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For a long time, there’d been his family to tend to.
There’d been Raven, always by his side and doing her best to protect him from the hundreds of cruelties, little and large, done to him by the other and much older members of the Branwen Tribe.
After they’d been released into the wilderness together for their Trials at the tender age of sixteen, he’d briefly thought—maybe then. The stars had glittered overhead, bright and hypnotizing and pulling—
It wasn’t meant to be.
Raven had found hers in a neighboring tribe—they hadn’t been actually of that tribe, Tai and Summer—merely visiting—but they’d been there when he and Raven had stumbled into their territory, tired and hungry.
The Beacon Tribe had tended their wounds, had scoffed and sneered at the brutal practices of the Branwen Tribe in sending their young into exile to fend for themselves—until they were strong, until they were worthy of the Branwen name. Their leader, Ozpin, had taken Qrow and Raven under his wing for a time, and then, when Summer and Tai had made to return to the Tribe of Patch that they called home, and Raven had expressed a desire to join them, Qrow had rushed to follow, too, ignoring how those distant, calling stars grew more and more distant with each step he took.
He’d loved his sister. He’d loved Tai and Summer and their warmth.
He’d hated the Branwen Tribe of his birth.
For a time, they’d settled on Patch together, integrating themselves with the tribe there, ignoring the rapidly approaching deadline to return to the Branwens. They’d helped fend off Grimm, helped plant and hunt and harvest, helped build and destroy and teach. And when Raven had had a child by Tai, Qrow had looked to the sky and thought that maybe he could slip away for a time, go searching, return to his family once he’d found—
It wasn’t meant to be.
Raven left them. She’d returned to the Branwen Tribe in their twenty-first year, just as ordered, and from what Qrow had heard, she’d taken up the mantle of Chieftain not long after, murdering the former holder of the title and claiming it as her own.
She’d left brother, left lovers, left child.
And Qrow’s eyes had left the sky, and he had thrown himself into piecing the broken family back together as best he could (though it had always been in his nature to break rather than to repair, he’d tried his best). He’d borne himself up under Tai’s former smiles that had turned into suspicious glares, under Summer’s quiet heartbreak on the days she looked upon him and saw only his missing sister, under little Yang’s lost wailing and his own deep, shattered mourning for the part of himself that had abandoned him.
He’d cooked, he’d cleaned, he’d cared for, and he’d held, and held, and held tight to what was left.
He had passed into his twenty-second year with the knowledge that he would no longer be welcomed back to the Branwen Tribe.
Little by little, his new family had healed. Qrow accepted full induction into the Tribe of Patch (or as full as he was allowed, having not been born there) and had continued to stay with Summer and Tai and Yang, doing his best to fill the void left behind and help care for his niece. He’d resolutely avoided looking at the stars.
Then, there’d been fresh good news, and nine months later, little Ruby had come loudly into the world. She’d had such mighty lungs for such a small thing, and Qrow had spent many a night standing on the porch outside with her, rocking her back to sleep for hours at a time so that her weary parents might rest.
Yang loved her. Qrow loved them both.
Happiness had entered the family’s world again.
The night sky called to him once more…
But it wasn’t meant to be.
Summer went off on what was meant to be a simple Grimm hunt as a favor to the Beacon Tribe on the main continent.
She never returned.
No body had been recovered, no peace found, and there was no end to the cries of the girls who could barely understand what had happened. Tai shut down, and then it had been up to Qrow to keep things running so little Yang would not have to.
He gave up on the stars.
Years passed, so many and so quickly.
Tai got better, though Qrow still caught him peering into the sky from time to time with that absent, helpless look on his face. The girls grew. The Patch Tribe’s distrust of him lessened the longer he stayed.
He’d aged.
And, in time, he’d approached his end with a quiet acceptance—a certain willingness—if it meant he could be there for his brother, for his girls.
They were all he had left.
It was worth it.
Now, he shivers against the warm sunlight cascading in tender streams over his shoulders, down his back. The omnipresent cold never goes away, no matter the temperature. The breeze that would once have been pleasant on this hot day chills him to the bone.
