Disclaimer: I do not own the Teen Titans.

Coyote – Chapter 20

Charlie spotted the younger man as he bolted out of the door and took to the skies as a pterodactyl. He could feel the anxiety and the excitement and the hope pouring out of him.

That can only mean one thing.

He ripped keys from his belt loop. The Jeep roared to life and followed in his wake.

(break)(break)

Raven could sense him. He was there, in the space between heartbeat and breath.

There was no light, no warmth here. The eyes of her soul could see the cold cave surrounding her and pulling on the space in front of her, a long murky hallway of frozen stone. The taste of cold metal raked across her spirit. Its flavor curled into the empty places in her mind, leading her forward, deeper into the core of his spirit, showing her the way. And then she saw the wall.

She recognized this wall. A wall like this had imprisoned her own soul once. A wall that was deeply rooted and broad and cold. One that had separated her from every other living being, from any chance at wholeness. And the only weapon that demolished that wall was...love.

She focused on that which had destroyed her own barrier, which helped her pierce the sorrow that threatened to swallow her whole, as fear had swallowed this man.

This is where healing begins. Where the barrier is found. I must get beyond this wall to truly speak to his soul.

She rested one trembling ethereal hand against the frozen barricade. She conjured images of her family, the one awaiting her in San Francisco—happy, loving images. In her tortured life there were very few, but those few were all the more powerful and precious because they were so rare. Her heart stirred as she sifted through the memories and gathered their strength in the space behind her soul's eyes.

Garfield's concern for her, even before they had shared their hearts. His attempts to make her smile. His asking permission – in his own way – to kiss her. A delighted blush swept across her body's face at the power of that memory. His cradling her in her moment of weakness. And taming the ten-story stair luge with him and Bart. Dear Bart, who accepted her as part of the family without fear. His pleasant pestering only meant he was concerned for her. And Cassie, who forgave her social foibles and actually wanted to spend time with her. Cyborg – despite his momentary lapse of reason – and his fatherly heart guiding her, always there, giving his hand. The first time her eyes beheld Wallace, the first man her own age she had ever known –

Oh, Grandfather, her soul sang to the wall, Even the little I have is wealth compared to what you have had these past few years. You could not sense it, even the love that Charles still has for you. But here is my love. The love I can make you feel. The love that only I can force you to feel. Feel the love I have felt, feel my family's light. I give it to you...

She released the brightness in the front of her mind and let it flow through her ghostly hand and into the wall. That curse, that curse of being able to manipulate the emotions of those around her, for the moment became a blessing. The ice around it began to melt and drip onto the misty rock floor below. The fear, the terror that he had gathered over the years dissipated in the face of that affectionate warmth. Faster and faster it melted, and the drops fell as rain in the dying gloom.

A brief, bloody flash emerged in the bluish-white, a nightmarish reflection of her four-eyed, red-faced self, that reached into her soul's heart and tried to drown it in the chill of the wall. It blinked two sets of eyes at her, mouthed silent words to her, the likeness reaching for her spirit's hand. Every fiber of her soul shuddered, wanted to recoil, wanted nothing more than to flee, but she held on, thinking the wall still wants to exist, it tries to terrify me still, this is but an illusion, and then the flash was gone, fading with the thawing wall.

Horrified but still undaunted, Raven continued her battle. She remembered the admiration in the photo of Thunder Horse and his grandchild and used it to fuel that fire. Cracks radiated out from her, cracks that ripped deep into the heart of the barrier. The soulscape trembled beneath her, and in the far distance, she heard the screams of his body echoing around the fire in the cave.

Her focus was so tight on the wall before her that her connection to her own body had grown numb. The only thing that existed for her now was the search for the bright soul on the other side. The wall trembled. It breathed. It seemed alive...and it wanted to continue to live, as if his soul wished to hide from this unfamiliar flavor flowing from her.

She pressed on, letting go of her own control, letting that warmth spread through her soul. Mental pictures flowered within her, faster, and faster, more love than she thought possible. Kisses stolen by Garfield from her at every opportunity. Ben and Jerry's ice cream. Cyborg helping her to register for school. Freddie Mercury's blessed voice. Cheesecake. Monty Python giggles with his greenness laughing away next to her. Her own laughter. A giggle of delight bubbled from her, giggles that deepened the chasms in the barrier.

