Paladin of Dust: A Shining Beacon Part 3

The young weaver politely declined to join Yang and Ruby in their improvised camp on the side of the ballroom that had been unofficially designated for girls. After storing her weapons and dust supplies in a locker, and changing into her sleepwear, she set up against a wall near to the entrance of the ballroom with some fabric and thread to work on finishing a piece of new gear. At the same time indulging in one of her favorite pastimes of people watching. Fortunately or unfortunately all that seemed to be on offer were the boys on the far side of the room posing like well muscled peacocks.

She wasn't very surprised when a tall redhead in comfy looking red and brown flannel pajamas sat down next to her. "I see your toes still get cold faster than the rest of you." Umber glanced at her ankle sock covered feet on her otherwise bare legs below the long t-shirt she was wearing before she shrugged in response. "Is that a backpack you're working on?"

"I discovered that if a good close combat fighter pressures me I don't have the time to reach into my pouch and grab any of my dust rockets, so I am making a space expanded pack to store a spring loaded magazine for them as well as my thrusters." Umber responded with false mildness while watching the needles and thread form more stitches.

"When I watched the video of your fight with Sage I was sure you dropped something from your right hand right before you two clashed." The other girl leaned in and whispered. "If it was a rocket why didn't it fire off?"

"He was convinced I was a close range fighter. Which you, Pyrrha, should know very well I'm not." Umber smirked at the other girl. "At such short range igniting the propellant would have just made it obvious for him to see and possibly dodge. Just using my semblance and some double sided tape to make it stick to the inside of his duster was far more effective. Surprising him by making myself light enough to be knocked into the air ensured that he wouldn't look down to see it."

"Why didn't you use dust spells against Reese?"

Umber shrugged again. "The chance to target her never came up before she presented such a glaringly easy way to take her down by out flying her."

"Then what was the reason you started with hand to hand combat against me instead of creating space by flying up and carpet bombing with dust spells?" The champion asked quietly.

"Maybe I wanted to show someone that always acted like they needed to be a shield for me that I could actually stand up myself." The blond girl smiled at her friend, deciding to stick with a partial truth and not the family politics laced one. "I didn't win but I was the only competitor to take the repeat winners Aura down to the halfway mark."

Pyrrha smiled while relaxing back against the wall and looking over the room before she suddenly started giggling. "On an unrelated topic do you think there is any explanation for that."

She followed her friend's gaze and suddenly felt a headache coming on. Blinking several times did not make the affront to any form of adult style disappear. Thinking on it for a few moments when she realized it was not going away she came to the conclusion that it was diabolical in how well it accomplished its intended function.

"Pure speculation at the moment, but if I had a brother that was sweet, caring, entirely too trusting, and that I was really not ready to share with any girl his own age." Umber paused a moment to decide how best to phrase the rest. "I would assure him that wearing pajamas that were comfortable, hid any hint of an athletic physique, and styled appropriately for a seven year old, were the perfect thing to wear at all times to sleep in. I would likely go as far as to make him several with his favorite cereal mascot embroidered on the front to help ensure he would wear them." Pyrrha was hugging her legs with her head resting against her knees trying to stifle her giggles. "On that note, I think I overplayed my hand with him earlier."

"Oh! Hehe...ha heee." I took several more moments and deep breaths for the other girl to continue. "Hee ha hha...h.. how Sssso?"

"I put a basic casting circle on the back of his sword sheath with some electric Dust laced enamel, and, he recognized it." Umber sighed and leaned back against the wall. "He didn't make any accusations or warn the other two you saw me with earlier, but he bolted straight to the library where I am fairly certain he made a CCT video call. After that he was friendly again, but started dropping a lot of references to how he was reminded of hanging out with his sisters."

Pyrrha just glanced over to her with a slightly confused look on her face.

"I guess I forgot to mention before that the clients who asked me to look after their little brother all happen to call one of my mom's cousin's mom. Though not all are hers by birth."

"The father has two or more wives?" The redhead nodded in understanding. "Must be a fairly influential family to keep that old tradition in modern Vale"

"So I have to believe that someone at home asked him to play nice even though he knows I wasn't just purely interested in him when we first met." Umber sighed and watched a few more stitches form themselves around a difficult corner seam on the pack she was working on. "Which leaves me with a troublesome situation of do I keep dogging his heels and risk alienating him more, or do I let him go on his own and risk letting him get hurt."

