21 Illness and A Wounded Blackbird.

(General POV)

It had been two days since Ruby's birthday and the whole family was preparing to leave for Mistral the next morning so that they were there day before Tai's father's funeral.

The morning following Ruby's birthday Tai had explained about the call the night before and why he seemed upset. He also explained why they had never got the chance to meet their grandfather and about how their relationship had gotten to the point that it had. Both girls had been understanding of the situation and had hugged their father after the explanation exclaiming how much they loved him and he would also have them.

Everyone thought they had saw Tai cry slightly at this as he hugged his daughters but nobody brought it up and simply allowed Tai this moment knowing that it meant a lot to the man. Especially after learning about his father.

Sadly however not everything was going well. Daemon had for some reason come down with a fever which was rare amongst those who had aura. He had been sick that afternoon and was now in bed resting. Both Tai and Summer were worried about him and wanted to stay and look after him as he wouldn't be able to travel when he was ill. Not to mention they would be away for at least four days and there would be no one here to help look after him and care for him.

Daemon however would here none of their protests and told them to go and that he would be fine. He was ill not crippled and argued that Summer was pregnant and should be away from his illness anyway and there was not a chance in hell that he letting Tai miss his father's funeral.

After arguing with Daemon for the day they eventually relented and gave up on the condition that he call them should anything happen or should he need them.

The next morning they finally left and Daemon had the house to himself, sadly due to feeling ill he wasn't really able to much but rest and occasionally get up and get something to eat. He did manage to write out the code then next 20 level of his dust based candy crush game throughout the day however.

That night Daemon called his family and let them know that he was alright and checked they had settled in Mistral okay and that the flight had gone well. He also spoke with the girls for about two hours as they explained everything about their day in Mistral in great detail and he just listened intently with a smile.

He eventually got off the phone after Summer took it off the girls and told them Daemon had to get some sleep or he wouldn't get better. They reluctantly wished him a goodnight and ended the call and he drifted off to sleep.

(Daemon POV)

I woke to the sun shining on my face and dragged myself out of bed. I actually felt a lot better than I had the last few days so I decided to take my temperature and saw that it was at a normal temperature for me given my semblance and decided that with little else to do today I would spend the day in my tower.

I got up and made myself some ham and cheese omelettes for breakfast knowing that the eggs needed using in the next two or three days. After cooking and eating I washed all the cooking utensils and wiped everything down before leaving for the tower and locking all the doors and closing all of the windows in the house.

I rushed to the tower in excitement and began to plan for what I wanted to accomplish for that day and decided that I would plan and start the build process of a weapon. I in the end decided that I would focus on a smaller weapon to start with as I was planning to experiment with mechashift for the first time. So i decided to start small with a two form side arm.

I looked at a few designs of gun before finding one that I liked the look of. It was a Korth NFX .44 Revolver with the potential to hold eight rounds. I first drew up the spec for the gun before then deciding what particular blade or melee weapon I would want to incorporate as its shift. I eventually decided on a wakizashi with the blade being twenty inches in length not including the handle.

It took me several attempts to draw up a technical blueprint that I then photo copied. I place the original in a filing draw within my office so that if I ever needed it I could easily access. I then scanned the copy so that I could access the blueprint on my computer and began to use the specialise programs on computer to detail the parts for the laser to cut out of the plate of metal I would use to assemble it.

This took me until around three o'clock so I to the small kitchenette in the tower and made some sandwiches to eat as I planned my next step. I decided to use ebony for the creation of the gun so I would have to use the forge to hammer out a sheet of the metal to then use the laser on. I obviously finished my sandwiches before I decided to do this.

I ended going to the courtyard about thirty minutes later and as I exited the tower I could see storm clouds on the horizon, A solid wall of black with the occasional flash of bright light barely visible amongst it, I could even hear the faint rumble of thunder far off in the distance. about an hour off being over me so I ignored them and got to work knowing that I would be done by the time they got here.

Working on a time limit not wanting to be stuck working in the oncoming storm I used my semblance to speed up the heating process as Ebony took a while to heat otherwise even with my enchanted forge. Once it was hot enough I began to begin the process of hammering the bar in to uniform sheet of metal. I used my semblance to maintain temperature of the bar as I began to hammer away at it.

It took almost forty-five of constant manoeuvring and hammering until I was satisfied with my end result. It was an almost perfectly uniform sheet of ebony. Once inside I would use the sheet roller that I had inside to make it perfect but I had finished the important part. It took about twenty minutes for me to finish the process and I decided that I had done enough for the day with this particular project.

While I wanted to continue I had been very physically active and while feeling better I was completely back to normal from where I was ill the previous days and needed to rest so I decided that I would instead focus on something like my programming and made my way upstairs to my room where I sat at my computer and began programming the next fifty levels of my game.

