Chapter Text
Cassandra closes the door to her room with a sigh.
The meeting had gone well. The whole day went well, as a matter of fact. Reconstruction was well under way, the last crops of the year were being harvested before winter fully set in, and the people of Whitestone’s spirits are slowly, slowly rising once more. It’s as if the city has been asleep for five years and is finally waking up. The somewhat improved weather helps as well; she hadn’t realized, during those five years, just how much gloomier the city had become under the reign of the Briarwoods.
Cassandra sits at the foot of her bed, and takes a shaky breath. Then, another. Finally, she can’t hold it back. Her face screws up in a pained frown, and she lets out a sob.
Her eyes hurt and she’s had a cold for a couple days now. Her brother had been worried, even fearful that it was a side-effect of… breaking the connection with it. But no, she knows the truth: it’s because she’s been crying, hard, every day since the city was saved.
She hates it. She hates herself for it. The city is free, the Briarwoods are dead, her brother is alive… she’s had everything she wanted but doesn’t deserve handed to her on a silver platter. Even knowing that, it’s like she can’t feel it to be true yet. (She hopes she will, soon. She hopes that empty feeling in her chest will fill in with something other than hate.)
Cassandra Briarwood couldn’t cry. The few times she did, in the depths of the night when she thought no one could hear her, they’d known, somehow. Delilah would spend the next day being extra sugary-sweet to her, and they would sit down and have a “proper dinner like a real family” and she would pretend she didn’t know that Sylas’s glass had blood in it.
She coughs out another sob. For a moment, something catches in her throat, and she opens her eyes in fear, expecting to see smoke coming from her mouth. She doesn’t; he’s gone. The only thing in her throat is the saliva and mucus of a messy cry. She had known the moment they threw her rapier in the acid alongside the body of Delilah Briarwood and her brother's gun; she’d felt the demon leave. She is free.
Slowly, carefully, Cassandra slides off her coat, and lets her wings stretch out for the first time in hours. She tries to stifle a yawn, but it comes out even through her crying-induced hiccups.
When she was little, she’d made a habit of reading some of the storybooks in the library. There was a small selection of ones that weren’t for adults but not quite for kids either; she knew there was a term for it but can’t recall anymore. Regardless, among those books included a handful with a common theme: a young girl wants to be a knight, or a fighter, or some other adventurous job, and pretends to be a boy in order to do so. Cass had been fascinated by those stories, left in awe by the perseverance of their heroines in keeping a deathly secret to themselves every hour of the day.
Cassandra wishes her deception were as honorable as breaking gender expectations. Instead, she hides her devil’s wings from the people she’d betrayed.
They’re growing back. Every morning, she spots a few new feathers on the bony protrusions, limbs that have become shiny-white like her brother’s hair or the white streak in her own. That doesn’t change the fact that the reason they have to grow back at all is because she had Fallen, with a capital F.
She can’t remember the sequence of events. Somewhere between losing her family and becoming Cassandra Briarwood she’d been hurt and experimented on and turned into something else. And then one day she’d woken up and been the aasimar child of a necromancer and a vampire with a demon whispering in her dreams.
She lets out another sob. She never wants to think of herself that way, ever again. She doesn’t have to. They’re gone. But… the memories aren’t. This can’t be fixed in a week.
So Cassandra hunches over on herself, wings spread wide for none of the world to see, and cries.
---
“Hey, kid.”
Cassandra can’t help but startle at the voice that greets her when she walks into the servant’s kitchen late one night.
She’s not sure why she’s here. Ostensibly- to herself, that is- it’s to get a glass of water. The truth is, she’s a bit hungry as well, even though she knows late-night snacking is a bad habit. Part of the reason might be that she just wants to prove that she can, that she’s allowed to leave her room and go do whatever she wants.
So when Scanlan Shorthalt casually addresses her from his seat atop the dining table, yes, she flinches.
“Oh, ah, sorry about that.” His lute is in his lap but he doesn’t seem to have been playing it.
“No problem,” she says quietly, and fetches herself a glass.
“What’s a lovely young lady like you doing down here at this time of night?”
Cassandra doesn’t want to dignify his words with a response, but she can’t help but turn back and look at him just to raise an eyebrow.