"You may have to just let the chips fall as they may." Pyrrha said quietly. "Were you thinking of taking it as far as becoming his partner and teammate?"

"I really wasn't planning to go that far, but I wouldn't mind at this point. From what I can tell he may not be a front line fighter, but his grasp of strategy and tactics is almost scary. His Aura levels from what I could sense are nothing to sneeze at, he is almost on par with Uncle Alex from what I can recall." Umber smiled a little sadly at the memory. "I don't think it would be a good idea for us to be partners either, being from another country and sticking together would only work against us in the long run."

A commotion farther into the room caught the girl's attention, followed by an even louder call for the familiar pair of girls to cut it out so others could sleep. The resulting shouting match caused more of a disturbance then the sibling tussle that preceded it.

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Jaune was doing his best to clear the area of the girls shouting match. Experience had taught him that trying to play peacemaker would only add fuel to the fire. Double checking his gear in his locker before sleep was sounding like an exceptional idea. Hearing a muffled laugh he glanced at the far wall and almost tripped as for a moment he could have sworn he saw two of his younger sisters. A second glance revealed it was Umber chatting happily with a red haired girl just enough taller than her sitting to make the mistaken impression.

Nodding his head he relaxed and started walking again before an even worse realization hit him, he increased his pace to get to the locker room and his Scroll that everyone had been ordered not to bring with them into the ballroom for the night.

Getting to his locker he quickly punched in the access code and grabbed his Scroll out of his pants pocket, his folded clothes falling to the floor in his haste. Quickly he started searching through his photo album on the device when a message chimed. A circular icon with multilayered petals of a golden larkspur flower under a single golden crescent appeared with the text “looking for this?” A window popped up with a picture of a six year old version of himself with a goofy mask being pulled up off his face, he was supposed to have insisted it was a fox with its ears laid back. The result was that the ears were long enough for it to be mistaken for Pumpkin Pete. Surrounded on both sides and blushing as two girls kissed him on the cheek. A picture that the sender loved to tease him with always claiming that it reminded her of just how brave and crafty her little brother could be. The redhead on his left always made him think of his sister Jillian but the blond on his right was too young to be his older sister Jen and Jana was only a toddler at the time.

“How do you do that Joan?” He typed in reply wishing he could emote the groan that escaped his mouth.

“I have my ways, but mostly I just heard that Mama Iris couldn't help but bring up ‘The Mysterious Fox’ so I was guessing you would connect the dots.” He could almost visualize the grin she had to be wearing as she typed that.

“She also mentioned a marriage meeting involving at least one of them, and I am fairly certain both of them are here. So please be straight with me on how screwed I am.” His hands were shaking as he hit send.

“I will tell you truthfully there is no obligation you are under except the non-optional mission for me.” Jaune cringed slightly remembering the promises he made for her and Iris's help getting into Beacon. “I realize you were six at the time so I will explain the situation. Two families meet up. One has one son and six daughters at the time. The other also has one son and two daughters. Numerically what do you think the main topic of conversation was?”

“I would guess the second family was considering trying to arrange a bride for their son?” He offered gaining a little bit of hope in the process.

“Yes another cute little boy took your place getting all the younger girls' attention for a few days while the parents talked. Fortunately they correctly assumed since I was about to start at Beacon I would not have an interest in considering any future arrangements with a boy who wouldn't even enter combat school for a few years.” Jaune chuckled a little at her tone. “So I was given the task of babysitting you and the two precocious girls. As far as I know the only thing that was settled on was that any of the children in our family were invited to spend a few years living in Mistral to train in their family combat style, which I already availed myself of, and they asked us to look out for their daughters who they hoped would study at Beacon since the mothers were originally from Vale. Their little boy grew up to be a promising huntsman in training, but inherited his mom's short temper. I have high hopes my brave little brother will do the same, hopefully without the temper part. So I trust you read the mission homework I gave you?”

“The book on POW camp survivors and PTSD from the Great War?”  Jaune settled to the floor and leaned against the open locker, couldn't she settle on a mood?

“Yes, now here is the first test of this mission. With the information you have gathered today why did I ask you to read that book?”

