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Princess and The Dragons	By : RWBYRemnants Category: +M through R > RWBY Views: 1056 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: RWBY is not mine and I make no money from this fic

Chapter List
- 31
- 32
- 33
=Chapter 32
Fortunately, they only had to wait inside with Mrs. Nikos for about half an hour. She was quite accommodating and understanding, having heard from her husband how unreasonable Jacques had been when they confronted their daughters together - and hearing first-hand his shouting after them as they walked up the street scant minutes before. Most of the small town knew about the incident by now, and while a man might have sided with Jacques, few women would do the same. She had no problem providing Willow with tea and sympathy, and a handkerchief to bawl into.
The minute Pyrrha walked in the door, she knew something was wrong without even having to ask. But she did.
“What's wrong? What happened?”
Mrs. Nikos attempted to field the question herself, adjusting her spectacles. “The Schnees are having… a disagreement. Would you mind driving them to a motel or wherever they need to go, sweetie?”
“A disagreement?” Her friend swallowed hard. “Oh no… oh no, he got out.”
“What?”
“He did,” Mrs. Schnee answered for her, looking wearier by the moment. “And as much as I hate the idea of causing a scene, I can't put my daughter in danger. Not knowingly. If he could drug another poor girl once, send her after Weiss with a knife…”
Mrs. Nikos shook her head, red bob bouncing to and fro. Pyrrha definitely favored her father a bit more in terms of features and size, but the hair was unmistakable. “To think he could treat his own family that way! Absolutely disgraceful - and right here in Atlas Heights!”
“I know, Mom,” Pyrrha said calmly, even though Weiss could tell that she was extremely upset beneath the facade. “But he's hurt them more times in the past. I hate to see any family fall apart, but…”
“Mia zoí malákas!” She spat downward three times; Weiss and her mother were a little surprised, but Pyrrha merely nodded solemnly. “Not that I could believe that of my Nick, of course… but one can never be too careful.”
At their continued confusion, Pyrrha explained, “Old superstition - she's warding off the same evil happening to our family.”
“A-ah,” Willow stammered, not having been prepared for what a high society woman such as she would consider to be a display of extremely unladylike behavior. Weiss knew it probably wasn't unladylike in Mrs. Nikos' culture, of course, but her mother was even less worldly.
“Where will you go?" Pyrrha asked. "I mean… I'm sorry, I don't mean to ask too many questions, but…”
Mrs. Schnee waved that away. “It’s alright, dear. I think… well, maybe I'm presuming too much, but Kali once told me to come to her for anything I might need. And we were talking about my marriage, all the financials. So…”
“Oh! Oh, that's fine - I can definitely drive you there. What about your clothes and things? Do you want me to see if Mr. Schnee will let me in to collect-”
“NO!” When everyone else was surprised by Weiss’s outburst, she hurried to follow up with, “Pyrrha, this isn't your job. Besides, I'm worried he would take out his frustrations with us on you.”
Before she could protest, Pyrrha’s mother said, “Listen to her, kóri. Best to only go in there with more than one of you. It's safer. My God, I never thought I would have to say that about someone in this neighborhood…”
They bade Mrs. Nikos goodnight and piled into Pyrrha's car. The minute they had pulled away down the street, Weiss turned to look at the driver.
“Don't go to Kali's house.”
“What?” they both said.
“Not straight there. I don't want Father having you followed and leading him straight to us, or putting you in danger, like your mom said. You’ve already had to protect me once and that’s more than you ever should have.” She thought frantically. “Let's go to the Branwen's. Then Yang and her mother can take us to the Belladonna's. Just an… an extra, um…”
“A precaution,” her mother finished for her, nodding. She had to crane her neck to see her. “My smart daughter. It might not be necessary, but you're right; better safe than sorry.”
Pyrrha reached over and took up Weiss's hand, drawing her gaze as they came to a stop sign and paused there. “But I would gladly protect you again. I know you would do the same for me! But… oh, you're right. We shouldn't invite trouble when it can be avoided.”
So they did exactly as they planned. Weiss could see that her mother was growing more and more uncomfortable as they got deeper into the poorer part of town, but she was trying to pretend otherwise, maintaining light conversation about the weather and asking after Pyrrha's studies. The other two women were much better at small talk than Weiss was.
Her nerves spiked as they got closer to the Branwen house. Yang’s mother was decidedly no fan of hers, but she had been marginally more civil the last couple of times she visited, so maybe there was some hope.
“Both of you wait here,” she commanded them, reaching for the door handle. “This shouldn't take long. Either she'll help us, or she won't. Simple as that.”