No love tricked into existence would have this kind of power, she realized.

This is real.

Oh, my beloved.

It is real.

That thought pushed all that heat, all that desire forward in one smashing blow, and the ice shattered outward from her, shards of fear glistening in the bright day just beyond the gloom of the cave. They tumbled away into a blue, blue sky, evaporating in a newly formed soulscape in front of her.

The dazzling light invaded the cave, exposing the dimmest corners. Even the hardened stone began to dissolve in the new warmth. Raven ached to step into that light. One spirited foot ventured out, then another, and she searched the horizon of the soulscape for its owner.

Instead of an ocean of rock, she discovered a sea of tall grass, wave upon wave of rounded hills rising and falling into the distance. This strange, green desert stretched as far as her soul's eyes could see. She strode forward into the sunless brightness, mentally comparing it with the frosty empty space of her own soul, at least as she had last seen it. She had not visited her own for some time, and she wondered briefly what transformation was being wrought there since Garfield had entered her heart. Flashes of lightning darted in the distance as the soulscape continued to reform itself in the aftermath of fear's destruction.

And there he was, a kneeling figure in the tall grass, facing away from her, intently watching the lightning knit more grassland on the far horizon.

Her footsteps made no sound here. There was no whisper of movement as she walked to him through the high grass. She sensed no life here, other than their own. She saw him more clearly as she approached, though she was not prepared for what she saw.

The snow-white hair was now as shining black as her own, and it fell straight down past his shoulders. These shoulders were strong and smooth, instead of bent and wrinkled. His chest and arms were bare. One knee, wrapped in white buckskin pants, rested on the ground. He sat back on his ankle, elbow propped on the other knee. A relaxed alertness telegraphed outward from him.

As she approached him, he spoke to her without turning his face away from the sparks of lightning.

"So you did save me, Dawn Child. Just not in the way I expected." The words were strong but gentle, and his voice was deep and calm.

"Thunder Horse."

"Yes. I am the old man himself." His snapping black eyes turned to her. He tapped his bare chest. "But this is how I like to see myself."

"As you were when you were young?" To Raven, the conversation felt so natural. His voice was clear and joyful, and her question to him came easily, as if she had known him all her life. He was so open to her, and none of his feelings were hidden. She felt an instant connection with this spirit, one much deeper than the one with Charles. A kindred spirit was this one, who had also known the darkness and craved the light.

"No," he replied with a broad grin. "I wasn't nearly this handsome. I never lived in a lodge. I never wore these." His hand tapped his leggings. "I never got the chance. Always wanted to, though. I always wanted to see the buffalo. But my school never allowed it. Then I went to France. For World War I, you know. Army fatigues and boots for this medicine man." He shook his head. "A war zone is no place for an empath. It is difficult to be a warrior when you can feel every blow against an enemy."

Such a gentle mind is this, she thought.

She returned his smile, surprised at how easily it came to her. "I know. I am the veteran of a few wars myself...Grandfather."

"It must feel strange for you to call this young buck that, Dawn Child. Come, sit with me a moment." He pointed to the new hills rolling away from them. "Let us watch what you have set free to grow."

She sat in the grass, still not feeling it scratching against her, still not feeling the breeze that was stirring Thunder Horse's hair.

"How do you know so much about me? My names—"

"I have always spent time at Charlie's when he wasn't there. And I've been able to stay hidden from him – he cannot read past energies the way you and I can. I've always tried to stay close to him. That's one reason why my hiding place was so close to him."

"Then you've read my letters to him."

"Yes, and some of his to you. Light draws out those who crave it, Dawn Child. And you just gave me a large dose of it. Charlie is right. You are a creature of love. Maybe, someday, you'll realize that."

She blinked slowly, letting the words sink in.

"Can you return with me now? Can you go back to Charles?" she asked.

