["Holding On To You"--21 Pilots]

"And I asked, 'Are you robbing me?'" Ruby told Royal over lunch a few minutes later. "And he was like, 'Yeah,' and I was like, 'Huh,' and then I knocked his butt right through the wall!" She gestured wildly and almost fell out of her chair.

Cinder, who was sitting in the corner of her own volition, had to smirk. She could just see the look on Roman's smug face.

"And the dandy guy, what did he do?" Royal knew Roman and was just dying to hear this also.

"He just said, 'Okay...'" Ruby imitated his tone pretty well. "And then he said to get me. So I kicked all their butts, and he shot dust around and ran away, and then I chased him up the roof, and he was getting away in a ship, and Cinder was there, and he shot at me, but then Glynda was there, so he was like, 'Oh no, a huntress,' or something, I guess, and Cinder comes out and start using magic and those screaming portal things--"

"Those were magic, Ruby," Cinder said in an annoyed tone.

"Right, and they got away. Then Ozpin recruited me--after Glynda scolded me for getting involved." Ruby winced at the memory.

"So he just recruited a 15-year old kid because she kicked some bad guys' butts?" Royal said. "I mean, any Signal Academy kid could have handled those punks. Roman's the only one who can fight at all."

"How do you know that?" Pyrrha said, over the head of one of the kids who'd decided to braid her hair to amuse themselves.

"His guys still get into fist fights on the job when Neo's not around to stop them. I've seen them do it, and it's just sad." Royal shook his head. "Also he should really stop it, but he thinks it's funny. The Argus people don't think it's so funny."

"Roman usually wouldn't let his guys get away with that kind of punk behavior," Cinder commented. "He must be bored. So much for liking his new job."

"Or they're just bad workers," Oscar said.

"Well, Ozpin let me in," Ruby said. "Fast forward a few months, I've got new friends--and Weiss."

"She wouldn't like that," Pyrrha said.

"Are you gonna tell her?" Ruby asked.

"Of course not," Pyrrha said. "I remember when you said that before though. She went, 'Hey!'"

Pyrrha nailed Weiss' voice surprisingly well for someone with such a different cadence, and Oscar and Ruby both started choking on laughs.

"Do I detect some salt, Nikos?" Cinder said. "Your competition."

"Oh, that was years ago," Pyrrha brushed it off. 

"Competition?" Royal said. "Wait, did Jaune like Weiss? Or did she like him? I feel like she'd probably like him."

They all snorted, even Cinder.

"No," Ruby said with emphasis.

"Not at all," Pyrrha said. 

"Jaune wasn't such a catch back then," Ruby said. "He's shaped up pretty well. But he was...uh...hitting a learning curb his first year."

"You mean he was a total loser who faked his way into Beacon," Cinder said.

"And we all know no one else ever did that," Ruby said dryly.

"The difference is I had to hold back to make it convincing, and he couldn't even make it believable," Cinder said.

"Jaune is probably more powerful than you," Pyrrha said. "He just couldn't harness it, and stronger power takes longer to hone--we know that. I'm not sure you'd do so well now."

"I never fought him except that one time in--" Cinder suddenly realized she shouldn't bring that up. "Well, never mind. Go on."

"I didn't think you'd be enjoying this," Oscar said.

"Oh, I'd love to hear how clueless they all were," she said. "It's so gratifying to remember how easy it was for us."

"That sounds disheartening to me," Pyrrha said.

"Okay, but this woman--" Royal pointed a Cinder rather rudely. "--walks into your school, and she's like 22? 23?"

[I couldn't find any canon answer to this. One site said she was 17 when she met Emerald, but it was a fan site, from what I could tell, so it's probably not right. But she's confirmed to be in her mid twenties by the creators, so that might be a good estimate.]

"Younger than that!" Cinder acted as if that was something to be offended over.

"How old are you?" Oscar asked.

"I...don't know, exactly," Cidner said strangely.

"Oh..." they said awkwardly.

"I must have been...20 or 21 then," Cinder decided.

"I didn't realize you were younger than Winter," Pyrrha said.

Only these three people would probably not have added "other than mentally" to that statement.

"My point was, does she look the right age to be a Beacon student?" Royal said. "No one thought anything of it?"