“Be careful, sweetie,” her mother bade her as she slipped out of the car and walked up to the house.
Raven answered after the first knock. She rolled her eyes when she saw the young cheerleader on her doorstep, but made no other derisive comment or gesture - only stood back to let her into the house.
“Actually, we can't stay, Mrs. Branwen. I wondered if I could ask you or Yang for a favor?”
Her bottomless eyes narrowed further. “Like what? And who's ‘we’?”
“Well… it's a long story. The short version is, my father is out of jail and we'd like a ride to Kali's house because we don't want him to strangle us in our sleep.”
She had been expecting some kind of snarky comment, or at the very least a demand for further explanation. Instead, Raven nodded for a moment, then held up a finger before retreating into the house. Weiss was just beginning to worry that she had been ignored when the woman returned, jacket on and keys in hand. It wasn't the kind of coat the Dragons normally sported, but one of a red leather with black fur around the collar. Sunglasses were clipped to the breast pocket, almost as an afterthought.
“Mrs. Branwen? What- I mean, um, what about Yang?”
“This is a grown-up problem, girl. The grown-ups should handle it.” She headed straight for her rusty old car, barely pausing to call over her shoulder, “Whoever's coming had better hurry up. I ain't got all day.”
Pyrrha followed them back to Atlas Heights in her vehicle. Even though she privately thought her mother would be just as comfortable staying with her friend as riding with Raven, if not moreso, she came along, anyway. It was a fairly tense trip.
“He knocked you around?” she asked Willow without preamble.
“What? Oh… yes, I'm… I'm afraid so.”
“Both of you? And you just took it?”
“Raven!” Weiss hissed, unable to help herself. The glare of doom she saw in the rearview mirror made her rethink the action, but she stood her ground.
“Don't you sass me, girl. Grown women are talking.”
Before Weiss could reply, her mother held up a hand to signal that she could field the question herself. “It's fine. She's right; I should have done something about this situation long ago. But I… well, I convinced myself that keeping the peace within our family was more important than my own safety. I was wrong.”
“Damn right you were wrong. If my Taiyang had ever so much as tweaked my girl's nose wrong, I would have slit his throat. That goes for most mothers, I'd wager - and if I'm actually a better parent than you are, that's pretty sad.”
Again, Weiss wanted to argue with her, but this time she stopped herself. That was the most solid proof thus far that Raven wasn't quite the negligent parent that she seemed to be. Maybe this wasn't the time to shout her down. Though she certainly resolved to comfort her mother later, and assure her that she didn't think of her as a bad parent.
Not when they had her father to compare her to.
“Must we do this?” Willow asked in a shaking voice as they pulled into her own driveway. “Shouldn't we leave well enough alone for a while?”
Raven spared her a dark little smirk as she turned off the engine. “A highfalutin’ woman like you? Probably wouldn't last two days without her collection of lipsticks and pantyhose. No, we’d better do this now.”
The walk up to the front door seemed to last an eternity. Both Weiss and her mother were trembling, and she could feel her own palms were moist, stomach clenching in anticipation of another fight, or a shouting match… or worse.
It was Whitley who answered the door. He looked shocked enough to see his own family members, and yet more when he noticed the strange woman glaring down at him as if he had been spawned from a swamp.
“What-?”
“Excuse us.” Raven pushed her way past him without even waiting for him to finish a sentence. After only a second or two spent getting her bearings, she headed for the stairs. Weiss and her mother hurried to follow, the flustered boy tagging along at their heels.
“Your room?” When Weiss nodded, she stormed in and looked around. “Suitcase?”
“Up here, in the closet.” She went to get it herself, hoping that if she wasn’t completely useless she might earn some tiny shred of Raven’s respect. The woman started yanking open drawers, shoving her hands into piles of panties. “H-hey! Don’t touch those!”
Her lip curled as she tossed them unceremoniously into her bag. “Please. You have to be this tall to ride this roller coaster.” She held her hand out at the height that just happened to match that of her mother, and she snorted when she noticed. “Huh. Look at that.”
“Excuse me?” Willow breathed.
“Nothin'. Hurry up, Weiss.” Then she steered the older woman out of her room.
It took another few seconds for Weiss to snap out of her dazed state and begin to pack. They wouldn’t have much time; so far, they had been lucky that her father wasn’t around to interrupt their desperate grab for their personal effects. She focused on clothes first, then began to grab for school supplies, makeup, other things that could be easily picked up and moved. Lastly, she made sure to pluck from the bottom of her closet the single slipper that had lost its mate to her love, tucking it in the corner before she shut the case.