The most obvious clue was if she and his sisters had been the ones to ask Umber to get in contact with him it had to involve her. She was born in Mistral but talked about being in Atlas and not being in enough contact to know that her half sister would be here. Her constantly teasing him like a kid with a new toy, she obviously enjoyed making him blush, but it was more like she felt it was safe to do so, maybe for the first time in a long time. Finally he sighed when he put the pieces together. “I think you are using me like a therapy dog. If I understand the hints Umber was not in Atlas by her own choice and wasn't allowed to leave either. So you asked her to stick close and look after me so that I could look after her.”

“A golden star for the observation.” Jaune slumped at the lack of denial. “I would put it more as I expect you to try to be a friend that she can lean on that she has no lingering resentment towards, and maybe a little fondness for if she remembers your first meeting at all. You can't deny you could use all the friends you can get and looking after you could possibly keep her from self destructing by testing how far her newfound freedom goes.”

“So any other surprises I should be watching out for?” He set about gathering his scattered clothing and putting it back in the locker for the night.

“That should be all that I have for you. Sleep well and stay safe, I look forward to hearing from you after you get assigned a team.” He smiled as he sent a good night wish in return and started putting his Scroll back in his pants. As he picked up his breastplate he noticed the padding had pulled up on one side and a bit of blue enamel was showing against the white. Unhooking the padding entirely revealed not one, or two, but seven large and thickly enameled seals like Umber's that had been put there. With a groan he reseated the padding and put the breastplate back in the locker and closed the door.

Walking back to the ballroom from the locker room revealed that the argument had ended and most of the other prospective students had already curled up in their sleeping bags. Glancing over where he had seen the two girls before he rushed from the room he found a pair of sleeping bags that had been turned so the openings faced each other. In one he could see the back of a red haired head and in the other he saw Umber's hat covering her head and face. He could see between them the red haired girl reaching over into the other sleeping bag and a peak of her hand gently holding a hand with pale pink skin.

As he walked over and climbed into his own sleeping bag a few more things clicked into place. From the time they arrived Umber had quite literally not approached anyone that wasn't staff that he hadn't approached first. The only exceptions being Coco who he assumed she knew by reputation, the black haired girl who kissed her in the assembly hall, and this girl who she was now sleeping next to. Thanks to the demonstration of Umber's color changing illusions, which it was apparent she couldn't maintain in her sleep. It was simple elimination to assume that the girl with black hair and the one with red that she seemed so comfortable with now were one in the same. Which given their first meeting he came to the conclusion their relationship was something a bit more than sisterly.

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".ey sl..py ..ed" He tried rolling over and burying his head into the pillow but the voice came back again accompanied by a pair of hands gently pulling his shoulder. "Wake up, it's time for breakfast."

"Just five more minutes Jilli food can wait that long can't it?" He tried sleepily arguing with his tormenter while rolling free of her grasp.

"Jaune who's Jilli?" The question woke him up enough to open his eyes as he realized he was not in fact in his warm bed at home.

"My sister Jillian who only likes to think she is older and more responsible then me." The blonde girl kneeling next to him was definitely not who he first thought of either. The hair pooling behind her on the floor was longer than any of his sisters wore theirs, even if the hairband she was wearing reminded him of his baby sister still. "You remind me of her a little, and on that note I feel I should tell you to be more cautious. I can see something I probably shouldn't from this angle."

"Well big brother Jaune." The girl grinned impishly at him while leaning forward to whisper in his ear, incidentally pushing her knees further apart. "You can't see something I'm not wearing in the first place." Composure breaking the girl started giggling at his blushing and sputtering. "I'm wearing a bodysuit under this shirt, so what you are seeing is an armor plate, but if my opponent in a spar spends time thinking about what they are or aren't seeing it's to my advantage."

"Why me?" Jaune groaned as he rolled out of his sleeping bag, for good or ill his heart rate was now far too high to fall back asleep. "Seriously why wait on me? It looked like you were getting along well with the girl you were talking to last night, or there's Ruby and Yang."

"She's a friend from back home and I suggested it would be better for us both to mingle more." Umber relaxed back into a more demure sitting position with her knees drawn up to her chest. "After breakfast we don't have a lot of time before the initiation, and I would hate to horn in on the girls' sisterly bonding time since we don't know how things will stand after." She pointed a finger dramatically at Jaune and winked. "And you sir seriously underestimate how enjoyable your company can be."