"Well, age is kind of hard to figure out," Oscar said. "Shine says everyone here looks really young."

"Everyone inside the kingdoms?" Royal said slyly.

"Yeah," Ruby said, "you know...Besides, people didn't graduate Beacon till they were 20 anyway. The really odd thing was her being old but still in the first year category, but some people join a little later.... It's not unheard of."

[And actually makes sense why no one thought it was odd she was there.]

"And she wasn't the only one who was more skilled than other people. Blake never had formal training in a school and she was better than most of the first years," Pyrrha said. "And so was I, but I trained all the time. So no, it wasn't a dead giveaway. Jaune, on the other hand...I'm still certain Ozpin knew all along."

"He did, actually. He said so," Oscar said.

"Anyway," Ruby said pointedly, to get back on track, "after that, stuff went crazy when Beacon fell."

"Now, correct me if I'm wrong, Mrs. Arc," Royal said, which tickled Pyrrha pink, but isn't that when...you reportedly, well... died? I saw your statue. It was nice. I saw your fights too. Atlas loved you."

"I was fortunate to get a lot of support from them," Pyrrha said. "Weiss and I met at some events."

"We did too," Royal said, unexpectedly. "But you wouldn't remember me."

"What? We did?" Pyrrha said.

"Only at one or two of them my father made me go to," Royal said, matter-of-factly. "Of course, he'd have made sure to have met you. Probably would have asked you to wear our sportswear. But you got your armor specially made, like most of the really committed fighters. Ironically, it's the military that gets them made in bulk."

"Why is that ironic?" Oscar asked.

"Uh...Nevermind," Royal said.

"It was so long ago...I'm sorry, I can't place you..." Pyrrha stared at him.

"My hair was longer back then and I was smaller," Royal said. "And wearing some stuffy silk suit."

Pyrrha tried to picture it. "Oh...wait, I think I might.... Was your father Raymond...? Oh, yes, Zapato, now I remember."

"That was him."

"You look just like him," Pyrrha said. "I'm amazed I didn't see it before. He was a very commanding sort of man. More so than Jacques Schnee. He made him look small by comparison."

"Probably why Schnee never invited him to many of his parties, but other people did," Royal said. "Well, who cares now?"

"I've hardly met anyone who I knew in the past," Pyrrha said thoughtfully. "Sorry. It's kind of nice, though, like an old scrapbook photo almost."

"Not like us commoners, huh?" Oscar said.

"Not like that, Oscar. I just didn't know that many people," Pyrrha said.

"I know,. I'm just kidding, sorry," Oscar said. "I just forget that you were in a different world, almost, before Beacon."

"I'm glad it changed," Pyrrha said. "I never regretted it, not even after dying--" She stopped, realizing that she'd never answered Royal's question, and now she'd blurted it out.

Of course Royal had heard the stories, but, hearing her say it outright, he stared at her.

Cinder went pale, as she suddenly realized that if Pyrrha told this story, it wouldn't look good for her.

Despite Pyrrha insisting that the fight had been more fair than people had thought, given her own intent to kill during it, Cinder didn't really see it that way now. She'd said she did, but deep down it still felt like a dirty thing to kill someone like Pyrrha, when she hadn't had to.

Not to mention her parting words to her had been incredibly cruel.

And insane.... She'd gone on about not being worthy, as if that had anything to do with why Pyrrha was afraid she'd destroy the entire kingdom if she was left alone.

Feeling sick suddenly, Cinder got up and left the room.

"Cinder?" Oscar looked.

"Bathroom maybe?" Ruby asked.

"It's to the left..." Pyrrha called.

"Maybe she was embarrassed," Oscar hissed.

"Why?" Ruby said blankly. "We weren't talking about her."

Silence as all of them realized that of course they'd been about to, indirectly.

"What?" Royal asked.

The news had not covered much that Cinder had been responsible for Pyrrha dying, the reason being that Ruby was the only one who'd seen it and had spent two weeks recovering afterward. By then the news had gotten most of the eye-witness accounts they wanted, and Ruby had never told them what happened. It hadn't seemed like it mattered. Cinder was wanted for enough other things.

So Royal actually didn't know this part and was puzzled.

"Maybe we shouldn't go into that," Pyrrha said.

