have drifted from talking to the king, her eyes on the golden ones that are looking at her just a bit confused but entirely trusting of Weiss. She finds bravery in the warm sunset glow of Blake's eyes. “That I love you, too.” The ex-heiress leans in, tip-toeing a bit to reach comfortably and whispers to Blake. “If it isn’t too late. I love you too, and I’d love to see where this takes us.”
For her efforts, Weiss didn’t expect the kiss on her cheek nor the one to the corner of her lips, maybe the one that graces the tip of her nose, and possibly the one that is placed just below her left eye. Though certainly not the one that takes her lips hostage.
She isn’t complaining by all means. She is rather taken by the affection and closes her eyes, enjoying their shared kisses, chasing for more when Blake tries to pull away for more smattering of butterfly kisses. One of her heels is in the air and her arms around the other’s shoulders once Blake’s hands shift to her waist and around her back.
The laughter that breaks their kissing barrage was followed by a clap of porcelain hands clanging and complimented by shining gold rings on each finger that cause a symphony of messy noises. “Always an entertainer, this one.”
Weiss becomes impressively red as Blake turns to him, her smile bright. The King points and laughs at his dear little knave who could be described as melting as she crouches into herself and hugs her knees in embarrassment. “She has a terrible sense of humor, but I’m glad you find her charm humorous.”
“Blake, Please,” Weiss whines and lifts her hand catching the faunus’s hand, using that to lift herself up, though not breaking the hold.
“I can already tell she makes you so happy.” The king smiles and walks towards them, he bumps Weiss’s head lightly with his sceptre, carefully as he did. “Champion, thank you for all that you have done for us. Thank you for your visitation, and for letting me see your growth. You may not be my knight, my royal guard, nor the courts' Jack any longer but I will always be forever changed by your heart. And for that I owe you.”
She rubs her head and yet smiles up at the king. “It was a joint effort, your Highness.”
“You speak of what you did in restoring order by taking down the Hatter, I speak of the bonds you made. You taught me so much about myself.” He hums and pats her on her shoulder. “What brings you here besides your promised visit?”
“ I did plan a longer stay, my King, with Blake. Are we welcome?”
“Of course!” His eyes grow wide and his grin wider. “Come, Come.” He ushers them past him and onto the route to the castle, both of them having a hand of his on their shoulder as he pushes them further. Turning his head towards his men. “GUARDS!! SERVANTS OF THE COURT!! Prepare a room for our honoured guests at once! Nothing but the best! Their stay at the Crimson Castle and in Ever After shall be magnificent, so much so they would be fools to leave.” then he turns back and ducks to whisper between them both. “That is of course exaggeration, I would love to impress you to stay longer, but you are free to come and go as you please.”
As he lets them go he ruffles Weiss’s neatly kempt hair and she practically grumbles a bitten back ‘Hey’
Blake’s giggle reaches her ear and Weiss leans over before running her hand in the dark waves of her hair. “You are so lucky you are gorgeous.”
“I’m more than lucky, Weiss. I’m in love and I am loved back.”