With a huff, Scanlan leans back onto the table. “Sheesh, I’m not actually flirting with you. You’re like, what, 16? Even I have limits.”
“Good,” she says, not bothering to correct him on her age.
She sits down at the table- several seats away from the gnome- and takes small sips of water from her glass. She sticks an elbow on the table so as to support her chin, and holds the glass in her other hand.
“Damn. You brood just like your brother,” Scanlan says after a couple of seconds.
Cassandra lets out a snort at that, half out of surprise and half out of amusement. Mercifully, he’d said it between sips.
“Oh really?”
“Yup. Well, he’d spend a good couple hours in his workshop first. Or days. But the few times we managed to get him out of there when he was in a bad mood, he’d sit just like that. ‘Course, we’d all be drinking ale or something and he’d pull out some whiskey or wine from gods-know-where. Up his tightwad ass, probably.”
She lets out a chuckle at that. “Well, he must have picked that up somewhere else, because Mother and Father wouldn’t let us drink until we were twenty.”
Scanlan doesn’t react to that. Cassandra doesn’t notice at first, but after another few sips of water she looks over and sees Scanlan staring up at the ceiling wordlessly.
Another few sips, and he says, “Everything alright between you guys?”
For a moment she doesn’t know what he means, but then she realizes: the gnome she’d thought to be nothing but a horny bard is seriously inquiring as to the state of her relationship with Percival- no- it’s just ‘Percy’ now.
“It’s… alright, yes,” she says, knowing that he’ll prod further.
“You sure?” he asks again, and rolls over- still laying down on the table- to look her in the eyes.
“...Yes. We talked, the morning after, and… I’d like to talk to him again, about things, but we’ve all been busy.”
“Make sure you do that, okay?”
Cassandra meets his eyes. Then, she nods. “I will.”
She finishes off her glass, then makes for the hallway. Just before she leaves the room, she turns back.
“I can show you where the Briarwoods kept their fancy liquor.”
“Ooooh,” Scanlan says, then hops off the table and flips his lute to his back. To her surprise, he doesn’t say anything else. Probably so that she doesn’t change her mind.
“Just don’t touch the pinot noir, Sylas put blood in those.”
“Noted.”
---
Two weeks after, well… everything, Cassandra finds herself once again sitting at the foot of her bed. This time though, she isn’t alone.
Pike Trickfoot had arrived from Vasselheim late last night, having set out to be in Whitestone in the flesh as soon as she’d returned from her stint of astral projection.
Keyleth, Scanlan, and Vex all have healing magic, but it was made instantly clear to Cassandra that Pike is the professional, with Pike herself having described the other three’s spells as “combat healing”, which Cass was pretty sure was a nice way of saying “band-aid solution.”
For ten minutes, Cassandra has sat still- almost bored- whilst Pike keeps her eyes closed with a faint glow of white over her eyelids and hands.
Finally, the cleric’s eyes open. Cass can’t see her own face, but she’s sure the expression she’s wearing is one that Pike has seen a lot.
Pike gives her a gentle smile, and says, “All good. I couldn’t sense anything.”
Cassandra, despite herself, lets out a sigh of relief. Detect Good and Evil; that was what Pike had called the spell. And, according to said spell- Cass is demon-free.
Pike gestures to Cass’s hands, which are currently covered by her gloves. “Would you mind if I…?”
“Oh, of course,” she responds, and peels off the leather gloves. Underneath, her hands have almost completely recovered.
The day of the Ziggurat battle, the battle where she’d nearly killed her own brother… well, she hadn’t come out unscathed. In that mess of fire and smoke, as Cassandra had tried to hold it down as her brother gushed out a fountain of flames… well, the demon had fought back. The fire, too, had not discriminated.
Hence the pink patches of recovering skin and faint scar lines on Cassandra’s hands and wrists.
“Looks like they’re healing nicely. Any issues with coordination, grip strength, or holding things?”
“No,” Cass says with a shake of her head; it’s the honest truth. Pike’s quick application of healing after the battle is probably to thank for that.
“Looks like a full recovery, then. That’s good,” Pike says, then looks up to meet Cassandra’s eyes. She has to work to not flinch, not because she’s scared of the gnome, but because she’s a bloody walking miracle.