"But he'll find out sooner or later," Oscar said. "Mercury will tell him, if we don't...and he won't tell him all of it. Neither will anyone else. It's better from you, Pyrrha."

"What is it?" Royal asked.

"It's...well...do you like Cinder?" Pyrrha asked this in a tone that meant just casually.

Royal took it that way.

"To be honest, she's a hard person to figure out," he said. "I'm starting to get her, kind of, I think. And to be honest further, she spends so much of her time actively trying to dislike people, it's hard to tell what she's really like under it."

"Oh yeah," Oscar said.

"And she's been that way as long as we've known her," Ruby said. "You see, it's kind of different with her than with Emerald and Mercury. They were awful to us, and they helped kill people we liked, but Emerald did it out of loyalty to someone, and we all understood that--after a while--because of our loyalty to Ozpin and other people, and we were mistaken. Maybe we'd have done what she did, in her place. I know my uncle thought about things like that..." She hesitated.

"And I did do things like that," Pyrrha said quietly.

"It was complicated," Oscar said. "And Mercury, he was never taught any better, but we came to see he cared about Emerald, so he couldn't be all bad. And Hazel never really liked being on the wrong side. He just was lost and angry and bitter."

"So?" Royal said.

"Cinder..." Ruby said, "she was different. She was such a headcase back then. I mean, she's not anymore. She seems pretty normal now. Whatever happened in the last 3 years, I guess it's worked. But you understand, we all changed a lot in those days."

"And we wouldn't want to ruin her chances at any new, well, friends or...at least allies, by speaking of things that we can't really apply to her anymore," Pyrrha said.

Royal stared at all of them.

"Cinder killed you, didn't she?" he said, point blank.

Cinder, who was listening to this from the hall so she wouldn't be witnessed, winced.

So it was that easy to figure it out. No, they'd already spelled it out for him.

"Wow...you are smart," Oscar said.

"No way you'd be saying all that if it wasn't the case, and you did die, I take it," Royal said. "But you came back somehow. I heard that. Most people think it's a tall tale, but I don't get the idea it is. Where does someone like you disappear to for months that no one would know about, and then just show up, no rescue party, no ransom, nothing? It was a miracle already. People just don't know how much of one.... It was those two, wasn't it?"

They were amazed at him.

"Wow," Ruby said.

"That makes sense." Royal leaned back. "If they could do that, you keeping it a secret makes perfect sense. People would demand it more if they knew. And I'm guessing they can't do it too often. All those other people still died...but Roman, I hear he came back too. And you talk about Ozpin like he did, but no one saw him."

"You're right that no one saw him, exactly," Oscar said. "But he did come back, in a way."

"That's the really freaky part," Ruby said.

"At this point, it couldn't get much worse," Royal said. "Whoa..."

He might well look stunned.

They weren't sure what to say.

"How did it happen?" Royal asked finally. "I mean...all of it?"

Pyrrha was anxious to make it seem a little less weird--if that was possible.

"Actually, I attacked first," she said. "You've...heard of the Maidens?"

"She told me a little about that yesterday." Royal didn't think that was odd, but they all did. Cinder had talked about it? How unusual for her.

"Right, well, she wanted the powers," Pyrrha said. "I was supposed to get them. I'm glad I didn't now. But at the time...well, when I failed--"

"Failed?" Royal said.

"More like Cinder killed the Maiden at the time." Ruby didn't see as much as Pyrrha did why that might be the wrong thing to say.

Royal didn't comment.

Cinder wanted to slap Ruby.

But of course it was true.... And why shouldn't they tell it? It wasn't like she'd sworn them to secrecy. She couldn't do that.

Why did it bother her anyway? Hearing all this 3 and a half years later...it was...just odd. It was almost like hearing someone else had done those things but still remembering doing them herself. And why had she done that? Oh, sure, she knew why. She remembered why...but knowing now that the powers were only a curse in of themselves, she wanted to go back in time and smack herself for not seeing it would be that way from the start. How could anything you got by killing someone not be a curse?

But back then she didn't know dark magic had rules--she didn't know any of that. She'd literally played with fire and not known what it was.

But good luck explaining that to anyone, and it didn't make it less evil if it was true.