Acknowledging the inevitable Jaune gathered up his bedroll and walked in a surprisingly relaxed silence with Umber to the locker room where after grabbing clean clothing they parted ways to head to the gender separated shower and changing areas. After a quick shower and getting dressed he almost chuckled when he found Umber in the shared lavatory fully dressed and trying somewhat successfully to dry her long hair with one of the provided bath towels that even the boy could tell was not adequate to the task.

"Would you like some help?" He ventured while holding a fresh towel in each hand. The girl blushed a little but nodded in acceptance of the offer. "I'm surprised you don't have a blow dryer."

"I usually cheat and use water dust to draw the moisture out." Umber sighed as he gently gathered her hair behind her head holding it between the two large cloths and began rubbing them back and forth while working his way down to the tip. "Yang said one of the announcements was that we were not to use any spells with offensive potential on campus before initiation. Since we weren't there to hear it, I would rather not take any chances."

Jaune just shrugged in response, there really wasn't anything more to say. He just watched as the girl finished drying her hair and tucking her fox ears back and slipping the hairband over them to keep them from popping out of her hair. "Thank you for helping me."

Things went smoothly from there with Jaune only having a small laugh at her healthy appetite for eggs and bacon instead of the large platters of pancakes the cafeteria offered reminding him even more of home.

The first real hurdle Jaune found in dealing with Umber came when they went back to the locker room where they had both picked lockers on the far side of the room and after he had strapped on Crocea Mors he turned to find her with her gear on including straps for a new backpack. He had to guess it was a backpack because Umber had her back pressed up against a pillar and looked to be in no hurry to move. A glance towards the exit was all it took for him to understand why.

"You noticed yesterday that Weiss isn't likely to recognize you." He quietly observed.

"That was yesterday in a crowded and poorly lit grand hall." Umber whispered back. "I can't get out of this well lit room without passing within a few feet of her." His look of disbelief prompted her to continue. "Imagine if you were forced to carry an open bucket of oil down a narrow path lined with torches. You can't let go of the bucket, you know that there is only a small chance of it being ignited, but you know if it goes up you have no chance of putting it back out."

Jaune took a few minutes to look over the room before he unstrapped his weapon and handed it to Umber. Pulling a facility map out of the pocket of his hoodie he grinned at her confused expression. "Here is what we will do then. I'll make sure everyone's attention is on me. You follow a few steps behind and make sure to keep this map blocking your view of Weiss. In this instance it will be a case of if you can't see her she won't be able to see your face."

"Ridiculous!" He whined loudly as he walked past Ruby and Yang, earning a raised eyebrow from the other blond. "There's no way I put my stuff in locker six three six yesterday! I would have remembered having to count that high!" A glance to his left revealed Umber following as he asked and barely restraining giggles. "Why does this have to happen today?!"

Reaching the far end of the room Umber handed him back his weapon and then he made the mistake of glancing back into the room. Her friend really did remind him of his sister right down to the incredibly fake smile she was giving Weiss as the girl talked to her. He nodded for Umber to head on out, and glanced back at the redhead. "Once more into the breach." He noticed her smile became more genuine as she realized his intent. Having four older sisters hadn't taught him much about what worked in flirting, but boy was it hard not to get an earful about what didn't.

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"So Pyrrha have you given any thought to whose team you would like to be on? I'm sure there are many who would be eager to unite with such a strong, well known individual such as yourself." The girl stated oh so politely. To which she would have loved to say anyone but yours.

"Well I'm not quite sure." Pyrrha glanced past Weiss to see Umber join Jaune by the exit. She couldn't help but smile at just how nicely he was playing with her friend. "I was planning on letting the chips fall how they may."

Umber handed a sword with a rather sturdy looking sheath back to the young man, and Pyrrha had to contain a chuckle at remembering his loud lament about locker numbers. She could only cast glances in their direction so as to not give her "companion" the impression she wasn't paying attention. While she wouldn't claim to be any good at reading lips, it was easy to pick out the boy nodding towards the exit and then in her direction with the words "once more" to which Umber nodded enthusiastically before turning and leaving the room.

"Well I was thinking maybe we could be on a team together." The heiress continued the mostly one sided conversation.