“Do you really think you two will get away with this?”
When she glanced up, it was to see her brother looking quite livid, fists clenched at his side. Sighing as she pulled the suitcase down from the bed to rest on the floor, she finally snapped, “Get away with what?”
“Abandoning Father when he needs us most!” he half-shouted, pasty little face livid. “You already got him thrown in prison, and he’s finally shown that he is willing to reason with you and Mother after all of this… and still you throw that back in his face?”
“Reason with- Whitley, he attacked us! There's nothing for us to feel sorry about - we had to protect ourselves!”
“Of course there is! If you hadn't been… well, you know! Hanging around those bad girls! Why would you keep doing that when you could simply do as Father says and… and ensure your future with the company, with this family? You're even crazier than I thought!”
Weiss had been prepared to hate Whitley for siding with their father. To lash out, to try and make him see reason. Instead, the most prominent emotion she felt… was pity.
“Oh, you poor little idiot.”
“I am not poor and I am not an idiot!” he snarled with a stomp of his foot.
“You are. You just don't know it yet.” As she began to haul the suitcase toward her doorway, she grunted, “You're still welcome to come with us instead of staying here with a dangerous lunatic. But I have a feeling you won't.”
Rolling his eyes, he folded his arms over his chest. “Don't be absurd.” When she kept going, he jogged a bit to catch up and asked, “Where will you be staying?”
“The Starlight Motel.” The lie felt disgusting in her mouth, but it was for their own safety. “Don't bother calling; we are staying under assumed names and asking not to be disturbed.”
“You would rather stay in a fleabag motel than with your own family?”
Narrowing her eyes at him, she hissed, “That man is not my family anymore.”
Then she walked into the hallway. Hers and Yang's mothers had yet to return; that was no surprise. Her mother always took forever to pack. It was one of the many and varied topics she and her husband argued about, nearly every time they took a vacation. Before her mother had stopped arguing and started drinking, of course.
“Thinking about raiding our good silver?”
“Shut up, Whitley.”
“This isn't over, you know,” he sighed in a would-be causal voice. The trembling gave away that he was much more frustrated than that, of course. “Father will make you come back. Or at least return these things you're stealing.”
Taken aback, she snapped, “They're my things! My clothes and books! And do you really expect me to believe you think this is Father's pantyhose in my suitcase?”
“Yes. Oh - well, not in that way!” he burst out in annoyance. “I meant that he paid for all these things and you know that!”
Weiss was about to argue about that, take him down a peg, when the older women emerged from the master bedroom. Two bags were packed - Weiss now wished she had done the same, but she had been trying to pack light and take only the bare necessities. Her mother obviously didn't agree with the same definition of “necessities”.
“...quite a shock at first,” Willow was saying as they approached. Were they actually talking? Raven and her mother?! “But, well… I don't have much room to throw stones in my glass house.”
“I keep telling you, that's not what I care about.” But the instant she saw Weiss standing there, she buttoned her lip. “Hmm.”
“Yes?” Weiss gently prompted.
“Nothing. You ready?”
“I am. Is… everything alright?”
Raven spared her mother a glance. They looked a little more at ease around each other now, which she found as confusing as encouraging. “Think so. Let's go before Willow tries to pack a tea set or something.”
As they descended the stairs, Weiss goggling at Yang's mother calling hers by name, the woman in question whispered, “Oh… the tea set…”
They had just put the second bag into Raven's trunk when another car pulled into the driveway. They were blocked in. Even worse was the man getting out of said car.
“Ah,” he said, face aglow with a self-satisfied smirk that Weiss found infuriating. “Already crawling back with your tail between your legs, eh, Willow? I might have known it wouldn't take long.”
“Jacques,” she said in a dignified voice, which did nothing to hide her obvious fear.
“Wait…” His eyes finally took in the way Raven was stashing the last suitcase and slamming the trunk door closed. “Who is this? What are- did you come back to burgle me? Can you really be that pathetic?”
Raising a hand as if already warding off an attack, his wife backed up until the car pressed into her rear. “We came for what is rightfully ours. Please just… don't cause a fuss.”
“This is absurd!” Weiss almost wanted to laugh at him using the same word choice his son had scant minutes ago. “You really mean to do this! To abandon everything we've built together over some petty squabble! Where will you even stay? With this, this… bitter hag?”
Though Raven’s jaw tightened, she made no other move and offered no word. Weiss had a feeling that was a lot clearer sign of danger than if she had replied.