The girls, headed for their nineteenth and seventeenth years, tussle about on the yard, Zwei, one of the Patch Tribe’s dogs, rushing about them and weaving between their legs. Tai sits next to Qrow on the porch, and Qrow can feel crystal blue eyes boring into him with concern. The symptoms are becoming more and more difficult to hide.
Tai thinks Qrow has no soulmate.
Qrow has allowed for such.
He’d feel guilty, Qrow knows, if he were aware of Qrow’s dilemma, of how quickly his time is dwindling. He’d blame himself for holding Qrow back.
But this is his choice—it always has been.
He loves his family more than he loves his life; more than he loves a soulmate he’ll never know.
He’s nearing his thirty-ninth year.
Ruby stumbles over Zwei and goes down with a yelp, Yang taking the opportunity to descend upon her with a wild cackle that echoes in the trees. Other tribesmen and women milling about look on fondly. They’ve known Ruby and Yang their whole lives—their presence is a light, is a comfort.
Qrow draws his deep red shawl (a remnant and an identifying marker of his status as an outsider) closer about himself and laughs at their antics. He is glad that they have not been forced to grow up too fast, that they can still be young and unafraid.
Then Tai’s hand is on his shoulder, and when Qrow turns, his gaze is heavy—is worried.
“It’s at least eighty out here,” Tai murmurs, close. “Aren’t you hot?”
And Qrow smiles. “You know I run cold. I’m fine, Tai.”
Blake and Weiss come down the path, loaded down hard with baskets from the market. Qrow stands. “Dinner,” he says, though he has no appetite, and goes to meet them.
It’s a well-executed evasion, but Tai’s eyes linger.
He can’t keep it a secret much longer, and when Tai finds out—
“What the hell, Qrow?!” he roars, like the dragon for which he is named, and Qrow’s lips quirk up at the corners with the thought.
He is shivering on the couch. He is three months into his thirty-ninth year, and he has coughed up just a bit of blood, just the slightest warning, but it is enough. Tai sees. Tai grieves.
The girls look afraid.
“You’re scaring the girls,” Qrow says calmly.
Tai’s face darkens. Ah. That was the wrong thing to say, then. “I’m scaring the girls? I’m scaring the girls?! You’re dying and you haven’t said anything! That’s what’s scaring the girls! How could you do this to us?!”
“You all were more important,” Qrow tries, “It’s okay—”
“No, it’s not!” Tai snarls. “I am not going to just stand here and let the only one I have left kill himself over some stupid—!”
Qrow coughs into his elbow. Tai’s voice breaks.
Then he is lowering himself to the couch beside Qrow—sits there and guides Qrow’s head to his shoulder. Qrow closes his eyes, relaxing into the unexpected tenderness. He melts at the fingers that slip through his hair, blissful. He hears one of the girls—Weiss? Ruby?—sniffle, but his mind is foggy.
“Why?” Tai whispers brokenly.
Qrow doesn’t answer. His eyes slide open only when he feels someone take his hand, and when he looks, Blake is kneeling before him, fingers twined tight with his, fierce determination writ plain across her face. She’s always so quiet. But she’s good for Yang, and he’s glad they met.
She looks like a different person in this moment.
“Where are they?” Blake demands softly. “Do you have any idea?”
Qrow blinks. “Far from here. The Beacon Tribe is the closest I ever got… from there, I don’t know.”
“We’ll help you look,” Blake says like the matter is done and settled. “You still have something like nine more months. Yang, Ruby, Weiss, and I. We’ll help you look.” She squeezes his hand. Her golden eyes are steady and calm, even as premature grief lends a fragile edge to her voice.
He doesn’t know why it matters; he’s lived so much longer than he ever should have, anyway. Had he gone back to the Branwen Tribe all those years ago, he’d likely have been killed before ever reaching thirty, his Misfortune an unwanted bane—a liability to their violent raids upon other tribes—an attraction for Grimm in the wilds.
Patch is isolated. There aren’t many Grimm. It’s good for him.
He thinks about himself and the girls on the main continent and he worries.
But then, he doesn’t have much choice.
They gather around him on the couch, faces drawn and decided, Tai’s arm tight about his shoulders—Tai can’t leave, isn’t able to when Patch needs him as one of their only educators—the girls will be the ones taking him where the stars lead.