"Well that would be grand!" Pyrrha said with some enthusiasm as she tried to subtly wave the boy over. If Weiss assumed it was a response to her statement then all the better. She had to assume the other girl took it that way as her evil grin all but gave away her megalomaniacal musings at the idea.

"You know what else is great." Her knight in faded jeans stated while casually stepping between her and the girl in white. "Me! Jaune Arc. Nice to meet you." She had heard drunken sailors deliver lines more smoothly but at the moment she could quite happily have kissed him.

"Oh you again!" The heiress grumbled. While Pyrrha took the opportunity to close and step away from her locker.

"It's nice to meet you Jaune." She happily responded to her rescuer.

"Ya ya," The boy stepped up to create space between the girls again and with a wink returned to the offensive against the heiress. "So Weiss I couldn't help but overhear your fondness of me the other day."

"Oh you have got to be kidding me." The girl whined.

"Don't worry no need to be embarrassed." Jaune bull rushed on not giving Weiss a chance to regain control of the conversation. "So I was hearing rumors about teams! I was thinking you and I would make a good one. Whatta ya say?" Pyrrha had to contain a laugh from the outrage showing on the heiress' face at having the same insinuation she had been forcing moments before turned back on her. Apparently it never occurred to the other girl that others could overhear them talking.

"Actually I think the teams are composed of four students each so..." The champion began hoping to draw some of the ire directed at him away.

"You don't say." The young man slid towards her and continued his playfully confident delivery. "Well hot stuff if you play your cards right maybe you can join the winning team."

"Jaune? is it?" Weiss interposed herself between them and held him to a double arms length from Pyrrha. The champion only wished she could do the same in turn. "Do you have any idea who you are talking to?"

"Not in the slightest Snow Angel." Pyrrha double blinked at that, he would come to help her simply because she was a friend of a friend?

"This is Pyrrha." The girl introduced her as though they had known each other for more than a few minutes. In truth she had been trying to avoid this situation and only stayed because she sensed Umber was otherwise trapped further in the room with a potentially irate Weiss if she had tried to blow her off and leave.

"Hello again." She waved to Jaune.

"Pyrrha graduated top of her class at Sanctum." She rolled her eyes so only he could see, like this public knowledge somehow made them closer.

"Never heard of it." She felt like her grin threatened to split her face at the scoff his easy dismissive response earned from the other girl.

"She's won the Mistral Regional Tournament four years in a row! A new record!" Pyrrha was having to really hold in giggles at how easily the other girl was losing her cool.

"The what?" The delivery was so easy she had to believe his lack of knowledge was real. Which intrigued the champion, Joan had mentioned something about a gag order on discussing Hunter activities in the house but this was extreme. She just hoped he didn't push the heiress to much further.

Fortunately rather then going on the attack the other girl started to comically flail her arms uselessly at her sides. "She's on the cover of every Pumpkin Pete's Marshmallow Flakes box!"

"Oh that was you!" Jaune put his hands together and pointed at Pyrrha with overly cute adoration. "They only do that for star athletes and cartoon characters!"

"Yah it was pretty cool." She was surprised to find herself blushing a little. "Sadly the cereal is not very good for you."

"So after hearing all that do you honestly believe you! Are in a position to ask her! To be on your team." The uppity snit just had to try taking the stuffing out of him.

The boy deflated under the pressure. "I guess you're right...sorry."

Pyrrha stepped up and put a hand on his shoulder. "Actually Jaune I think you'd make a great leader."

The effect as she put her hands behind her back and smiled was instantaneous with him being all cute confidence again. "Dou oh! Stop it."

"Seriously please stop it." The annoying midget came back again. "This sort of behavior should not be encouraged."

"Sounds like Pyrrha's on for team Jaune. Spots are filling up quick. Now I'm not supposed to do this, but maybe I can pull a few strings and find a place for you. What do you say?" The boy came on like a verbal freight train battering through her defense.

"Okay that's a bit to close." The girl called for an assist. "Pyrrha a little help please." The Champion realized it was time to extract her rescuer and for practice decided to tag his hoodie with Milo.

"I'm sorry." She offered somewhat lamely before she was interrupted by the intercom.

"All first year students please report to Beacon Cliffs for initiation."