"Amber was going to die anyway," Pyrrha said. "And really, I'm just as bad, because I was going to kill her, in a way. To take the power myself--they thought she'd never wake up, but it was still wrong, and I knew it, but things seemed so serious, I was going to push aside what my heart was telling me was right and wrong and just do it to save the world."

"By killing someone who was in a coma?" Royal said.

"By...stealing her Aura," Pyrrha said.

"Uh...Mrs. Arc...that's messed up." Royal had a disturbed expression.

"I know. I wish now I'd said no," Pyrrha said. "We had no idea there was another way at the time, and all Ozpin had told us was that things were desperate. We knew of no other gods, no other powers. It's not a reason to do the wrong thing, but it was why we told ourselves it was necessary."

"General Ironwood drove himself insane doing that, from all I hear," Royal said.

"Yep," Oscar said flatly.

"We almost did too," Ruby said. "I mean, some of what we did was on the edge of insanity, for sure."

"Cinder got there first," Pyrrha said. "But I almost think, in the end, it was for the best. Perhaps she never should have attacked Amber, but half the power could have been even worse, being divided. What they could have done, who knows? We saw some of what it was like later to share magic, and it was awful. One more person stuck with it wouldn't have helped anything. And Amber herself would have only had the same problem, otherwise. Murder is not okay...but perhaps stealing someone's soul is worse. I've come to loathe the thought of what I was going to do."

Royal did not disagree with Pyrrha.

Unlike her friends, he didn't know her that well, and though he knew she was a kind person, he didn't have a bias in her favor.

Oscar and Ruby realized, with some surprise, that he was actually considering if Pyrrha was, in fact, worse than Cinder.

Such a thought would not have occurred to them.

"Well," he said at last, "I see why you felt that way. It's not something I'd ever think I'd do myself. It's in the past now, right? You realize you were wrong. But does it sound worse than murder? In a way it does. At least with murder someone might go on to the afterlife, but...would that...?"

"It might," Pyrrha said. "You see how evil even the good guys were allowed to be? I was supposed to be a hero. I almost was a villain."

"But you failed," Royal said. "Or she stopped you, really, though not in a way I'd say was exactly nice. Still, some might call that mercy by comparison."

"Not why she did it," Ruby said, "trust me. Later she was just as willing to steal people's Aura as Pyrrha was--uh, I didn't mean it that way." She winced. "I meant more willing, without remorse."

"I don't know about that. She always tried to justify it," Oscar said. "That means some remorse somewhere."

"Or she was crazy," Ruby said.

"I think you established that," Royal said. "But what happened? I'm dying here."

"I chased her up to Beacon tower, after she killed Ozpin," Pyrrha said. "But...uh, that wasn't really murder, because she knew he'd be back, so...nevermind. I admit I wanted to kill her if I could, though I didn't think I could. Of course she fought back. But I didn't have a chance. To be honest, I don't think Cinder would have killed me if I had left her alone. She didn't seem to care about any of us in particular.... Cinder usually only killed people for a purpose back then. Mindless death...that was Tyrian's thing."

"Weird how it was less Salem's thing than his," Ruby muttered.

"Callows...yes, I've heard a lot of bad things about him, and I believe them all," Royal said distastefully. "One of the people at the base used to have family in one of the towns he murdered in before he went missing, said it was a piece of work."

"Ugh," Ruby shuddered.

"In the end she won," Pyrrha said. "I didn't think she'd let me go. I mean, why would she? I knew the secret; I was just a liability if she let me go. I don't remember anything after that for a long time, till I woke up here in Argus." She stared out the window. "Not far from this street, in fact. I came back and it was like I'd been asleep. But everyone else's reactions made me realize something else had happened. Then I learned the truth."

"I felt horrible. I saw what happened," Ruby said. "But I was just a second too late to stop it. Cinder shot her. She still has the scar."

Pyrrha didn't show it.

"Wow, really?" Royal said.

"I think I always will," Pyrrha said. "I'm not sorry that it happened. Otherwise I might think I dreamed the entire thing."

"When I saw it, light flashed out of my eyes," Ruby said, "light that destroyed magic and Grimm alike. That's how Cinder lost her arm and her eye. Then later Oscar healed them."

Oscar nodded. "Not really me," he said, "but I was used."

