Disclaimer: I do not own the Teen Titans.
Coyote – Chapter 17
She slept later than she thought she ever could. The walls of her tent fairly glowed in the light of the morning sun. The savory scents of a breakfast brewing over a fire caressed her nose.
"I sense you're awake now, Dawn Child," Charlie called through the tent door. "Come and enjoy this fine morning with me."
His emotional barriers were still as strong as ever, but he was allowing a peppermint-like cheerfulness to permeate the campsite. She crawled out of the sleeping bag with a slow deliberateness, unsure of what regard he would have for her now that her story had had time to incubate in his heart.
She blinked in the bright sunlight as she stretched the night out of her creaky joints. The sky is so crisp, so clear here, she thought. Peaceful moments, like this, rare and precious jewels to me. She tried to imagine what comment Garfield would make about it. He is the only thing missing. She found herself balancing on the balls of her feet as she felt the breeze kiss her face. It is all I can do to keep my feet on the ground. I want to taste that blue.
"This whole canyon sings," she said, half to her cousin and half to herself.
"It does indeed," he replied. "Especially to those who listen. Tea?"
She nodded as she accepted the steaming cup from him. It was difficult to look him in the eye.
"You're worried," he observed. "Worried about your story?"
Her eyes moved to him at last; she was unused to being read by others. She was irritated with herself for letting her guard down so easily.
"Yes," she replied. It was the only reply she could give.
"Please, sit while we eat. I'll tell you why you have no need to worry. The men in the white coats couldn't find this place with a GPS and night goggles, anyway." He chuckled at his own joke while she sat across the fire pit from him.
He took a long, serious sip from his own mug before he began. "I stayed up into the night considering everything you told me. I am glad I listened with my Lakota heart. My doctor's heart would have diagnosed a hundred different conditions that would explain such a tale: multiple personality disorder, schizophrenia, even a messiah complex, after a fashion. But my doctor's heart cares little for the great gifts that you possess. What I have seen makes me more inclined to believe what you say is true. My doctor's heart says that you are damaged from years of emotional abuse. My Lakota heart says the same, that you have been cruelly used by many who see you as a tool, an instrument, and not a living, breathing person."
Her hands shook as he spoke. Hot tea began spilling over her fingers. Placing the cup on the ground, she shook the burning liquid off and wiped her hands against her pants.
He watched her shake. His eyes closed for a while, giving her a private moment to collect herself. "I know it is never easy to hear such things, Raven. These things are never easy to overcome. The doctor in me would prescribe years of intense therapy to overcome the layers of abuse you have endured. The Lakota in me says that you need a home, a stable place, a family that surrounds you and loves you as a Human Being. It also says that along with accepting such love, you must give up the hate you feel towards those who have hurt you, from your father on down." He raised his hands as she began to protest. "Don't dare tell me that you do not hate them. I felt the venom rise in you as you told your tale last night. It is fine to feel anger at them, and fine to fight what they have done to you."
He paused and took another sip from his mug. His eyes focused on a point above her head, and for a moment she felt the barriers in his mind lower. An odd sadness leaked over those walls, the kind of sadness one feels on hearing about a past that cannot be changed. That sadness soaked in to the ground and into the sky and overcame the cheerfulness she had felt just a moment ago. Then his eyes returned to her own face, and they watched each other for long, quiet moments before he spoke again.
"But do not waste your energy hating them the rest of your life. Fighting for what you believe in does not degrade you, as your former teachers would have you believe. There are times when you have to accept what you are given with grace, and there are times when you are meant to fight against it to make something better. True wisdom will show you the difference. But hating does degrade you. Because you become what you hate. Surely, in the events of your own life, you must see that."
She sat there in stunned silence. The hint of a tear gathered in the corner of her eye as she felt herself fill up with a strange emotion that she knew he was projecting at her: a sense of belonging. That sense pushed down her own rising tide of anger and regret that this conversation was awakening.
He walked around the fire pit and sat down next to her. His two hands engulfed hers as he studied her face. "Let us be your true home," he said, a great tenderness in his voice. "Karen and I would welcome you into our family. You are part of our tribe. Finish your education here, with people of your own Lakota Heart. Live long enough to finally grow up, here in this life-filled land whose song you hear. Give up the life of a superhero and live a new adventure. Dawn Child, come and live with us."
Raven stared at her cousin, not sure of what to say. Her words trembled as they spilled into the morning air. "Give up the Titans? Come here? To live?" Away from him?