She’s heard the tone of awe that Vox Machina uses when describing Pike. And it turns out, the real thing lives up to the hype.
“How about your wings?”
“Oh, er-” Cassandra starts, then decides to just take off her coat.
“You don’t have to if you don’t-”
“No, no, I… you should take a look,” she says, cutting off Pike. “I don’t mind.”
The truth is, she really doesn’t. She can sense the earnestness coming off of Pike like heat off a fire. The forgiveness and generosity the cleric has shown her is almost intimidating in its virtue.
Cassandra slips her arms out of the jacket’s sleeves, and her wings extend outwards. She automatically stretches them out to their full span- which is admittedly satisfying- and then instinctively shakes them for a second before folding them loosely against her back.
“I’ll be honest, there really isn’t a precedent for this,” Pike says, gesturing at the wings. “But it looks like they’re… recovering. How did they look before…”
Before I let a demon into my soul, Cass finishes the thought.
“They… I… I don’t know,” she admits. “I knew I was an aasimar, from the eyes and the white streak, but… I never summoned the wings. Not until after.”
Pike nods. “I understand it can be worrying, to experience something… new, like this-”
“I don’t need the puberty talk,” Cass interrupts. She immediately realizes that wasn’t what Pike was going to talk about, and puts a hand over her mouth out of sheepishness. “I mean, ah, go on.”
“Right, er… I mean, if you haven’t-”
“I know the facts of life, thanks,” Cass quickly says. Bloody hells, she may have been living under a rock, but she’s 18!
“Right. Sorry. Anyways…” Pike takes a step back. “I’m going to be honest- there’s no record that I was able to find in Vasselheim about aasimar with permanent, physical wings. That doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened before, or that this is wrong. I’ve double-checked now- there’s nothing demonic, infernal, or otherwise hellish in you. And…”
Pike looks a bit sheepish. “This is only speculation, but… I think that you and Percy are going through similar things. You had at least a semblance of physical wings to start with; he didn’t, hence the different stages of growth. That’s despite the fact that you two, as far as we know, displayed very different aasimar traits when it was… awakened in you. That makes me think that, whatever happens from here on out? It’s part of the original gift given to your family, not what happened in between.”
Cassandra sits in silence, trying to take that in. It’s, on a surface level, patently ridiculous. A long-lost blessing? Unheard of aasimar traits? She wants to dismiss it out of hand, she wants to curl into her self-doubt, but… she’s spent five years living the impossible, surviving the impossible.
“I hope you’re right,” she says quietly. Pike takes one of her hands in her own, and they share a smile.
---
Cassandra pauses to catch her breath, sucking in air past her dry throat even though she’d only been walking. That, though, was enough to leave her winded after such a long day helping with the reconstruction.
In the first couple weeks, she’d helped with the harvest, a task slightly better suited for someone who’d barely had the chance to exercise in the past half decade. Now though, with winter firmly setting in, the main focus is to ensure that everyone in the city has a place that can survive the harsh northern snows.
Beyond the soreness of her throat from the exercise of moving planks and bricks around, a deep ache has set in from the base of her neck down to the bottom of her shoulder blades. She hunches over and tightens her jacket against the chill, even as it worsens the ache and she feels the outline of her wings press against the fabric.
She’s only a couple minutes away from the castle, even at her pace. From where she stands, she can see the town in its entirety, bathed in a faint pink from the partially-clouded sunset. Despite the time of year, the Sun Tree’s lowest branches are dotted with leaves, and the trunk no longer looks so gnarled and ancient.
If she has contributed even a fraction of what Vox Machina has done for this city, then the ache in her upper body has been worth it.
“You alright, Cass?” a voice calls, pulling her attention away from the vista. It’s Percival.
She turns to see her brother walking up the castle road, clad in his usual blue coat, cheeks pink in the chilly air.
“Er- yes,” she says, and wraps her arms around herself. “Just a bit chilly.”
Even as she says that, she winces as a lance of pain shoots through her left shoulder, and she tries to adjust her stance without making it too awkward and revealing the extent of her soreness.
“Did you hurt something-” Percy says, clearing the final few steps to her and reaching a hand out, but not quite touching her shoulder.