I spent almost three hours typing away before I finally realised how long I had been typing for and realised that I should probably take a break and have something more to eat. As I entered the relaxation room I could hear the storm overhead and found it soothing even the rumbles of lighting and in the end I sat watching the storm over the forest through the window.

After an hour I realised that there was something else to do so I headed to the music area and used the computer with all of the music based programs and then drew up my recording file for hall of fame and used the software to design the backing to it with my lyrics over the top. Eventually I got it just right and saved it and after considering it for a while I downloaded it to Dust-tube with a newly made anonymous account, in the sense it couldn't be traced back to me, called DraconicHits. I uploaded the song using an animated fire scene as the video for the song. Before closing the computer.

As I stood up and stretched I picked up my scroll and almost choked seeing that it was mid-night. I hadn't even called Tai and Summer, shit. I got to caught up in my projects, they were probably asleep by now considering the time and had likely had an emotional day so I would call in the morning I decided.

The storm had gotten worse outside, it reminded me of the night I had died in my past life. I couldn't see more than a few feet in front of me and it was pitch black. It was likely that grim were roaming the forest between me and the house but I decided to head back anyway. I don't why after all I had a bedroom in the tower but I just felt a gut feeling and they had never led me wrong before so I followed it.

I drew my sword from my inventory and strapped it to my waist and left the tower donning a heavy cloak to protect me from the rain. I stood just underneath the arch of the doorway to my tower as I shut and sealed the door behind before focusing aura into my eyes to increase my visibility and into my legs before dashing to the house. I did have to dispatch a few beowolves on the way but they died with a single aura slash each.

I reached the house within around twenty minutes due to some distractions and slippery surfaces and lack of sight visibility. When I reached the house I felt something was off but I couldn't tell what then I spotted it.

Some muddy tracks led up to the doorway of the house, there was also blood. I was quick to check the door. It was still locked and undamaged. I quickly opened and there was no sign that the person had been inside so I closed it again deciding that this took precedence over getting in from the storm and resting.

I could see blood on the patio but due to the rain and darkness I couldn't see any on the dirt so I didn't know what to do. I wish I could smell it or something and then it clicked and I called Lilith through our link and she appeared almost instantly out of my shadow. I crouched and ruffled her fur with strokes and thanked her for coming before then using the link to relay what I wanted her to try and pointed out the blood.

Lilith spent around a minute sniffing it before then standing up and sniffing the air before barking at me and sending me a message through the link 'Follow'. I followed Lilith through the storm until we got to the shed where the bike was. The chain lay on the ground with a pick still in the lock.

The lack of subtly had me a bit worried that they had stolen Tai's bike so I gently pulled the door open with Lilith beside me. The bike was still in there, under it's cover untouched. I could see the trail of blood and mud that led to back of shed where we kept some straw and wood for fires in the winter. Lilith barked at me and relayed that someone was still there.

I crept as silently as possibly to the back of the shed where I saw a person shadow huddled at the back shivering but asleep. I approached and used my magic to summon a small soft mage light to get a better look at the intruder. I was shocked at what I saw.

It was a young girl seemingly a couple of years younger than me but I couldn't sense any aura on her so she may be closer to my age. That however was beside the point, she had delicate features with high cheek bones and a mane of wavy black hair that fell to just below her shoulders, it however was matted with mud and leaves and twigs, she had likely been caught out in the storm and broke in to take shelter, and her lack aura likely meant that she had taken ill. She appeared to be soaked through.

She was wearing a too large for her, by a large margin, leather jacket, black jeans and a pair of black boots. This stopped me from getting a better look at her but from what I could see she was very pretty. The jacket also meant that if she was wounded, which by the trail of blood was likely I couldn't see it. Despite being wary I decided I should take her to the house and get her wrapped up in blankets and cleaned up. This was going to be awkward as she was a girl but I realised that she might die if I do nothing.

I gently scooped her up in my arms and began to carry her. She felt weird to carry, and I couldn't work out why, it was like she had something behind her back but what I had no idea but I didn't feel like metal so it was unlikely to be a weapon. As such I decided to worry about it in a minute once we were inside.

One we were inside I carried to my room and placed her on the bed before running and gathering all of the blankets in the house and stacking them at the end of my bed. I then went and grabbed the largest bucket I could find and filled it with hot soapy water. 

I took less than three minutes but on my way back up the stairs I noticed something laying on the floor. A pure black feather that was slightly ruffled and appeared to have dried blood on. 