Word spreads. They unintentionally (or intentionally, he never can be sure with the girls) pick up their friends Jaune, Oscar, Ren, and Nora along the way. The other tribespeople stare at him with worry, with dread. He’d never have expected such concern from them; he didn’t know they cared. Patch’s Chieftain grants their party’s request to leave without hesitation. She looks at him solemnly and wishes him luck with great sincerity.
It makes him feel… warm. For the first time in years.
They depart by nightfall.
Soulmates live in the stars.
Everyone sees a different night sky when they look up—everyone except those without soulmates, anyway, who see the sky as it “truly is,” and who expend a great deal of time and energy on comparing star charts and maps. Qrow has seen these documents before. They don’t make sense; none of them match with what he sees.
The night sky and the luminous, broken moon pull him elsewhere.
You look to the sky and you know. The stars dim. They brighten. They point inexorably in one direction (or two, or three, or more—it’s innate; it should be confusing, but it’s innate), and you follow until you find the person or people born for you.
Or else you don’t.
Steadily, you fall ill.
You reach forty.
You die.
Younger soulmates are not punished for their elders’ lack of conviction; it is what comforts Qrow, what makes him settled at the concept of allowing himself to fade away. His illness proves he’s the elder. When he dies, his soulmate will feel no consequences except in how their night sky will change to that indefinable state of Truly Is known only to the Without and the Mourning.
Of course, you need only find your soulmate by forty. Tai will not die of Raven’s abandonment. He will see her stars in his sky forever—devoid, now, of Summer’s contributions, yes—but he will not die.
The vengeful little seed that huddles in Qrow’s heart hopes Raven, wherever she is, looks to Tai’s sky and aches.
He knows he does, as he gazes at his stars, now—trying so desperately to lead him to that inevitable and unchanging point at the center of his orbit.
There’s shame in how he loses the ability to fight.
He’d been one of the greatest swordsmen in the land, not long ago. He’d taught Ruby. He’d been the first one the chieftain went to with requests to dispatch any opportunistic Grimm moving in on the island.
Now, after just a few months of decline, his arms shake with the weight of his sword. He kills what comes too close through force of will alone, but he cannot hunt—can barely keep up with the kids as they trek across the lands.
His sister, if she were here, would kill him herself.
She’d call it mercy.
Instead, Yang holds his hand. Ruby clings. On bad days, Jaune and Ren support him, his arms around their shoulders as he stumbles and tries not to fall. Weiss and Blake and Nora walk alongside him like an honor guard, weapons drawn and ready. When they make camp during the day, the stars hidden away, Oscar sits in their nicest tent with him and wipes at his brow with a cool, cool cloth.
The cold lingers and bites, and it only worsens as they go further and further north in pursuit of his stars. The kids hunt and barter with sympathetic tribes whose land they pass through in their months of travel, and they drape him in hides and furs to fight the ache that pulses through every line of his body.
He’d expected the wasting-away, but he didn’t know it would feel like this.
They shack up with the Beacon Tribe for longer than they probably should, but it’s the first time they’ve eaten well in weeks. Ozpin, still alive, still Chieftain, peers at him anxiously. It has been nearly twenty years since they’ve seen each other for any significant amount of time, but the affection remains, and Oz pushes foul-tasting herbs between his lips that pull him back to awareness and ease his sufferings insofar as they are able. He fills Qrow with hot tea, hot broth, hot anything, and the kindnesses are comforts.
Oz’s soulmate had left him a long time ago. She’d already been long gone by the time Qrow had met the older man. Ozpin’s hands shake against Qrow’s clammy skin.
Ozpin’s right hand, Glynda, whom Qrow remembers annoying in their youth, sees to his health as well. They talk long into the night, staying together with Oz in his private quarters while the kids rest up on the floor of the tribe’s Great Hall. Glynda’s soulmate, Robyn, has never met him before, but she tries to cheer him up with jokes and wisecracks. His ribs hurt when he laughs, but the feeling is real, and he relishes in it.