“No, I’m fine,” she snaps, then turns to look up at him. “Just sore. Especially the… you know.”
Percy’s face is soft, toeing the line of pity and concern just on the side of the latter. “You could let them out, you know. If… if you want.”
“What?” she asks, then exhales. “Sorry, I mean- they’re still…”
“No one saw them, ah, before,” he says, and she quickly glances around to see if there’s anyone else nearby. There isn’t, of course. Percy continues. “We need a cover story, anyway. Both of us. How about… that our blessing occurred around the same time, but that we didn’t know it until we met up again. Then, we both learned to control it, only to be wounded by the Briarwoods’ magic, and my recovery is going to take a little longer. No one will see yours as anything but celestial wings that were gravely wounded in a fight.”
“I-” Cassandra begins, then cuts herself off. She wants to believe that is how the people of Whitestone will see them- will see her. She’s seen the looks citizens give her as she works among them; pride, awe, even gratitude for her perceived heroism. It’s a purely selfish desire, but… she doesn’t want to lose that. She doesn't want the looks of scorn and resentment that populate her nightmares to become reality. She bows her head.
Percy remains silent, then nods his head. “It’s your choice. I… I want people to see you for what you are. What you really are. Someone who has suffered, and fought, and came through the other side, just like them.”
Cass feels her lips screw into a frown, and she fights back the urge to fling herself at her brother and not let go. She wants that so, so bad.
Before she can hesitate or change her mind, she quickly pulls her arms out of her jacket and ties it around her waist. She’s already cut holes in her less fancy shirts to wear underneath her winter clothes. The cold seems to creep deeper into her without the extra layer, but it’s worth it. She doesn’t spread her wings to their widest span; they simply hang loosely, casually, only extending a little bit out past her torso’s width on each side, in the position that seems to be their default.
She looks up at Percy, who in turn is looking at her wings poking around from behind her back. He looks up to meet her eyes, and nods.
“I’m proud of you, Cass. I may not trust my judgement in many things, but I have faith in that feeling. Faith in you.”
Cass, drained of all inhibitions, throws herself at her brother and wraps her arms around his soft coat, pressing her face into his chest. She doesn’t feel tears coming- she’s emptied of them by now- but desires the comfort all the same. “Th-thanks…”
Percy returns the hug and begins to run his right hand along her right wing, right where it emerges from her shirt. It’s soothing, the same as rubbing one’s back, and she lets her stance relax. After a few moments, Percy withdraws, and she lets him. He looks down at her, runs a thumb along the left side of her forehead, right on the hairline, then leans down and presses a kiss to her scalp.
“I want to talk,” she says as he pulls back, and his eyes widen ever so slightly. She lets out a small chuckle. “Just, as… I just want us to talk more.”
The concern fades from his eyes and melts into something she’s too overwhelmed to put a name to. “I would like that too. Very much.”
Then, he gestures up towards the castle. “But first, let’s get somewhere warmer, hm?”
“Oh, yes,” Cass agrees, letting her fatigue come through in her voice even as she shows enthusiasm. They walk side-by-side, and the uphill climb isn’t so bad anymore.
“Would you like me to, ah, adjust your coats? I’ve picked up some needleworking, if you’d believe it. Running around killing things and getting dirty has forced me to pick up some skills,” he says, and Cass smiles.
“I seem to recall my brother Percival was already quite skilled even before his adventurous cavortions,” she responds. The urge to tease is there, but she’d rather not push when he’s been so unabashedly earnest with her.
“Mmm. Perhaps I should specify practical skills,” he says, and she doesn’t have to look over at him to know he’s smiling too.
“Well, the little trinkets you made for us back then may not have been practical, but they were still great gifts,” she says. Is she laying it on thick? She’s not trying to butter him up or anything- what she’s saying is true- but she doesn’t know how it’ll come off when she’s so used to being coy and, well, fake with the B- with her captors.
“That’s… I’m glad to hear that,” Percy admits.
Something strikes Cass. “I think I managed to hide some away, come to think of it.”
“Oh?” her brother asks, and stops walking to turn to face her.
Cassandra frowns. “It was… a while ago. Near the beginning. They might’ve been found. I… forgot, until just now.”