"How do you go from that to...well...this?" Royal glanced around. "I wouldn't have guessed all that happened. You're not enemies now."

"A lot changed," Pyrrha said. "But really, I just realized that I was no better than her, in my own way. People hailed me as a hero, but I knew the truth: I was going to do the same thing as her, and I was going to claim I was doing it for better reasons. But maybe Cinder was more honest than I was. There is no good reason to do anything like that. Might as well just call it selfish and evil and be real. In the end, she was the first to get rid of her magic powers."

"I'm still weirded out when I think about that," Ruby said. "We thought she'd never let them go, but she let it go first."

"Cinder's very practical in some ways," Oscar said. "It wasn't helping her anymore, so she let it go. Cut if off, literally in one case. And honestly, I think that's a good thing. I mean, we stalled ourselves so much by asking if it was the noble thing to do to put up with that stuff more--even me--and in the end, did it really do us much good? A little selfishness is okay when it's common sense. Shine and Wally taught us that you can sacrifice everything but your soul and other people, but we wanted to do both. The horrible thing was when they pointed out to us that that was just the same as Cinder and Salem and the others. We weren't so different."

"Perhaps people aren't as different as you think," Royal mused. "If the world knew all that, they wouldn't see you the same way. Is that why this is secret?"

"It's not that I really wanted to preserve my reputation," Pyrrha said, uncomfortably. "But they wouldn't understand. I doubt they'd even believe us. And it's not better for her or Emerald or Mercury or Hazel if we told everyone this."

"I'm still trying to figure out how to describe that part," Oscar said. "Even if it's fictional, people will connect the dots. They might think it's a metaphor, but still..."

"It's the truth though, and we know we shouldn't lie anymore," Ruby said.

"This story is amazing," Royal said. "And I think it could change a lot of people's minds, but yeah, you'd all risk being judged for your actions. People won't ask themselves if they would have done any better if they were you. They aren't that honest."

"But Mr. Royal, you seem to take that view of it," Pyrrha noted. "Do you think we're terrible?"

"I think you had a close call and you turned back." Royal was candid. "All of you. And it's not that shocking. Ironwood lost his mind; anyone else would have a hard time dealing with it too. But do I think you should be idolized? I don't know about that. Maybe no one should. Even if people manage to do the right thing, it's hard enough for them to do it. All of us should find a way to make our own choices, right? Not try to copy everyone else's lives. We couldn't copy yours anyway."

"I think in a way that's true," Oscar said. "We can emulate, but we can't totally copy someone else. We're too different."

"There's more to it," Ruby said. "Why things changed, that started with Oscar."

"Let's hear it," Royal said.

It took a long time to go over it. The kids had long since gone upstairs.

Cinder sat in the hall for a while, listening.

It was two hours at least before they began to run out of energy to talk.

"Maybe that's enough for now," Oscar finally said.

They had only gotten as far as Vacuo in all that time.

[I can relate. It took me 3 arcs.]

"She's been gone a long time." Ruby suddenly realized Cinder had never come back. "Did she leave?"

"She shouldn't have gone off alone," Oscar said.

"She does like to do that," Royal said. "Dang, didn't even think about it. I'm sorry, I've gotta go. Raven'll kill me if I lost her on the first day."

He got up and went out the front door.

"I hope it was the right thing to tell him all that," Pyrrha said. "I know the DJs gave us permission to share it, but it's...so personal."

"I guess because it's our testimony." Oscar used a Bible word.

"I hope Cinder didn't hear us," Ruby said. "She might not like it, but it was the truth.... What can we say?"

Cinder slipped out the back door and then vaulted herself over the wall to the street so they wouldn't see her go.

Royal was standing on the street still, to her surprise.

"I knew you'd never have left while they were talking about that," he said triumphantly. "Not without making a point of it. Okay, maybe I only thought 50-50, but I was right."

Cinder looked like a caught rabbit.

"I...I didn't want to interrupt," she lied, and it was obvious. Why would she have cared about being polite?

"All that talking made me thirsty," Royal said, as if nothing had happened. "If you're fine with it, I'm going to go that way. Or we can stand here. But I can't go till you do."

"That's it?" Cinder said.

"It? Weren't you there when Raven said that?" Royal reminded her. "Short memory."

"No, not--" Cinder stopped. "Whatever."