They leave Beacon loaded with more supplies than before, a better map, endless well-wishes both from those Qrow remembers and those he doesn’t. Their journey continues ever northward, guided by the stars that emerge at night. They sparkle and brighten with each step Qrow takes to follow them, and the splintered, brilliant, dusty moon sings.
They get lost a few times. Turned around. Heavy clouds cover the stars for days at a time, especially as they draw nearer to the coldest reaches of Anima. Temperate forests transform into chilly taigas, snow blankets the ground around them as winter drones on, and Qrow’s looming birthday breathes heavily down their necks. They take to huddling all together in one tent rather than splitting into many. It’s all that keeps them warm.
They set watches when Qrow can no longer use his sword.
His lips are blue always, no matter how numerous or how thick the furs they bestow upon him become. His aura is constantly and irreparably depleted, refusing to regenerate, and the kids keep careful eyes on him.
He doesn’t deserve their love, their kindness, their attention.
They give it anyway.
His nieces cuddle close at night, and it pains him that they must watch him slip away.
He doesn’t know what his plan was, once upon a time—had he intended to retreat to die, like a wounded animal? To flee like his sister had to spare them the emotional toll of his slow and withering death?
It doesn’t matter now. Their presence on either side of him near-kills him with fondness. Brings him back to the days when they’d been small enough to tuck into the cradle of his arms, when he could rock them to sleep so easily and spirit all their troubles away with just a bottle or a song.
Blake and Weiss see to him almost exclusively when Yang and Ruby are forced away; they are his nieces, too, through their connections with Yang and Ruby, respectively, and he loves them as fiercely. There comes a point where he’s no longer quite conscious of the things he says to them, but he tries to impress upon them his gratitude, his desire for them to take care of his girls if—when—he goes. Blake shushes him, at this. Weiss’ face smooths over impassively, a practiced retreat that he recognizes from his own childhood.
With two months left, they arrive at the Argus Tribe’s territory. It’s coastal, and the wind coming up off the ocean is searing, biting, salt-stinging. The nip of outward pain brings him more clarity than he’s felt in weeks. The stars are bright, here, but not bright enough. They point to the ocean—to what lies beyond it.
One of Jaune’s sisters and her soulmate and their child, it turns out, live here, and they’re kind enough to take their whole group in for a few days while they get their bearings. They must get hold of a ship somehow. These women who have become their latest friends see to him while his kids disperse throughout Argus in search of answers.
Qrow apologizes for all of the trouble in a broken whisper, and he notes how Saphron and Terra Cotta-Arc look scared even as they reassure him that there’s no trouble at all.
They’ve never been witness to this wasting sickness, then.
Every inch of his body pulsates pain.
When the kids return, they return defeated and grief-stricken.
The Chieftain, a Madame Caroline Cordovin, has refused them passage. She “expresses her deepest sympathies for your uncle’s delicate condition,” but, “Argus Tribe has firm treaties with Atlas Tribe,” and, “no entry is currently permitted by Atlas’ borders except in the case of an emergency,” which, “this,” (she’s so sorry to say), “isn’t.”
The hopelessness doesn’t last long, though. Defiance takes its place. That familiar determination builds again, that fierceness, that willful rebelliousness. Saphron and Terra get swept-up in it, get angry at how their Tribe’s Chieftain will not allow passage even to a dying man, and it is with their help that he and the kids are secreted away on a small sailing vessel two weeks later, captained by an exceedingly kind man, Pietro, and his daughter, Penny.
On the boat, the ocean rocks and terrorizes. It’s all he can do—all the kids can do—to keep him aware. A month and a half remains when they board. By the time they put to shore, only a month. Jaune, who had lost his own soulmate at a heartbreakingly young age, tucks his sword away and carries Qrow over rough terrain, that persistent anger at the universe hidden away behind the compassion shining in cobalt eyes. Qrow knows he’s lost weight; he can barely stomach most of their provisions. He imagines that makes him a lot easier to carry.
While they wait for night to settle in and the stars to tell them where to go, Ruby and Yang’s trembling fingers trace his eyelids, the bridge of his nose, the angle of his jawline. They cling to his hands, and he holds them just as tightly as he can in return. He forces scratchy reassurances through his raw throat.