She meets his gaze. “I think the remains of that alarm clock you made might be there, if they’re still there. I took what I could find out of everyone else’s bedrooms and stuck them in an old set of drawers in one of the storage rooms.”
Percy lifts his eyebrows in recollection. “I, ah… if you got them out of the bottom drawer of my desk, that would be where I put, er, my failed creations. The ones that were intact and worth looking at later, if I recall correctly.”
“All the more reason to hope they went untouched,” Cass concludes. Percy gives a snort, and they continue walking.
“Learning needlework is impressive and all, but Mother taught us girls that. I appreciate the offer but, ah, I can manage my own wardrobe,” she says after remembering what had led them to the subject.
“I could still lend a hand, no? Many hands make light work, and all that,” Percy retorts.
“Says the boy who would blow his top any time the rest of us tried to peek in his workshop,” Cass shoots back. Still, she considers his words. Percy’s always given gifts made by his own hands to his family, and that seems to have extended to Vox Machina. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that he shows his love with what he makes.
“I did not-!” Percy begins, then lets out a sigh. Out of the corner of her eyes Cassandra watches him pinch his nose. “You lot always managed to get me to let you in, anyways. And I’d very much like to think I’ve matured.”
“...You have,” Cass says after a moment, unable to think of a humorous response.
“We both have,” Percy agrees. Before the conversation can stagnate into awkwardness via honesty, Cass looks up from the trail to see that they’ve arrived.
Percy pulls open one of the large double doors, and gestures to Cass. “Lady Cassandra.”
Cass gives a faux curtsy, then rolls her eyes. “Lord Percival.”
They enter, and are all the warmer for it.
---
It’s two days before Winter’s Crest when Cassandra hears the footsteps.
Percy is downstairs in his workshop. The rest of Vox Machina has gone into town to, in Scanlan’s words, “philanthropize local businesses”. The servants have gone home for the day. She’s spent five years learning to be perceptive, and so while she hasn’t quite learned Vox Machina’s footsteps she has at least picked up on her brother’s. These are not her brother's footsteps.
There’s no one in the castle but her and Percy, and the footsteps she is hearing are not his. They’re quiet, in fact- suspiciously so.
Cassandra holds in her frustrated reaction to reaching at her hip and remembering that her rapier is long since gone into an acid pit. All she has on her is a dagger: a wicked sharp one, but still just a dagger.
She’s approaching a turn in the corridor, where the west hall becomes the south hall. As soon as she turns left, she sidles up against the inner wall as quietly as she can. The footsteps grow louder.
As soon as the person comes into view, she jumps behind them, left hand on their shoulder and right hand wrapped around to place the dagger against their neck.
She takes in the intruder, the coat they’re wearing, the leather strap across their torso, long black hair with feathers in it-
“Vex,” Cass says in shock, almost a whisper, and immediately retracts the dagger. “Oh, Gods, I’m- I thought-”
“Darling,” Vex says, turning around quickly to reveal a surprisingly calm face for someone who’d just been jumped and held at dagger-point. She raises her hands in surrender. “It’s just me.”
“I know, I’m- Gods, I’m sorry. I thought you were out for the night,” Cass says, and begins to take heavy breaths that she hadn’t realized she needs.
“You’ve nothing to apologize for,” Vex says with a shake of her head, face apologetic. “It’s my bad. I trained myself to be sneaky; it's practically automatic. You had every reason to be afraid.”
“Let’s chalk it up to mutual error,” Cassandra says, attempting to be diplomatic, but Vex’s expression doesn’t change. At that, Cass moves to continue to her destination, that being the library. “Let me get out of your hair.”
“It’s not a bother, Cass, truly. It’s your castle after all,” Vex says with a faint smile.
“Not a bother to almost have your throat slit?” Cass asks in bewilderment. “Is the adventuring lifestyle truly so perilous?”
“Not any more perilous than what you’ve been through, I’m sure,” Vex says, and Cass tips her head in acknowledgement; the half-elf has a point. Then, Vex surprises her with a question. “Are you alright, still living here?”
Cass freezes at that. “What do you mean?”
Vex frowns. “I’m sorry if- I just thought… it’s not quite the same, but… well, Vax and I spent some years in a household where our every move was watched. Even if the person responsible for that were to leave, well… I wouldn't- I refuse to ever live in that house again.”
