RWBY Through Worlds

56: Locked Away

Then it bared its teeth.

"Ah!" Weiss screamed.

No one could have gotten to her, except Ruby maybe, but Ruby couldn't run.

But just at this moment when it seemed everyone was lost, a new voice called out.

"Back fiend! Dreadful creature!"

And a flash of brilliantly white light, with a bluish cast, seemed to blind them all.

The Jabberwocky howled like it was stung and backed off several yards away, then began writhing in the air and going in circles.

"Well, that stunned it for a moment," the owner of the voice stepped out of the tree itself...no, there was a door in it.

They all stared at her.

A woman who might have been 30 something, wearing the oddest clothes they'd ever seen, with blonde hair down past her shoulders, a headband in her hair that looked like a bow, but was in fact a snake with its head over its own tail, and a large snake headed staff that had shot the light out.

"Are you all right, dear?" she asked Weiss, holding out her hand.

Weiss stared at her in astonishment and then took it.

The woman pulled her up.

"Alicia?" Pyrrha finally found her voice.

No one else had made the connection, but then they thought it must be so.

"I thought she was dead," Yang said.

"No," the woman laughed wryly. "Not dead...though I suppose to you I might as well be dead. But we have little time to talk. You children ought to be at home in your beds, and that monstrosity there ought to be disposed of."

She took Weiss by the arm and hopped out of the tree onto the ground.

The others came closer to her.

"Quickly now, while it's still dazed, was anyone harmed by it?" Alicia asked. She had an odd accent.

"Ruby, her feet..." Blake said.

Alicia took a look at them.

"Ah, right," she said. "Look here at this, dearie," she held out her staff.

"Look at what?" Ruby asked.

"Just look at it and you'll be all right," Alicia insisted.

Ruby thought it was ridiculous, but she glanced at the snake head eyes...and just like that, her feet felt normal.

She looked down to see no sign of burning.

"You're one of the Silver eyed ones," Alicia noted. "I know you...ah, Ozma did think so highly of them. The closest thing to the Spirit of Power your world has, I must admit. The god of light did his imitations well...but alas, it's only an imitation. It has rules that make it inconvenient. Blasted gods always only give you powers when you're in the right mood. In the real world, we have no time for such things, but there you go."

"Huh?" Ruby said. "Wait, you know about silver eyes?"

"My dear child, I didn't spend months in Remnant without picking up few things," Alicia said.

"Huh?" Yang said.

"It's...a lot to explain, " Pyrrha said. "I don't know the full story myself...but Alicia, I thought you went home."

"I know you," Alicia tilted her head at her. "You were dead...well, life is suiting you nicely now, child, isn't it?"

"Oh...uh...yes," Pyrrha felt a little awkward.