Mercury Black hurriedly navigated the dimly lit halls of Salem's castle, his destination the only place he could find solace in the desolate landscape that surrounded him. He was an outsider here, a servant to the lowest link on the food chain. The people Salem had gathered looked down on Cinder, and as a result, on him as well. Perhaps it was because of her youth, or maybe she possessed less experience than the rest of them. Whatever the case, the atmosphere their relations created made him feel most unwelcome among their ranks. Despite what Cinder had told him, this place was not his home, and it likely never would be.

His footsteps echoed throughout the halls of the grand castle, their unchallenged rhythm confirming his solitude. It was unlikely that anyone else would be up and about, as he had left his room deep in the night so as to avoid running into any of his 'superiors'. It would certainly be viewed as suspicious for one with questionable loyalties such as him to be snooping around the premises at such a time, but if he had chosen any other time, Emerald would probably be glued to Cinder's side, and what he wanted to say tonight was not meant for her ears. After making his way through a veritable maze of hallways and passages he had struggled to commit to memory, he arrived at a closed door.

Mercury knocked on the door with two quick raps, careful so as not to irritate the person within. After a short time, the door cracked open, barely revealing a single amber eye. The expression on her face lightened considerably as she realized who stood opposite her. With no delay, the door opened wider, revealing Remnant's new Fall Maiden.

"Yeah, I'd be happy to see me too," Mercury remarked. "I can only imagine what any of those freaks would want with you at this hour."

"What are you doing here?" Cinder's raspy voice was usually inaudible, but there was little in the way of competition in the dead of night, so he could hear her strained whispers just fine.

"I wanted to talk," he answered. "Can I come in?"

"You can talk from there."

Mercury sighed. It appeared his meaning had not gotten across. "I mean I want to talk talk."

Cinder narrowed her eyes at her apprentice, suspicious of his motives. A couple seconds passed, and she eventually relented, removing herself from the doorway and allowing him entry.

The young man stepped inside and closed the door behind him, taking a look around Cinder's room as he did so. It was clear she didn't spend much time here, as everything was neatly arranged and looked like it hadn't been touched in months. Though, since they had only arrived just the day before, it was possible she just hadn't yet had time to make a mess of the place.

"I haven't had a chance to hold a decent conversation with you since Beacon. How are you feeling?"

"That's none of your business,"

"What? I'm not allowed to worry about you? Wounds like that… they leave scars on more than just the skin. I just want to make sure you're okay." Cinder seemed to be upset by that. Perhaps he had worded it wrong.

"I don't need your sympathy," she spat. "Do you really think me so weak as to deserve the pity of a child?"

Mercury rolled his eyes. He knew what this was. Cinder would not allow herself to be seen as anything less than invincible in front of her inferiors. He had caught glimpses of this issue during their time together in Vale, but now, in the face of her clear inferiority complex in regards to her colleagues, it was as plain as day.

"Come on, you know that's not fair. Just talk to me."

"I'm fine. There's nothing to talk about. Leave me."

Mercury walked to the edge of her bed and sat down, a clear but passive display of his intention to stay. "You say that, but you still haven't changed out of your dress. You weren't going to sleep tonight, were you? You can't."

The Fall Maiden averted her gaze away from the young man, embarrassed that she had been found out so easily.

"You don't have to say anything; I already know most of it. I couldn't sleep either at first."

"What could you know of this?"

Mercury shook his head. "Really? I've got my fair share of scars, thank you very much. Don't act like you haven't seen them."

Cinder silently chastised herself for forgetting the circumstances of Mercury's recruitment. Now that she remembered, it all made sense. He had gone through something similar in the past, though his experience lasted years, and likely had far more emotional impact. He understood where she was now, and he wanted to help her get past it. At this point, she felt stupid for not having expected his visit in the first place. "You've kept them covered… I'd almost forgotten."

"I'm glad that you were able to. It means that they don't stop me from being who I am. I'm not a reflection of the pain I've experienced, and you shouldn't be either. Cinder Fall is too good for that. Now come on, talk to me."

The young woman slowly walked over to her bed and sat down beside her apprentice, taking a deep breath as she prepared to open up to someone she felt she never should. "I feel… weak. I'm more powerful than ever before, and yet, I've never suffered a greater defeat. I've been maimed, Mercury. My eye is gone, I can barely speak, and even as a Maiden with nature's wrath at my fingertips, I was powerless to stop it. It's humiliating." Talking to Mercury like an equal was strange, but every word seemed to lift a small weight off of her shoulders. Perhaps she should consider confiding in her subordinates more often.

"That makes sense," he said, "but you know you're not that weak. All you have to do is remind yourself of your strength."