I picked it up trying to determine where it had come from. It was far larger than an avian species I could think of especially considering it appeared to be from a corvid of some sort. With the exception that the feather was almost two and a half times the size the one of a normal corvid. I knew this with certainty due to Qrow teaching me about all the different corvid species, his form alongside his sister's were both of this branch and he wanted to ensure that I knew how to identify the different types and that I was aware of Raven's own form.

Suddenly I came to a realisation. The lumps on the girl's back, the feather, the fact she appeared to be hiding her wings. She must be a Faunus, one who likely didn't have good experiences with humans or had heard about the crimes that they regularly commit. I also contemplated something the Oobleck once told me, a bird Faunus with wings was exceptionally rare. Maybe one in every five thousand bird Faunus would have wings, and during the periods where they were openly oppressed and enslaved they were sold for extortionate sums.

  Sadly, I had little doubt that at her age and with her inability to protect herself that if a slaver or criminal of any kind did spot it would be highly likely they would kidnap her and try to sell her. I decided to open with her and let her know I knew she was faunus when she woke up. She may initially panic but hopefully it will show that I am being open and honest.

I gently pushed open the door to the bedroom. She hadn't moved at all.

I tired to wake the girl but sadly she didn't seem at all responsive so I had to go ahead with my initial plan. I carefully took one arm out of jacket and then rolled her over to be able to remove the other arm. That is when I saw them.

A pair of beautiful black wings. She looked like a fallen angel, covered in dirt and blood but ethereal and beautiful. I gently slapped my cheek. I needed to focus. Besides I already have a girlfriend, in fact I have two girlfriends.

Underneath it she was wearing a black shirt which was also to large for her. She had a necklace with a pendant on and two silver rings with black striped rings also on the chain. I had a weird feeling that I had seen the rings before but I couldn't place them. I gently lifted the side of shirt that I could see was torn.

In doing so I revealed the huge wound on her left side that the jacket had previously covered. The injury on her side appeared to have been caused by a grimm, the appearance of it suggested a beowolve, a set of four jagged gashes that ran along her side. I quickly summoned my white flames to help heal her injury and watched as the injury rapidly regenerated, sadly however my flames could do nothing to actually heal the illness only the injuries.

After doing this I used the warm soapy water to gently clean her face and arms and washed her hair in the bucket. I decided that I should only clean the areas that were available for me to clean without undressing her. I then wrapped her in the blankets I had gathered and wrapped her hair in a towel.

She was still running a ridiculously high temperature and I needed to keep her warm and comfortable. I hoped she would wake up soon and I could get her to eat something. I decided I should prepare something for her eat if she did wake up. I put a tomato soup on the stove and got a bottle of water to take up.

It also occurred to me that I should eat something and did something I hadn't done in a long time and ate some of the food in my inventory. I still had a ton of crispy chilli beef that I hadn't eaten once since coming to this world. Since moving here the only times I ate something from my inventory was when I was on a solo mission or if it was like a steak that I could say I pulled from a seal that I had on me. I quickly pulled out a portion and tucked into it while waiting for the soup to heat through.

I took it upstairs, using my semblance to keep it warm and in passing gave Lilith a mammoth steak as a thank you for her help in locating the girl. I returned to the girls side and grabbed a chair and sat beside.

After about thirty minutes I got a little bores so I began to play around with some of the seals that I had read about in the Uzumaki sealing book giving to me by Merlin. One had caught my eye earlier which was a temperature maintained seal that would make something maintain its temperature. I decided to see if I could alter it so it would maintain the temperature of an item with the seal being directly inscribed or placed on it. 

In effect I wanted to create a fancy heating plate using seals. It took me around two hours before I succeeded. In the end my final idea of inverting the directional matrices within the seal had so that it would channel the heat and cycle it through the seal and back into the object in a cycle was the method that proved effective.

(The next morning)

I don't know when but sometime after finishing the seal I must fallen asleep as I woke up to the sun blaring across my eyes as I sat in the chair beside the bed that I had placed the girl. Remembering the girl I immediately got out the chair and began to check on her.

I noticed her temperature had dropped slightly since last night. I determined this by placing the back of my hand against her forehead. As I drew my hand away from her forehead I noticed a slight change her breathing and realised that she had woken up.

  Her eyes were blurred and unfocused as she gazed at me with ruby red eyes before her eyes sharpened and she jumped out the bed and to her feet looking at me warily. Or at least she attempted to. 

The second her feet hit the floor she fell to the ground, wincing and looking panicked. She then look at me clearly afraid after eying me critically and obviously finding something that scared her.

I crouched down and slowly extended my hand towards and spoke as softly as I could.

"I'm not going to hurt. My name Daemon and I found you out in the barn last night wounded. I healed your injuries and washed the parts of you that were not covered by your clothes."

She just stared at me so I decided to carry on talking. Asking questions in the hope of having her respond.