Thunder Horse flashed her a fatherly smile while he increased that warm scent of belonging around her. "Yes. To live a peaceful life. A full life. One with the danger behind you."
"But – but – it is all I know," she stammered. "I don't know how to live among – among –"
"Regular people? Without your friends? You don't know now, but you can learn. You can learn anything you really wish to. And you'll learn to lose that 'I am a demon' attitude. From what I know of you, you certainly are no demon. Born to be an angel? Born to be a devil? It doesn't work that way, little sister. Good and evil are a matter of choice and intention, not genetics. You are proof of that."
She looked at the ground, taking in his words. A matter of choice. I've never felt like I even had a choice. I just did what I had to do.
He continued. "No one puts their lives, their very souls, on the line for a world they've never known like you have without great love in their heart. You're a creature of love, Raven, no matter who your father is. Love is not just that warm fuzzy in someone's heart, more than just the part that you've had to shut out all these years. It's action. It's in your deeds. And your deeds show that you are full of love. Only you cannot see that." He laughed faintly. "We empaths tend to have a blind spot when it comes to reading ourselves. Or people we care for deeply. But Karen and I can help you with that. Help you see that 'demon' is a choice, not a species."
She wiped away the tear threatening at the edge of her eye. A choice. Despite myself, the offer is... tempting. A home. "Karen does not know my story – are you so sure she would –"
"Karen has lived with me long enough to know that there are many strange and wonderful things in the waking world and in the spirit world. And she understands much about good and evil. I admit she's a little rough around the edges, but she's a real jewel to me. You have yet to hear her story as well."
He picked up her mug of tea and handed it to her. "Still your shaking, sweet child. You do not have to answer now. You have all the time in the world to think about it."
(break)(break)
"Dawn Child," Charlie said, "I need to go make a few phone calls at the ranger station. The cell towers are out of range up here. It's about an hour's drive, so I'll be gone a bit. Do you want to stay and keep working? You should be safe for a few hours, at any rate."
I feel strong enough to go home, I think. I should be able to avoid any danger. After I find what I need, I will return to San Francisco. Maybe this afternoon. Garfield would still have time to pick out our movie-- I'd rather stay here and finish as early as I can rather than rumbling about –
"I will stay," she answered. "I will be fine, cousin."
An hour working alone was very quiet, indeed. She sensed very little movement in the area around the cave. Some of those holes she had felt last night danced around. My empathy must still be in recovery from that pain. Oh, Azar, maybe those days of pain are over.
Needing some fresh air, she stepped to the entrance to breathe in the blue. On the sunny ledge outside the cave, Raven stretched her arms into the sky, glad to be out of the darkness for a little while. Sitting down and leaning back against a rocky outcropping, she turned her face to the sun and let it warm her skin. Even through her closed eyes, she could sense the light, with a light red tinge on the edge of her vision. And those holes felt ...larger...
The morning goes well, she thought. I can face that wall a little better today, try to make some sense of what it says. And what it means –
Her cousin was gone. Raven stretched her limbs skyward once more, no longer fighting the urge to fly. Except for that persistent blind spot on the edge of her senses, she was alone.
Balancing on the balls of her feet, she drank in the hot air of the morning. Let us see how strong I am, she thought. Let me see if I am strong enough to make the leap home.
The pressure on her toes lessened as the weight of her body lifted above the ground. She hovered for a brief moment, then pushed off into the mouth of the canyon. Following the canyon floor like a riverbed, she soared above the desert.
What freedom, to fly like this, to see for miles. Flying inside a body was so different from flying as her soulself. Her soul couldn't feel the wind, couldn't sip the heat of the sun. To fly and be whole, how wonderful to taste the sky. I have not flown for...a very long time. I have missed it. Truly missed it.
There was a peace here, a peace she did not know was possible. How odd, she mused as she rose higher and higher into the blue, that I should feel such peace here, where we were hurt...
The we stuck in her thoughts, and the other half of the we appeared in her mind's eye. In all the years and the days, I never would have thought that you and I would be we, Garfield. But I thought or did not think then matters not. Only now matters.
She glanced at her wrist, where he had ridden along with her. And she smiled the broadest smile she could summon without swallowing any of the insects that were traveling with her. And now, I wish you were here.