They are intercepted by a few very angry members of the Mantle Tribe (a protectorate of the Atlas Tribe) soon after.
The anger dissolves into panic, into alarm, when they’re granted cautious access to where the kids have tucked Qrow away for his own safety. The kids explain the situation, though they don’t really need to, and then, with the Mantle tribeswomen—Joanna, May, and Fiona, whom they later find out are coincidentally friends of Robyn’s—serving as their guides, they are taken directly to the heart of Atlas—to the Tribe’s “General” (their Chieftain, he calls himself General; how quaint, how ridiculous).
They encounter the General’s honor guard, or most of it, anyway, toward the middle of the night. Fading in and out, he hears someone say that “Clover” is “with the General,” that, “he’ll know what to do with them.”
They scold the Mantle tribeswomen. They bind his kids’ wrists. If he could move, if he could do anything, he’d howl at the injustice, tear them to shreds. He’s transferred to the arms of a stranger, a large woman the others call “Elm,” and when they tie his hands together by his own feeble, wasted wrists, he chuckles under his breath at the absurdity of it all. What a farce. What a joke.
The honor guard brings them to the General. Elm chatters brightly the whole way; she seems the least concerned with their illegal intrusion into the Atlas Tribe’s territory, and her words wash over Qrow like waves.
Then they’re there, and the Chieftain—the General—James Ironwood—hears their case coolly and without letting anything on. At the end of it, he calls for “Clover,” a man comes, and—
The sky above explodes into a supernova of color.
In the aftermath, there’s a type of peace.
Qrow can’t describe the feelings that rise within—can’t describe how the barest hint of warmth that trickles through him feels like dying and like paradise, can’t describe how the sky is the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, how the pain eases but doesn’t leave him, how awareness permeates his mind like water soaking through sturdy, rough-spun fabric.
“Clover” is there. He freezes for but a moment. Rushes forward to see to Qrow, stricken.
The General demands an explanation. Clover snaps to attention, states that Qrow is his soulmate, and with this, they are tentatively released from their bonds.
Within a few minutes, Qrow can stand, however unsteadily, and he asks Elm to let him down. He sees to his kids before turning even a second glance toward his newfound soulmate. Ruby and Yang’s relieved tears soak the warm clothes they’d dressed him in yesterday morning. Oscar, so young, stands shaking at his side, and Qrow pulls him in, pulls them all in, hugs them tight and close and thanks them, thanks them, tells them he loves them, that they’ve given him more of themselves than he could have possibly asked for, that he’d do anything—
The reunion between this walking, talking, awake version of himself and his kids lasts for time indefinable. The General, apparently finding some germ of humanity in his heart, draws away and brings his honor guard with him, excepting Clover, whom he permits to stay behind, awaiting his turn with his soulmate.
And he gets it, eventually.
Later, Qrow sits outside, wrapped in many furs, with this stranger who makes him feel safe; he is cold and weary, but willing to bear it to keep an eye on his kids, who are playfully pelting each other with snow—acting their age for the first time in many months. Clover is a heady presence, radiating heat beside him. He’s not wearing any sleeves, his hair falls into his face in an adorable cowlick, and his teal eyes are the same shade as the rippling aurora in the sky. The stars pulse like a heartbeat, pleased with where Qrow has ended up.
Qrow’s aura crackles across his skin every few minutes, struggling to build up a reserve after being so long weakened.
“Your niece,” Clover starts, his voice low and sonorous, “The younger one. She told me your fortieth birthday is in a month. That you almost didn’t get here in time. Is that true?”
It’s a silly question, they both know so, but Qrow nods anyway.
“You didn’t look for me?”
“Not till this year.”
“Why?”
“I wasn’t going to.”
Clover’s mouth closes with a painful sounding click of the teeth. Some little ways away, Oscar scoops up an armful of snow and shakes it down Jaune’s back. Jaune makes a noise like a startled cat, whirls around, and picks the younger boy up.
Ah, the human shield tactic. A classic. Always popular.
“You… weren’t going to,” Clover repeats.
“No.”
There’s silence.
“That’s… not fair,” Clover says, then.