She didn't want to stand in front of Pyrrha's house.

She started walking.

Royal followed dutifully.

Cinder couldn't contain herself after about 10 minutes.

"Are you really not going to say anything about what they told you?"

"Did you listen the whole time?"

"No." It was again obvious she was lying.

"You could have stopped them," Royal said, "if you didn't want them to go on. All it would have taken was walking in."

"Nothing could have stopped them," Cinder said, "in the long run. And if it wasn't them, it would have been someone else. Oscar was right."

"Better from the horse's mouth, as it were," Royal observed.

"Pyrrha is...kinder than the others are about it." Cinder admitted this suprisingly easy. "She believes all that crap about being the same."

"Crap, huh?" Royal said.

Pause.

"Well, of course it's nonsense," Cinder said. "But if it makes her feel better about being on the same team as..."

"As someone who killed her? Boy, does that sound weird to say," Royal said. "How did you people live with it? It's the most bizarre situation I've ever heard of. It's like if you invited a kidnapper to a birthday party for the person they kidnapped..."

Cinder didn't appreciate the humor, if it was humor.

"The more you know, the uglier it gets," she said.

"It's the most inspiring story I ever heard," Royal said, as if she'd not spoken. In fact, he'd hardly listened to what she said. He was still reeling.

"Huh?" Cinder blanked.

"I mean it's like a legend," Royal said. "Or not like, it is one. And Ozpin too...and then Salem.... I'm starting to piece this together--I can't wait till that book comes out so I can read all this in order, but geez, even what I do get.... I wish I could have been there."

"Been there?" Cinder was too amazed to be terse. "Why? It was horrible."

"Horrible? Why?--I mean, I get that people suffered a lot, and that's horrible," Royal said hastily, not wanting to sound insane, "but around that, people.... I mean, a new faith, a new outlook, new lives...miracles.... Look, there's been many terrible times in history, more than we could count. How many of them got turned around by something like that?"

Pause.

Cinder had to think about that. It was unusual.

"And you got to be there. I'm so jealous, I could spit." Royal was almost mad. "I mean, I wouldn't have wanted to have gone through all that, but I think it'd almost have been worth it just to see it."

"'You believe because you have seen,'" Cinder said, as one of the parts from the book popped into her mind. "'Blessed are those who believe without seeing."' [From John 20:29]

"What?"

"Uh, nothing, just something I read--but are you really only going to react to that part?"

"I get the sense that you're a little embarrassed about it," Royal said. "I just don't get why."

"You don't get why?!" Cinder should not have said that so loudly--fortunately her voice was so quiet naturally that it was no more than what a slight yelp from most people would have been. "You must be doing this on purpose--you're not this stupid most of the time. I just don't see what the appeal is. Is it funny to you?"

"First of all, thanks for the compliment," Royal said, not bothered in the least. "And second, does it ever occur to you that people could look at something another way than you do?"

"Most of the time they do, but on this we're usually agreed."

"You're all a little too close to it, I think," Royal said sagely. "But from the outside, it's just astounding. So many different people coming together, I don't care what their reasons were. Besides, it can't be completely selfish to save the world, no matter what someone claims."

"But that didn't really come into it," Cinder said.

"Well, if you mean for you, at least you're willing to help other people if it helps you also," Royal said. "And that's better than nothing, if you're seriously worried that people are going to judge you. But why let it bother you if they do? You know what happened."

"Exactly, I know," Cinder insisted.

"I thought you didn't feel remorse."

Had he heard that? Or had he just guessed?

"I don't really," Cinder said. She almost had the feeling that she was lying, though she didn't think she was. "But I see how it looks."

"And you never saw that before?" Royal said.

Pause.

Cinder glanced around, but no one was close enough to hear them. 

"I...well, back then I wanted people to be afraid," she said. "It's...well, it's a long story. So it didn't bother me when they reacted the way they did. Now it would just get me killed. Being embarrassed has nothing to do with it."

"That's not how you act, but whatever." Royal still didn't seem to care. "I suppose...I could microscopically see why not talking about it might be easier. I just don't know how anyone could help it. You don't see those things and just keep it to yourself."

"Who would believe it?" Cidner changed her tone a bit. "Certainly no one in that small, narrow town."