Control of her flight was so easy now. Her resident aches and pains had receded for the moment into a background haze, a haze that she had long ago learned to tolerate and almost ignore. Crystals embedded in the rocks below glistened like moonlight on the sea. The canyons stretched out to either side of her, rolling waves in an ocean of red and tan sandstone that she remembered from her first trip here. But the view did not make her homesick for the rocky spires of long-lost Azarath this time. Instead, it felt like...home itself.
She slowed herself to a stop in midair, pushing her arms straight out from her sides to decelerate. Home? she asked herself. Charles has offered me a home here, just this morning. An actual home. With an actual dog. A mother. A mother who can teach me the knowledge I am lacking. A life of peace? Can I really have that? A life without constantly fighting evil? A life of retiring to a quiet bed a the end of every quiet day?
A hot breeze stirred strands of hair that had escaped her braid. Out of the corner of her eye, she spied the dusty wake of a vehicle along the distant canyon wall and thought it would be better to move along without being seen. With a light kick, she pushed forward again with that thought ringing through her mind. There was so much glowing life here that individual beings were hard to differentiate. They all blended together. She even thought she felt a hint of Garfield there...but no, not here. The circle of feelings had a break in it. There was a hole in the bright day, and it was more than just Beast Boy's absence. That hole, so elusive and vague before, was evolving from a simple blind spot into a palpable entity. It scratched the back of her psyche like a broken fingernail.
This is not right. I must find this hole.
She alighted on a high perch on the rim of the canyon. Dropping to one knee, she scanned the landscape below her. Her internal commentary continued as she searched for that hole.
And a life without my green one. Without his constant banter. Without his strange jokes that I have no hope of understanding. Without his laughter. Without his charming scent. Without his stealing a kiss when no one is looking. She leaned forward and squinted into the bright light, still sensing but not quite finding that gaping void in the margins of her senses. How...boring.
The memory of those strong arms cuddled her mind, and she could almost feel his lips against her face. I am sorry I have not let you...past that line. Prickly red heat crept up her cheeks. Oh, my Garfield. You are so patient – your desire burns as a beacon, but you never complain. Can it truly be real this time? I have to know...
The empathic void was creeping closer, nearer, almost breathing on her. But from which direction? Her eyes found only sky and sandstone. One single booming sound echoed down the canyon from a great distance, but other than that the area was quiet. Her head turned to the source of the noise, but it was too far away to determine exactly where it was. Her thoughts continued to meander through her mind.
Oh, my beloved one, I am so afraid. I am tired of being afraid. That wall is rebuilding now that I am faced with my own desire for you. I am not afraid of you but the...act...of being held down...of feeling...trapped—
"You are a graceful eagle, Dawn Child."
She gasped at the hoarse whisper slipping into her ear. She spun around to find its source. No footfall, no crunch of pebble, no breath, no heat had given away his presence behind her. A pillar of black blocked the sky behind him, and a hood shaded his face. His arms spread wide towards her, and his hands were empty.
"You were so bright. I almost could not see you, Raven. So fearless. So beautiful. My Rachel."
He knows my names. All of them.
The Black Rose had found her at last. But how could she say found when it suddenly seemed that it had been with her all along in the form of—
"Charles."
He remained silent.
"You know you cannot trap me here, cousin."
The hidden face tilted to one side, as if the wraith were smiling at her. "I know, child. Your last escape from me was very impressive, very clever. You are indeed part of my tribe."
He was the hole in the desert, rooted right in front of her. She could no more read him now than she could before.
"Why do you hound me, cousin? You ask me to stay with you with great kindness in your eyes, and then you threaten me with your theatrics? What do you hope to accomplish?"
The hood bowed forward, and the gloved fingers spread wider. "I am not Charlie. Charlie made me. Made me with his medicine. And I am not here to threaten you."
"But you have tried to kill me. Twice."
"The first time we met, I did not know you. Not until I had tasted your fears. Then I knew you were of my tribe. The second time we met, I was merely trying to get your attention. To tell you we have a bond. That we are family."
He took a step closer to her. She countered with a step back and away.
"Cousin, I know that we are family...why—"
"I am not your cousin. That family was a lifetime ago. But you can bring me back to family. We can understand each other. I alone can know the depth of terror that torments you. I alone can love you like family. The cousin you know cannot understand that. Not like I can."
Split personality? Her mind ran through as many possibilities as it could without empathic input. Possession? Oh, my cousin, are we this much alike?
"An eater of fear like you craves love? I find your 'love' a thousand times more frightening than your hate."
"You consume emotions, too, Dawn Child. Do you not crave love yourself? Do you not now have desire for your family in San Francisco?"