Cinder considered Mercury's words. She hadn't been able to pin down the source of her discontent until now, but Mercury had the right of it. At first, she thought the issue was her pride. She thought that it had somehow been damaged, but she had always known that this was not true. She had lost plenty of practice matches against Tyrian and Hazel, but her pride remained intact through it all. Even now, when Mercury offered to lend an ear to her troubles, her pride prevented her from allowing it. She still had her pride; her problem was confidence. She had been the youngest at Salem's table for a long time now, and her colleagues were constantly reminding her. Before, she could weather their jabs because she knew they were wrong. Now, she had lost. She had been knocked down at what was meant to be her peak, and she was starting to believe that she wasn't worth as much as she had previously thought. That had to end, but how? How could she prove to herself that she still deserved to be valued?

"What do I have to do?"

Mercury threw himself backward, his body now resting across the foot of Cinder's bed. "It's probably different for everyone, but I can tell you what worked for me. Well… you already know what worked for me."

"You killed him." It was a simple solution, but she could already see that it would be an effective one for her. The mere thought of her flames consuming Ruby's body was invigorating. The only problem was that as the Fall Maiden, she was at a severe disadvantage against a silver eyed warrior. She would have to train harder than she ever had before. The maiden's power needed to be pushed beyond its natural barriers, and there was no one in remnant better suited for the task.

Perhaps that was what drove Mercury forward: a constant desire to improve. Perhaps that was why he pushed himself so hard. From the day she found him standing over his father's corpse, Mercury went to bed stronger than when he had awoken. But he had already slain his demons; why did he persist like this?

"Mercury, what pushes you forward? You've done so much, and I've never even given a thought toward your motives."

Mercury scoffed. "For someone smart enough to destroy a huntsman academy, you really are dense."

Cinder glared at the young man, but ultimately remained silent in anticipation of his answer. He stared back at her, trying to read into her thoughts.

"You really have no idea, do you? I'm here for you, Cinder."

"Me?" The maiden did her best not to jump to any conclusions, but it was terribly difficult to do so. His statement was just so vague… the implications were as boundless as her imagination.

"Yeah, you're all I've got. Who knows where I'd have ended up if you hadn't found me."

Cinder had never realized just how much she could potentially mean to Mercury before this point. Regardless of her true intentions with the boy or what kind of road she would lead him down, she had put him back on his feet in his darkest hour. When every constant in his life was cast into the flame, she presented herself as a source of stability. She had, in a sense, given him a second chance at life. It was a cruel life that would leave him with sleepless nights and bloodstained hands, but it was a life he readily embraced if it meant standing by the side of his savior. The fact that he had not even been remotely resistant to being dragged along like this left her with only one question: 'just how much did she mean to him?

Strange feelings welled up in Cinder when she looked at the boy now. Aside from Emerald (who clearly didn't like the boy at all), she was the only person in his life that he could even come close to calling a friend. If tonight's discussion was anything to go by, she far from deserved it. At face value, he had chosen to accompany her and Emerald of his own accord, but upon further inspection, it became clear that there was no choice to be had. She had found him, taken him, and robbed him of the opportunity to live a normal life. Then, she disregarded almost everything that made him who he was and wrote off his concern out of some misguided sense of self-pity.

There was much more to the boy she had found in the woods than a lifetime of angst and enough skill in combat to strike fear in even seasoned warriors. Mercury was not a weapon to be directed at whatever she wished, he was a young man that, for his own sake, had discarded everything he had in a manner that would test even the strongest hearts, and he had bet everything on her. In selecting her to be the orchestrator of Beacon's downfall, Salem had placed great faith in her as an asset, but with Mercury, for the first time, someone had placed their faith in her as a person.

The Fall Maiden's hand strayed from its position, lightly brushing against that of the young man beside her. Mercury's hand was quickly retracted, almost as though he was recoiling away from the mouth of a predator.

"Alright, I'm starting to feel a little uncomfortable," Mercury said as he sprung off of Cinder's bed. "Get some sleep; you're going to need it if you're going to be dealing with those lunatics all day." He proceeded to the door, making sure he didn't look back at Cinder for fear of dying of humiliation.

"Mercury," she called , straining her raspy voice and halting the boy in his tracks, "thank you."

"For what? You would have figured this all out on your own; I didn't do anything."

"For caring." Just like him, she had no one she could truly call close. None of those she called her allies understood her, nor could she trust them with intimate thoughts such as these. But now, looking at the back of her apprentice, the scarred back that carried her lifeless body from Beacon… from what should have been her grave, she could see that they were very much the same. Ever since that fateful night, she'd had someone she could always fall back on. She'd had a true friend.

"Right… Goodnight, Cinder."

"Goodnight."

A/N: If you got this far, thanks for reading. I really like this ship, and I really don't think it gets the attention it deserves from the fandom. It's unfortunate, but I will be updating this fanfic fairly irregularly, as most of my writing time is going to be devoted to my other fanfiction. This is more of a side-project to sink my time into when I want to write and can't make any progress in my other story. That being said, I hope you enjoyed!