She looks at Cass, then winces. “It’s- it wasn’t nearly as bad as your situation. I just figured… if you don’t want to keep living up here in the castle, I don’t think anyone would blame you.”
Cass swallows, then considers her words. “I… thank you, that’s very thoughtful of you, I just… I want to stay here. Being here, being able to go wherever I want, becoming, well, the master of the house… helps, I think.”
She gives Vex a half-smile. “I don’t suppose Scanlan showed the rest of you the wine stash?”
Mercifully, Vex laughs at that. “Yes, and between him, Grog, and Keyleth, I’m afraid I have to report that Whitestone Castle is running low on alcohol. That’s why they resorted to, ah, tavern-crawling tonight.”
Cassandra raises her eyebrows. “That’s… wow. Even with a goliath… I’m impressed.”
“It helps to cope,” Vex says with a shrug. “Not that I’m recommending that avenue, of course, and especially not to someone of your age.”
“I suppose I’ll have to settle for late-night trips to the library,” Cassandra says with a shake of her head.
“Oh? Looking for something in particular, or…?” Vex trails off. Cass knows what Vex is doing- trying to accompany her to make sure she’s truly alright- but quite frankly, she doesn’t care. Companionship sounds quite nice at the moment.
“Yes, in fact, I am,” she says, then takes a breath. “There’s a, ah, specific genre my mother and Vesper used to enjoy, that I was too young to read at the time. I figured I may as well use my newfound freedom to, well… give it a shot.”
“I see,” Vex says, raising an eyebrow. “Mind if I assist in your search? I wouldn’t say I’m an expert in that field, but an extra pair of eyes never hurts…”
No, but it makes it a lot more awkward, Cass bites back, but she gives a shake in surrender. “I’d appreciate the help. I’ve heard you have an eye for quality, after all.”
Vex gives a mischievous smirk, and the two carry on down the hallway. Cass resolves not to ask what exactly brought Vex back to the castle that night.
---
“Are you the Lady?”
Cassandra starts, the loud voice coming from such close proximity taking her by surprise. She’s sitting on a bench- getting her pants a little wet from the condensation- watching the arm-wrestling tournament, which includes among its contestants several members of Vox Machina, the woman Trisha from the first Chamber meeting, and the ex-Duke Vedmeyer, who submitted himself to hard labor as penance for his crimes against the people of Whitestone.
Trisha defeats Vedmeyer. The cheers are deafening. The only person not to whoop in congratulations is Grog, who appears to be unable to hide his disappointment that he won’t get to go up against the ex-Duke.
Amidst the noise, Cassandra turns to find the voice that had spoken just moments before the cheering. To her surprise, its source is a young girl no older than seven or eight, staring at her curiously with head cocked to the side.
“I’m Lady Cassandra, if that was your question,” she responds. The girl nods vigorously. “What’s your name?”
“Eiline,” they respond. “E-I-L-I-N-E.”
“That’s a very pretty name. Mine is spelled C-A-S-S-A-N-D-R-A,” Cass says, only to watch Eiline squint in confusion. “It’s pretty long, huh?”
More nods. Cassandra smiles. “You can call me Cass, if you’d like.”
“But you’re a Lady,” Eiline insists. At that, Cassandra rubs at the empty half of the bench with her gloves to clear away the frost, then pats the open seat. Eiline climbs onto it.
“Well, that’s true. But that’s only important when I’m doing my job. Right now I’m not working, so I’m just Cass,” she says.
“Okay,” Eiline agrees. Cass watches as the girl tries to look at her wings without being obvious, but the girl is foiled by the unsubtleness of her age. Noticing that Cass has caught her staring, she asks, “Why do you have wings?”
It’s not the first time she’s been asked about them, but most of the time it’s phrased as ‘are you an angel?’ Cass doesn't mind explaining, though, not so long as it's the sanitized version of events that Percy cooked up.
“Some people are blessed when they’re born. It can be just them or their whole family. My family was blessed a long time ago, but eventually they lost it,” she begins.
“How did they lose it?” Eiline cuts in, and Cass stifles a laugh at the direct question.