Qrow looks up to stare hard at the sky. It was his decision. It was the right one, he’d thought, and most of him still does, and all of him still would, if not for the haunting memory of his nieces mapping the features of his face with their fingers, committing the line of his jaw to their minds just in case they woke one day to find him—
“I’m sorry,” Qrow offers, and it’s all he can say.
Clover’s eyes narrow, not that Qrow notices. He’s watching the twisting colors in the sky. Do all people who find their soulmates see this, or is it something that only happens in Atlas?
“What about me?” Clover asks, “You were just going to deprive me of the opportunity to ever meet you?”
Qrow rubs his lips together. They’re chapped to the point of bleeding. The frigid winds have cracked them open, and they sting. “My family needed me.”
“That’s—”
“And I don’t think you’ll want me, anyway, once you get to know me,” states Qrow simply. He rubs his hands together, shivering. He’d like to go to bed. He’d like to go home. “No great loss.”
"’No great loss,’” Clover echoes furiously under his breath. Qrow probably isn’t meant to hear it. Then, “That wasn’t for you to decide. Not for me,” Clover answers, and his voice is hard, hard and cold as the tundra around them.
“My family needed me,” Qrow says again. “I had to take care of them. Nothing was more important. I’m sorry.” He knows he’s being infuriating. But he doesn’t want to lie, not yet. Not when they’ve only just found each other, even though he knows there’s no chance of Clover coming back with him.
There’s a large crate they lean on, and now Clover sighs long and low and lets his head fall back against it. Together, they look at the same stars. The same moon. The same sky.
It’s a waste, Qrow thinks, to have ruined this relationship already. It turns out that he doesn’t need his Misfortune’s help. Not really. He catches Ruby’s worried look and waves her off. He’ll tell her tomorrow, on the journey back.
It feels surreal to be finally in the presence of someone he’s waited forty years to meet. But then, he’d stopped looking a long time ago. He doesn’t know what to do, now.
Clover turns to him abruptly.
“I was going to search for you.” He rests his palm on the back of Qrow’s hand and presses, so Qrow knows he’s there, then makes a tactical retreat that leaves Qrow wishing for more. “I was making arrangements with the General. Once I turned thirty-five in a few months, I was going looking.”
Qrow tilts his head. “Well, you found me.”
Clover huffs. “I think your kids found me.”
“They care more than they should,” Qrow says. “They were worried. Scared. I’m sorry I did that to them.”
“Have you told them that?”
“I will be for the rest of my life, I think.”
Blake approaches him with a hot mug of tea. It smells of lemon and honey and it’s nice against his still-sore throat. The charity is unwarranted. He is not sick any longer, not really, and they owed him nothing to begin with. Still, he thanks her, her ears flatten shyly against her hair, and she waves at Clover as she wanders away, back to her friends and her own soulmate.
Clover hums, watching her. “You shouldn’t beat yourself up about it.”
“You’re not mad at me?”
“I am.” Clover traces the wrinkles that form in his snow-white pants when he pulls his knee into his chest. “But I know a thing or two about duty.” He gestures around at the squat, sturdy buildings that surround them, built into the snow. “To some extent, I understand.” He glances at the sky again. “But still. I wish you’d have come.”
Qrow trails his fingers through the snow.
“And what about you?” Clover asks, then.
Qrow hums a questioning note.
“We went over why you didn’t come for me. Why didn’t you come for you?”
Qrow glances at him. Finds bright eyes staring back. Looks away.
“I’d lived longer than I ever expected to, anyway. But the reasoning is the same,” he admits carefully. He doesn’t feel ashamed of his decisions, but he’s hurt his soulmate’s feelings enough for one night.
The blazing heat of Clover’s hand insinuates itself on Qrow’s shoulder, this time. He jumps.
“I want to know you.” Clover’s eyes are dark and serious. “I do. My service here is almost up. I’d come back with you to Patch. If you’d have me.”
And Qrow wets his lips, trembling. Hesitantly, he covers Clover’s hand with his own.
“I would.”