"Yes...well, maybe you're right. Hiding out there must be easier because of that."

"Excuse me?!" Angrily.

"Well, if you were here, you might have more supporters who were in it, people who knew about Pyrrha, who knew about all of it," Royal said. "A lot of us saw at least some of it. And some might even be interested to hear your side of it, since, in the end, you helped them stop it. Something had to change your mind. Just my two lien, but it would be harder to dodge it here."

"Yes, and I couldn't hope to survive," Cinder said.

"You're friends with the leaders and a dozen powerful huntsmen and a crime boss," Royal said. "Not many people would mess with that if they knew. You're not as safe in Eurus. Anyone could find you there and hush it up. Good think Fay is keeping an eye out for it."

"What?" Cinder said.

Royal had forgotten that Fay had never told her this to her face.

"Ask her," he said.

"I don't see how this is any of your business." Cinder fell back on her old, faithful argument.

"I feel like it is now. I guessed Likstar told you all it was okay to clue me in." Royal continued to be smarter than was strictly comfortable.

"It's none of my affair if she did," Cinder huffed. "The others can do what they want."

"True...but none of them have your story."

"No one else could. There has to be someone who was the worst antagonist," Cinder said.

"Salem, right?" 

"Not funny."

"Well, not that I know you--" Royal made a big show of that to remind her that she'd said it. "--but it sounds like you keep fluctuating between being the victim and being the villain in this story. Can't have it both ways. Or are you one of the protagonists? They all seem to think so."

"That's not what they said. And it doesn't matter. I don't really like them," Cinder said.

"Maybe not, but who else knows what really happened?" Royal made another very good point.

Cinder paused.

It was hard to argue that part.

"But fine." Royal realized he shouldn't push her buttons. "You're right, this isn't really my business. And if it were me, maybe I wouldn't want to be involved. That's a lot to go through in a short amount of time, and not many people have experienced anything like that. It's overwhelming. I think it's incredible, but I didn't have to live through it...so maybe it is not my place to say. You should go home if you want, just live your life. If they leave you alone to do it."

After all that, Cinder was almost disappointed by this conclusion. Of course it was what she intended to do...but...

It did sound underwhelming after all that.

"And it goes without saying I'm not going to tell anyone about this," Royal added. "They'd never believe me if I did anyway."

Cinder was quiet for a while, but perhaps pacified by the assurance of secrecy, she finally said,

"You know, if you're serious about wanting to make changes, Oscar could help. He's got bucket-loads of information on this stuff now. And he loves doing it."

"I'll think about that." Royal certainly meant to if he could. "That reminds me...are you going to tell Sustrai about all that history?"

"How does that shoe feel on your foot?" Cinder couldn't resist saying meanly.

"A perfect fit, if you must know." Royal didn't let her get to him.

Cinder glared at him.

"You're just mad that it was a good comeback," Royal accused her.

"It wasn't," Cinder denied it. "As for Emerald--tell her yourself. Apparently it's better to know stuff. Maybe then she'd stop blaming herself for what happened. It's really Watts' fault."

"It really is," Royal agreed. "You know, I bet he killed more people in Atlas than the Grimm did."

"He'd not care. He's kind of a sociopath." Cinder knew that was rich coming from her--but she meant it ironically.

"Doesn't he live in Vacuo now?" Royal said.

Cinder nodded.

"If I go to Vacuo, I might have to look him up," Royal said. "But then, it's in the past."

Cinder snorted a bitter laugh. "If you meet Watts and don't want to punch him within 5 minutes just for his current crimes, I'd be shocked. I'd put money on that, in fact. He's insufferable."

"I get the feeling he'd say the same thing about you."

"Yes, but at least I had followers. He's never had anyone who wasn't paid to work for him."

"Well, he sounds lovely. Maybe I won't bother. By the way...how did Headmaster Theo fit into all this?"

"I.... Actually, I have no idea," Cinder realized. "I've never been filled in on all that. All I know is he screwed them over and then they recruited him because that's what they do. Likstar was one step ahead of him, and then his girlfriend ditched him.... All I heard was snide comments from the others. They wouldn't have explained it to me."

"And the plot thickens," Royal noted.

[Makes me realize how much work it was to write it. If even my own characters can't keep up with it, is it too complex?]