Raven forced her tense muscles to release their tightness, trying to move them into a state of relaxed alertness, ready to move at any moment. He knows too much to be anyone else.
"If you are not Charles, then you know much of what he knows."
The arms did not move. Only the hot wind stirred the edges of his hood. The smell of his sweat lingered in the bright sun, and the sound of his breathing was suddenly audible. His voice scratched the air around them.
"I have ears. I hear. I have eyes. I see. I have read your letters. I have watched your love for the green one grow. I have eaten the fear you have for Brother Blood. For Sebastian."
Raven's spine crackled as if it had been plunged into icy water. He was close. Too close.
He continued his press forward. "I have guarded you in your sleep. I have eaten your fear to chase the darkness from your dreams. Is this not what a father does?"
She shivered in the scorching sun. Perspiration mixed with the chemical scent of sunscreen trickled down her back, but her sweat was cold.
Azar! So close—and I never knew it—when? When was he there?
"I could have taken your life a hundred different times in a thousand different ways if that was my wish, child. But I don't wish to take your life. I wish to give you a new one."
"With you? As a killer?" Need help—cannot leave now – he'll disappear --he'll just keep coming. And coming. She felt the stirrings of her aggressive soulself within her. End this now, it snarled over the roaring of blood in her ears.
"I only kill to eat the fear. Fear is not the means to an end. It is the end. Fear is all I can taste. And I am weary of it. I need more than the fear to feed me. You can sense for me. You can feed me with your courage, light, life, that you draw from others for me. With fear, I am a ghost. But with you, I can live. I can stop killing. I will no longer need the Black Rose. We belong together, father and child. I alone can protect you from Sebastian. You alone can save me."
He stepped forward again, arms sweeping in an attempt to capture her in an embrace. She shuffled back, muscles again tensed and ready to flee.
My training – too weak against him—like Deathstroke. Think Terminator here, her soulself growled at her. It was seething to protect her, as it always had, even though it was her, just the aggressive part of her. The part of her that felt she was worth protecting. More than one way to use your aikido here. Use his strength and his weakness against him.
Raven held up her hands. "Do not touch me," she warned him. "You may think me weak, but I will not allow you to harm me." She slid one foot behind her, searching for the edge of her perch with her toes.
Yes, her fighting side hissed. His weakness. He can only move in two dimensions.
"My sweet Rachel, I would never raise my hands to you. I am begging you. My life is a never-ending nightmare. Save me."
Get control of this, Raven. Take him down. Your way.The figure continued his shuffled towards her. "I don't want to rule the heavens, like your demon father. I just want to live."
Her toes located the drop off. Raven shifted her weight to her front leg.
I can become invisible. I can become something he cannot see. Then I can...can...
She stretched out with her power, and all the desert life that had been singing to her that morning greeted her. From the tiniest mosquito to the longest rattlesnake to the highest hawks gliding overhead, she could feel that life pulsing through the maze of the canyon. All of that sheer, primal joy just shimmered in a bright cloud around her, a cloud that she knew he could not sense. She let that joy gather behind her eyes. The raging white soul self seeped out of her and concealed her in the sunlight dancing behind her. Those soul eyes kept watch for her pursuing shadow.
And in broad daylight, she began to fade from his view.
"I love you, my child. Why do you run?"
In one swift motion, he leaned heavily at her, dark embrace open to claim her before she disappeared from him completely, and she swept away into the open air. His arms clasped the empty space where she had been. Losing his balance, he pitched forward; his torso pulling him across the boundary of rosy sandstone into the blue. The man plummeted from the edge of the cliff, answering the siren call of gravity that she was able to resist. Gray dust and shards of red sandstone tumbled in his wake. He twisted in the sky, and only silence escaped his tumbling spirit.
I am no killer.
She released her soulself, which was chafing to be set free. She guided it, that bright and fierce portion of her soul, to unfurl itself between the falling man and the canyon floor that was rapidly rushing to welcome him. His empty hands reached for the shimmering form as a child would reach for his mother, crying aloud in a sing-song chant with words she could not understand.
Sleep, the soulself sang to him, soothing the chaos and confusion that she knew was lurking in his own mind, even if she could not taste it directly. Sleep.
And for a moment, before her bright soul captured him, his hood fell back and exposed his features to daylight at last.
His snow-white hair.
His snapping black eyes.
Not Charles. Not her cousin.
But Thunder Horse.
Grandfather!(break)(break)