The fairytale ending is this:
They go back to Patch—Clover and Qrow and the kids. Qrow’s fortieth birthday comes and goes, and he does not die. The return journey is quicker without the need for the kids to bear him as a burden, but still, they stay close. Often, one or the other of them will squeeze into the tent he shares with Clover—will stay there and listen for a while to reassure themselves that he’s still breathing. Then they slip out again, and the next day, Qrow pretends he hadn’t noticed.
He tries to relearn the skills he’d lost in his sickness. He starts with his sword, and the night after he picks it up again for the first time, he curls into Clover and cries, overcome with despair at how heavy it felt, how awkward the grip was. Clover pulls him close, tucks him in tight to his chest, accepts what Qrow has to give and then tugs out more—more feeling, more grief, more regret—until at last he feels settled and emptied-out of negative emotion. Clover promises to help, and the sparring (Qrow refuses to call it “training”) brings them nearer, nearer still.
Clover knows how to fish, and he helps them catch food on the journey back, lightening the load even further. The kids take to him, hesitantly at first, and then wholeheartedly. Yang seems particularly fond, even if only out of respect for the way he’d handily beaten her at arm-wrestling.
The cold remains a problem. The faint chill never quite departs, not unless Qrow is in Clover’s arms, and the moment he leaves that embrace, it returns with a vengeance. He’s back to having thick furs, heavy hides and coats, draped about his too-thin shoulders by the kids, and it is only Clover that keeps him from giving into that familiar, all-encompassing upwelling of shame.
His weight is another problem. He’d lost a lot of it on the journey and gaining it again proves difficult. Clover fusses, Ruby and Yang fuss, they all fuss over him. He tries to feel he deserves it.
They pass through Beacon a second time on the return trip, and Qrow is startled by how Oz shakes—how Glynda shakes—when they hug him tight. The naked relief. The lingering fear. They detain their party for a time, but not for as long as their previous visit.
They are all eager to get back to Patch.
At night, he and Clover look to their dazzling sky, the glittering fruit of their proximity.
Qrow manages to slay an Ursa when they are just a week out from Patch. He weeps.
At six months since leaving Atlas, fifteen since leaving Patch, they cram themselves tight into a skiff destined for home. Blake settles against his side. He’s been granted a place of honor on the sole bench. Yang settles on the floor between his knees, and he braids her thick Branwen hair almost absentmindedly, buzzing with nerves at the prospect of seeing Tai again. Clover is a warm weight behind him, and Ruby’s head falls against his shoulder when she manages to fall asleep even despite the excited sea mist that the boat kicks up to brush her cheeks. Weiss, Jaune, Nora, Ren, and Oscar bunch up in every other available space. The boat’s captain looks a little nervous, probably worried that the vessel will capsize (and it’s not an unreasonable worry, so long as he’s onboard, though Clover would scold him for saying so).
They arrive and off-load, and then they’re hurrying, hurrying down the island’s sandy pathways and carefully cultivated terrain, past rows and rows of lovingly constructed wooden houses with wide, shady porches overhanging. Qrow knows Clover probably wants to stop and look—he’s never seen someplace like Patch before—but he can’t stop, the kids can’t stop, even as joyous shouts go up amongst the tribespeople who notice them.
They come upon the cabin. Tai is sitting on the porch, reading. He looks tired. New stress lines mark deep furrows across his forehead. He looks up suddenly, stands like he’s been electrocuted.
Qrow and Ruby and Yang aren’t in his arms, and then they are. Their family, one Qrow had been more than willing to die for, once upon a time, is reunited. Tai’s tears wet his hair, his shoulder—he murmurs a million endearments, and Qrow whispers back a million and one apologies.
The other kids join, but Clover hangs back, so Qrow extricates himself and introduces his soulmate to his brother properly. There’s a certain glint in Tai’s eyes that promises an interrogation later, and likely also a thorough shovel talk.
Until then, they withdraw into the cabin, Qrow’s and Tai’s and the girls’ home, and they stay close.
And that night, with their stars winking at him through the window, Qrow lets Clover press a searing kiss to his lips, lets himself be pressed into the mattress, and lets this new security—this warm, warm, warm feeling—sink into his bones.
There’s his family to tend to.
There’s Clover.
There’s himself.