Cass shrugged. “It faded away. But my brother and I needed it very badly, so it came back. We fought the people who’d done terrible things to the city.”
“The Briarwoods,” Eiline says, and the sudden seriousness, almost somberness, of her tone makes Cass’s heart twinge. She pats Eiline’s shoulder.
“Yes. Them and the people who worked for them. Vox Machina- have you heard of them?” A nod. “-and myself fought the Briarwoods. They hurt me, so my wings are still recovering, which is why they’re so thin. But I’ll be fine; it’s just going to take a little time to heal.”
“Like when my brother broke his arm,” Eiline says.
“Yes, very much like that,” Cass agrees, and tries not to think about the many horrible ways someone in Whitestone could’ve gotten their arm broken in the past few years. She truly hopes it had been an accident.
Eiline looks at the wings again, and Cass stretches them out a little. They’re noticeably thicker, the odd material they’re made of having gone from a thin, skeletal branch to a thicker plane that curves forward along the top. About half of the surface is covered in feathers at this point, some of them several inches long. She’s not sure how they work, biologically- she’s almost certain there’s magic involved- or if she’ll even be able to fly with them, like her brother had been able to do with his fire. All the mysteries aside, she… likes them. She doesn’t mind them, and even in such a short amount of time… they’re a part of her. They don't feel the cold, and now that she doesn't have to hide them, they aren't a source of discomfort. They feel almost natural, right .
“I gotta go back to my momma,” Eiline says, meeting Cass’s eyes before moving to run off, only to stop and turn back. “Thank you!”
With that, Eiline runs off. Cass isn’t sure what, exactly, she was just thanked for.
“You’re so, so, welcome…” she whispers to herself, eyes blinking back tears she hadn’t felt coming. Something warm unfurls inside her chest; she can prove herself worthy of Eiline’s trust. She will do her best by this city.
---
“We have verified your claims. Having confirmed that you have not done grievous harm to or taken the life of one of your fellow citizens, and finding your circumstances severe enough to warrant your actions, you are assigned a year and a day of working to rebuild the city in exchange for a reasonable wage. Should you fulfill this without giving us any reason to doubt your loyalty to our city, you will be pardoned for your previous employment, and it will be wiped from the records,” Cassandra recites.
The man before her, Ryelee, gives a quick nod. “Thank you. I’ll work hard- as hard as I can.”
Cassandra gives a small, firm nod. “You are dismissed.”
The young man- young, but still a few years older than Cassandra herself- leaves the room as quick as he can without being impolite. Cass lets out a sigh, and turns to her brother.
Percival is sitting at the long table of the First House of Whitestone, the same one that has been used for Chamber meetings. He makes a note on one of the many papers spread out before him, then looks up. “That’s the last for today.”
Unable to stop herself, Cassandra lets out another sigh, then sits down at the table. “I hate this.”
“I know,” Percy says quietly. “There’s not many left to go over.”
Cass nods, but stays quiet.
Many of the guards for Tylerie and Vedmeyer’s Houses, as well as Whitestone Castle itself, had been mercenaries employed directly by the Briarwoods. Some had come from Wildemount when they’d first visited, having camped out in the Parchwood until the time came for the coup. Another portion had been members of the Pale Guard who had turned on the de Rolos at the behest of Kerrion Stonefell. Everyone in those two categories was now dead, whether at the hands of Whitestone’s liberators or by execution.
There’s a third category, though- those who were employed after the coup, from the terrified and desperate population of Whitestone. Most were young men lured by even the lowliest of wages in an attempt to feed their families following the death of one or both parents. (Said wages were better than the mere coppers paid to those forced to toil in the fields, which was the only option for most citizens.) Many were still alive, particularly those who had abandoned their posts following Vox Machina’s storming of the House used by Kerrion Stonefell. Those who had turned to fight in the revolution were pardoned on the condition that they had not taken the life of, or inflicted a grievous wound on, a fellow citizen during the occupation. Those who had not received word of the revolution were pardoned so long as they had not taken any lives or permanently wounded anyone during the occupation or revolution, and that they hadn’t shown any loyalty to the Briarwoods’ government following the retaking of the city.