"What's your name? If your hungry or thirsty I can get you something to eat."

She stared at me before mumbling quietly her voice slightly husky "Aquila, my name is Aquila..." 

I waited to see if she would add her surname to her introduction but she didn't so I didn't press the matter. I still had the feeling lingering the back of my mind that I knew who's child she was, but I couldn't place my thoughts on an idea with certainty.

"Would you like some food? Water? " I saw her contemplate my question before nodding still remaining quiet. It appeared that she didn't intend to talk to me unless she had to. 

I hand her the soup that had been kept warm by the seal and left to eat as I went to get her a glass of water to drink. Before making my way back up stairs.

I pushed the ajar door open and saw Aquila sitting up finishing the last of the soup that I had left her with. She jolted when she saw me enter the room and stared at me still warily. I passed her water and stepped back and let her drink and finish the soup in piece.

I let her relax for a few minutes before I pushed the conversation forward. 

I gently held up the feather for her to see ad spoke softly. "Aquila I know you are a Faunus. I found this and I saw your wings last night." She tensed up and knowing what was on her back I could also notice the subtle signs of agitation from the wings twitching beneath her clothing.

I continued "I mean you no harm, I merely wish to know who you are and if you need any help."

We sat in silence as she stared at me without answering. Clearly still afraid that I would harm her. 

I decided to try one last approach. "How about this. Tell me why you are in Patch and this area in particular and I will give you food and water and let you be on your way. You have my word as a Huntsman in training."

I could she her considering my words before she she spoke so quietly I almost didn't hear her, Almost.

"I am looking for my father."

I smiled at her answer. "Why? What is his name maybe I could ask my grandfather to help locate him, he is has a lot of friends in high places all over Remnant. You may even know him, Professor Ozpin of Beacon."

I almost laughed at the shocked look on her face as she processed what I had just told her before speaking very slowly and quietly. Yet not enough so as to mask the shaking in her voice.

"I don't know his name. I was given a picture of my father as she was dying. She was really sick." Aquila had started to tear up now, emotion bleeding into her speech. "She was really ill and dying. She had been for almost a year. I was called in as she was on her last breaths and she gave a locket with a picture of him and told me that he lived on Patch." Here her hand came to rest on the locket around her neck as she began crying. "All I have is a picture and with some letters drawn on it."

She opened the locket and passed it to me and my breath hitched. Inside the locket was a photo of a young Qrow hugging a woman with feather-like hair and on the corner of the photo in pen 'Q- JNPR'. On his hand were four rings two of which were on this chain and the other two that I now recognise as the rings he always wore.

Aquila was staring at him having clearly recognised his recognition of the man and the reaction he gave. She stared into him with sharp red eyes as he re-examinined her.

While Aquila bore a striking resemblance to the woman in the photos she also looked remarkably like Qrow. With the same spiky hair and red eyes. She had the same pale skin and aristocratic features which he could see had had likely been slightly soften by her mothers.

The irony that the man named Qrow who could turn into a crow had a crow faunus daughter was not lost on him.

I jolted as I heard the front door open. I didn't know who it could be. Tai, Summer, Qrow and girls weren't meant to be back until tomorrow. 

I summoned my sword to my hand from inventory and gestured to Aquila to stay quiet as I heard footsteps coming up the stairs. I crouched on the right side of the door as the footsteps approached it.

The door swung open and I began to swing before I saw a flash of yellow and I was flipped put in an arm bar and held to the floor disarmed.

I looked up in shock to see Tai's face that mirrored the shock on my own as he let me go.

I jumped up and shouted "What are you doing back already I thought someone was breaking in?"

He then replied just as loudly "We are back early because you didn't call last night and we couldn't even get through to your scroll this morning so we got an early flight back. Now why the hell didn't you answer..." He cut off here staring behind me as he continued in a quieter tone " your scroll."

He was staring at Aquila. "Daemon who is this?"

I answered quickly but not fully. "I found her in the barn, injured, last night and brought her back in to heal her. As for who she is... 

Maybe we should have a family meeting downstairs."

Tai looked surprised and confused before nodding nonetheless and saying. "Well I will give you a minute and go get the others seated downstairs."

As he left I turned to Aquila who looked nervous and confused and shocked. "Well this may be a bit sudden but are you ready to meet your father?"

(Hey everyone sorry I took so long to finally post again. I hit a bit of a writers block on this chapter and I don't think I am still fully happy but it is good enough. 

I have also started a new full time job where I work 53 hours a week sonI don't have much free time to write anymore. I will of course still keep writing when I am able to but I likely will only be posting once or twice a month. 

Anyway hopes you all enjoyed the chapter and are looking for to the fireworks that will be going off in the next. Thanks for reading and until next time.)