“At the Starlight Motel,” Weiss repeated loudly, cutting off whatever her mother had been about to say. “And don't bother asking for us; we're using assumed names and… and told them…”
Her voice faded as he turned the withering glare upon her. A few quick steps took him into her personal space, and she felt her flesh crawling in disgust for a man she had once trusted to provide for her, to protect and guide her into adulthood.
“This is all your doing,” he growled into her face, sounding more like a beast than a man. “Poisoning my own wife against me, dividing our home in two. You and those people you fraternize with now, skulking around and doing God knows what! And we both know what you're doing with that Chinese girl!”
She wasn't sure where the moment of boldness came from. Straightening up to her full height, despite it still being half a foot shorter than that of her father, she hissed as sharply as possible, “We do know that, Father. I'm in love with her and there's not a damn thing you can do about it!”
All the color drained from his face as he stared, open mouth, at his youngest daughter. If nothing else, at least she had accomplished shutting the man up for once.
“You…” He ground back to life like a toy having just been wound up again. One of his hands clamped hard on her bicep. “Disgusting… ungrateful… degenerate! Going against God’s laws - the laws of nature! We'll see about that! You're going up to your room, and you're going to stay there until I come up to teach you some-”
His words suddenly cut off. At first, Weiss thought he simply ran out of things to say in his frustration with her. Then he took a step back, and she saw a hand clamped on his shoulder at least as hard as the one on her own bicep.
“Careful, Papa Schnee,” Raven told him in a low, rattling voice. “Don't forget that you aren't alone in your house anymore. People are watching.”
His eyes raised, glancing wildly around the neighborhood. No one was looking out of their windows, or staring from the sidewalk. “Who is ‘people’? You? Please. Some barren old maid who looks like Evil Kineval? I'll thank you to stay out of things that are none of your concern.”
“Look again.”
Even Weiss had to do a double-take to notice what Raven was talking about. Two cars were parked on the other side of the street, their drivers staring intently at the Schnee household. Pyrrha and Kali - her personal knights in shining armor. Though Pyrrha looked a little bit more scared, Kali was filled with grim determination. Even as they stared, the latter's door opened and one of her high heels extended to rest on the pavement, ready to sprint toward the house at a moment's notice.
“You really think I'm scared of a bunch of women?” he scoffed, turning back to look at Weiss as if there had been no interruption. “I've seen the inside of a prison. Nothing you can do can compare with the atrocities I saw there.”
“Really?”
A loud click filled the air between them. When both Weiss and her father looked around, it was to see a prominent bulge in Raven's jacket pocket. Only a truly innocent lamb could mistake it for anything other than…
“A gun?!” she hissed at her. “Again?!”
“Why does everybody act so surprised that I have this and am ready to use it?”
Jacques flicked his beady eyes between the pocket and Raven's passively determined expression. He licked his lips, finally lowering his hand from Weiss's bicep to clench at his side. “It's a bluff. You're bluffing; I've never heard of a woman carrying around a pistol in all my life.”
“Keep threatening my daughter's girlfriend and you'll call my bluff,” she growled in a purely murderous tone, despite the cold smile on her lips. “Nobody gets to do that but me.”
Weiss wanted to sigh but decided she shouldn't.
“Jacques,” Willow set in a firmer tone than Weiss remembered hearing from her. “Please be reasonable. We just want to leave in one piece. Don't be stubborn and get someone hurt. Please?”
To drive home the point, Raven added, “I haven't even decided for sure that I won't shoot you if you do back off. Men like you make me sick. Really not smart to push me right now.”
“I'll have the police haul you in,” he growled angrily, his cheeks beginning to flush with redness due to the sheer levels of anger he was reaching. “You won't get away with threatening me! Do you have any idea who I am? How much power I have in this city?”
“Do you have any idea how little I care? Stop trying to impress me with the size of your piece and go away. I guarantee mine is bigger.”
Never before in her life had Weiss seen her father look so flustered and - to echo Raven's sentiments - impotent before. He glanced toward the front door, where Whitley was watching with an open mouth and an anxious expression, and again at the two women watching from their cars. By now, Kali had exited her vehicle and had one arm resting on the open door. Weiss cautiously retreated to stand next to her mother, silently reaching down to clasp her hand in solidarity. She felt the fingers flex and latch onto her own hard.
“Yes, I see, I see,” he muttered. “Battle of the sexes, is it? Well… we'll see about this. Yes, we will.” Glaring down at Weiss, he hissed in a venomous tone, “You have no idea how much worse I can make your life, ungrateful child.”
“Yes, we do. And we've had enough.” She pointed at the house with a shaking limb and said, “Go, Father. Just go.”