Furthermore, citizens were encouraged to report any incidents during the occupation in which they had been treated cruelly by someone employed by the Briarwoods’ retinue, so that the hired guards that had relished the opportunity to abuse their standing over their fellow citizens could be appropriately punished. Cassandra hated the possibility for mistrust, even betrayal or deceit, that this decision came with, but so far, they’d had only one or two false reports.
It was excruciating for Cassandra to stand and pretend that she wasn’t among those who’d fallen under the sway of the Briarwoods, that she was in any place to judge her fellows, but it was needed in order to curb the influence of Whitestone’s occupiers once and for all.
To her relief, most of the people who’d taken guard jobs out of desperation had come clean, falling on the Chamber’s mercy for their employment. Of course, it was far from relieving to consider the horrid circumstances most of them had faced to force their hand into serving the the monsters who’d controlled the city, but the grace with which most of them had accepted their pardons was worthy of respect. (Most of them truly hadn’t turned on their fellow man. In fact, several had claimed to have ignored orders to beat or harm fellow citizens, and almost all of them had their own scars to prove their insubordination. That, above all, stirred Cassandra’s pride: she may have taken five years to rebel, but not all of Whitestone had been as cowardly as her. The city had survived thanks to five years of tiny rebellions, every day filled with a hundred invisible revolts against their conquerors.)
There’d been a few difficult cases where witnesses had contradicted the claims of the accused, cases where the truth had taken days to unravel, but most of them were clear cut: the person had only acted out of desperation to pay for their family’s needs, had never even had the chance to act on horrific orders thanks to the city’s increasing timidity, and were more than happy to accept their punishment. Said punishment was almost always the assignment of working to rebuild the city- which most of the citizens were already doing, anyway. In fact, to many, the guarantee of work and the chance to help their city seemed to be taken as a reward, one that Cassandra was glad to give.
Emotionally exhausted, Cassandra slumps in her chair, chin placed directly onto the table, tucking her head between her folded arms. Her wings droop low, both at the connecting point to her back and at the hinge part of the ways up their span. Her eyes just above her arms, she watches as Percy reaches across the table and musses her hair.
“Only a couple left tomorrow. We just need to talk to a few more people and the last few cases will be wrapped up. Nothing too dramatic, I think,” he says.
“I hope so.”
---
“Take care of yourself, darling,” Vex tells her, and Cassandra accepts it with a faint smile.
“Yeah! Don’t worry, we’ll visit again soon!” Keyleth adds, and gives Cass an awkward, but quick, hug. She doesn’t mind it.
“Keep practicing,” Vax says, and gestures to the rapier at her hip, the replacement she’d received from Vox Machina for Winter’s Crest.
“Of course,” Cass says. Vax claps her on the shoulder- rather lightly- and moves to join the rest of Vox Machina.
“Don’t kiss the first man to say he loves you, mmkay? Know your worth,” Scanlan says as he slings his lute across his back. Cass gives a snort, not because of the advice, but because of the genuine sincerity the gnome has shown to her.
“Got it,” she agrees, and Scanlan gives her a double thumbs up.
“I’ll write lots, alright?” Percy says, and Cass turns to face her brother as he emerges from the hallway, bags fully packed. “If you need anything, let me know, no matter how small.”
He pulls her into a hug, and she accepts. She’s about halfway to crying, now, and the worst part is that she wouldn’t even be too embarrassed if she were to do so, because that’s just how Vox Machina is.
As Cass pulls away, she looks down at the new gun on her brother’s hip. She’s glad that her brother was able to cook it up in time to be able to defend himself; that might not be the reaction she should be having to it, but it’s her honest feelings.
“If you die out there, I’ll kill you,” she says, hoping that she’s successfully executing the humor that seems to be on-brand for Vox Machina.
“I’d expect nothing less,” Percy agrees. “And I will be back soon.”
Cass nods, and swallows hard. Percy rubs the top of her head- something that he seems to have adopted as his go-to gesture of affection to her- and turns to join the rest of his party. Percy gives one last look back at her, and then the doors close behind them.
The tears finally fall, and she sits down on the closest seat. She puts her hands in her face, and lets them fall. Her heart is tearing in two; not because her brother is leaving, not because he’s found family beyond just her, but because she’s somehow also a part of that family now.