The heiress flounced by Jaune with a sniff. Pyrrha reached out with her semblance to take hold of Milo and unpin the boy from the wall. "It was nice meeting you."

"Likewise..." She wished he could have seen her smile as he sighed, but the time he bought for Umber would be wasted if Weiss cornered her on the cliffs. So she chose to follow the girl and keep her distracted.

As they left the building and walked to the cliffs Weiss was in enough of a huff that she remained blissfully silent which Pyrrha was immensely grateful for. As they came in sight of the cliff she found Umber had taken up position on one of the first launchers and secured a few filled positions between them. While Weiss was looking at the professors she discretely caught Umber's attention and mouthed the words, 'I have a solution to your problem.'

She threw Umber a huge grin after Professor Ozpin announced their partners would be decided by eye contact. She attached Akouo to her bracer just before being launched into the air and used a few nudges of her semblance on it and her greaves to control her flight. After ploughing through two trees, and rolling into a ready position on a branch she brought out Milo in rifle form and sighted her target through the scope helping her lock on to his Aura in her mind. After shifting Milo back into a spear she launched it down range.

Delicate course correction with her semblance was required to line up where she sensed the space between his Aura was and where the small barb had been left from Milo's spear tip the first time. With a loud thunk she sent her weapon right through the same hole and pinned Jaune embarrassingly high up in a tree. Saving him from a rough landing, but also making it unlikely anyone would try to approach.

With a actual giggle at the irony of the situation she unclipped the plate with her spear and shield symbol from her sash and hung that on the strap to her pouch. Shaking it out a little she wrapped the veil around her head and shoulders. Within moments all her clothing and armor changed to dappled browns, grays, and greens. Lifting up slightly with her semblance on her greaves she started to skip lightly between the tree branches towards where Jaune was waiting.

With a quiet crackle a large curved fang of ice appeared off to the side of her in the woods and she saw a small figure actually run up it. Umber swooped in just in time to catch the little goth loli as her feet lost traction "Thanks for dropping in Little Rose." Pyrrha stifled a laugh at her sister's pun and it became even harder when she heard the exuberant response. "We're flying!"

She continued to slip like another shadow through the tree branches. She was born a Spartan, she had trained with weapons since before she could walk. It was hard for her to explain to her parents why one of her most precious childhood memories was of a camping trip. She loved her father but his idea of roughing it was not taking the captain's or VIP quarters on whatever ship he was traveling on. With her mother running the trading company it practically guaranteed that any family trips were taken on one of the company's ships. So it was a special occasion when her family got together with a larger family for a camp out and she ended up just being one girl among other girls doing normal things.

She spent the whole time just playing with the other girls. She and Umber got to listen to a baby's heartbeat through the mother's tummy. There was even this adorable toddler that insisted on climbing into her lap to curl up and take a nap, she had actually pleaded with her parents to let her keep that little girl.

Most special of all though was an inordinately rare occurrence. She had always been a prodigy, and could count on one hand the number of people outside her family who had ever caught on that she would want or need assistance and acted on it. During that trip it had been when she and Umber had decided snares they found around a clearing near their camp were needlessly cruel and set about springing them all. The result was the trappers caught them in the act of doing so, and she found herself facing four teens with only a walking stick.

She could never forget how this boy came out of nowhere and peppering the teens with water balloons and flowery insults tricked them all into chasing him over the side of a bluff where they fell into a river.

So today her count didn't go up by any. It didn't even matter that he didn't remember her name. The same sweet boy had chosen again to come to her rescue like she was just a regular girl.

She stopped on a branch seeing something that made her want to grind her teeth in frustration. An interloper had somehow reached the goal first and was hesitantly looking up at the target. The blond boy waved and let out a nervous laugh, to which the uninvited guest merely sniffed at and stomped off into the trees. "Hey wait, who's gonna get me down from here!"

She grinned as she let the concealing technique fade, affixing the veil as a sash again she dropped lightly to the ground. Stepping out from the trees and under the boy she crossed her arms under her chest and smiled up knowing full well the view she was giving him. "Jaune! Do you have any spots left on your team?"

"Very funny." The response was grumpy but the smile he returned was warm. He rescuer waiting again for her to help him back to safety. If she could have Umber hugging her back again the moment would be perfect.