He went. Even though he looked like he had a million more things to shout at them, he seemed to realize that they no longer wanted to listen. His steps toward the front door were sure and swift - Whitley had to jump out of the way to avoid being mowed down in his determination.
Their mother hesitated for a moment, watching Whitley's worried expression. Then she took a step toward the house. “Come with us, son. I don't want to leave you in his care. I really don't! But I won’t force you.”
“Mother…” He sighed, lowering his eyes. Though he looked as if he regretted it, he turned and went back inside the house, pulling the door closed behind him. Weiss had a sneaking suspicion that at least some of what she had said to him sank in, but he wasn't ready to fully believe it yet.
“Glad that's over,” Raven snorted. There was a distant clicking in her pocket again; uncocking her pistol, most likely. “Some men have heads full of sawdust, I swear to-”
The rest of her sentence was cut off by Willow throwing her arms around her, squeezing with all of her might. Weiss took a step backward in shock. The next emotion that flared up in her was pure worry; Raven wasn't exactly a touchy-feely kind of person. How would she react?
“Oh, thank you so much!” Willow breathed urgently against her shoulder. “That was terrifying, and you were so… calm, and made him listen, and you… I've never seen such a strong woman before! Standing up to a man like him!”
The only thing that could have been more surprising would be if Raven embraced her back. Which was exactly what she did - only patting her in the middle of her back with one hand, but it was still more than Weiss expected. She looked mostly wide-eyed and confused. “No big deal.”
“But it is!” She drew back and kissed Raven on either cheek. Privately, Weiss knew that she was just being sociable in the same way she would have with the ladies at the Country Club, but was amused when she realized how it might come across to Raven instead. “How can I ever repay you?”
Sure enough, for just a moment, there was a slight bashfulness in Yang's mother's expression. The shy grin spoke volumes. “Honestly, don't mention it. Ever again.”
“Well, well, you two look cozy.” They had been so wrapped up in the various events that they didn't even hear Kali approach. Her own features were a curious mixture of bemusement and irritation.
“Kali!” Raven gasped - proving that she had completely forgotten she was even there. “This isn't- I mean, I only came to help them get their stuff from the creep in there. That's it, I promise.”
Smirking as she folded her arms over her chest, the Belladonna matriarch needled her, “Never could resist a blonde in distress, could you? But it's all right. You handled that really well and I'm proud of you.”
Her smile was obviously pleased, despite her response being, “Like I care if you're proud or not. But thanks for the backup.”
“Wait,” Willow asked, “you know each other?”
“Boy, does she know me,” Raven half-purred, and Kali rolled her eyes.
“I hate to interrupt this… whatever this is,” Pyrrha announced in a nervous voice, even though none of them had noticed her approach, either, “but I think we should go to Mrs. Belladonna's house before we continue this conversation. I don't like knowing he's in there, watching us like this.”
Their eyes turned as one to the house just in time to see one of the upstairs curtains be wrenched shut. Raven grunted under her breath, “Good idea. Don't want the cops to arrive and find me with this piece in my pocket.”
As they went to their separate cars, Willow asked her, “So you weren't kidding? That's really a gun in your pocket, not just a bluff? I didn't even know women could buy guns!”
“Of course we can. Not that I bought it through strictly legal channels…” She started the car and glanced at the two platinum-haired women in her passenger seats. “You did good. Maybe… I was wrong about you, Little Schnee.”
That was about the most glowing praise Weiss could ever hope to receive from Raven, and she couldn't help the huge grin that broke out across her face. It made the older woman grimace and turn back around.
“How are we going to get out?” Willow asked. “Jacques boxed us in.”
“Did he?”
The next several seconds were like something out of a movie. Raven threw her car into gear, nearly plowed into the fence, then cut the steering wheel hard so she would reverse into the front yard around her father's car. Deep gouges were left into the grass and earth that would take a groundskeeper many hours to fix. As if an intentional finishing touch, she backed over the mailbox before winding up on the road again, shifting into drive and taking off at top speed.
That was fine with Weiss. She hated being boxed in.
“Oh, our mailbox…” After a brief second, Willow turned to nervously say, “But it's fine! I… we can buy another!”
“Who is ‘we’? Thought you were done living with that walking pile of dog shit.”
Simple as that statement was, it shattered the excitement for the two Schnee women and left them with nothing but melancholy and regrets. A chapter in their life had ended forever, leaving only an uncertain future looming on the horizon through the cracked windshield of Raven Branwen’s old rusty Dodge.
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Princess and The Dragons