He lowered his head into the soundless wind. He cocked his ear towards the distant lightning, as if it were broadcasting the changes brewing within him. "You have set my soul free from the chains of fear, child. But the damage to my mind from the drug is still there. It is beyond even your great gifts, I am afraid. The hurts go too deep. And my crimes. My crimes are many." He shook his head, and his bright cheerfulness from a moment before dimmed. "My crimes are not gone, even if I am free. No, Raven. I would only bring more horror to my Charlie. There can be no rest for me until I have atoned for what I have done."

Her ghostly hand reached for his. The grief in his voice shook her heart. I understand this pain all too well.

"You are not the only one to blame for what has happened, Thunder Horse...the drug..."

"Yes, the drug." He lowered his other knee and sat on the ground next to her. "He gave me the drug, yes. But every time I hungered, it was my finger that pulled the trigger. Not his. We all have our deeds that we must atone for. Myself. Charles. Even you. I see into your soul now, and see that you have your own to deal with."

"Charles has his own ideas about who is to blame. For just about everything."

"Coyote?" He exhaled a deep sigh. "Since I told him those stories as a child, he has hunted for Coyote. Even as an adult, even as a doctor, he always wanted someone to blame for all the evils that he saw." The wind played in his dark hair. "Let me tell you about Coyote. He is not a separate being. He is deep within us, a part of us."

"Like my father is deep within me."

"You will see. Coyote is the trickster. He tricked Charlie into thinking he could save me with a drug. He fooled you into thinking you could trick your friend, Wallace, into living, so long ago. Do you see what I say? Coyote is the desire to fix things the easy way, without working through them. Coyote is the easy road. Even out of the good that Coyote tries to do, some evil must come, on that easy road."

He plucked a long blade of grass from the prairie floor and rolled it between his fingers.

"My grandson meant well. And he is wise, in many ways. But no one is all-wise or all-knowing. He only wanted me to live. So he gave me the white man's medicine. But it was not medicine. It was a poison. It was Coyote. It tricked him and betrayed me, twisted me into the shell I became. It covered my senses, cut me off from the world, until only fear could get through."

His young face darkened, and his eyes narrowed.

"And Coyote still hungers. He is not done with us. You must go back to that place, Dawn Child, that place where I held you prisoner. You must see what I have done there, and you must deal with it. Deal with my Coyote, even though it will tear your heart apart. Do that, and keep my Coyote from eating us all."

Her shoulders lifted up as she stared hard at him. "What will I find there?"

"The tissue samples that we stole. We took them for CADMUS. We had a deal. I told you before, if I could not have you with me one way, I would have you another. They wanted the samples. My price was not money, but a copy of you. You must stop them before they complete their side of the bargain."

Her eyes grew wide as she thought of what a clone of herself might mean.

He studied her silent face. "And now I know how I can pay my own debt. I sense the pain hiding deep in you. I remember my own pain, from so long ago. It is the poison. Every time you run, or jump, or feel great joy, it will awaken the pain you have taken from others. That pain will keep growing, child," Thunder Horse said. He reached his hand out to her. "It will grow like a cancer. It will rise and fall in you like the waxing and waning of the moon. Fire on your skin. The burns, the itching, will eat into your mind until you can't see anything but the pain. It will crawl over you until you cannot sleep, cannot think, cannot breathe, until all you can do is pray for death because that is the only thing that will take away the pain. Pain that lives in my body even now. It nearly destroyed me, once. Made my Charlie think I was dead. But I lived, and I escaped my burial platform. I searched out that which I could feed upon, creating fear where I could not find it. But I am weary, child. Weary of causing fear and death where I once was a giver of medicine, like you. I must not allow this poison to continue to corrupt you, too. Charlie must destroy this drug. Tell him, child. Tell him to never use it again."

She took his hand between her own; torrents of sorrow were pouring through him, and she could not bear it. "Then let me heal you. Let me take those pains, that hunger –"

"No! No, little one. Oh, child, do you not hear what I say? I would not have you become as me. You are dying now, but there is a choice. There is only death for me. But for you, for you, I choose life. Out of the darkness of my death comes new light for you. Sometimes out of evil, good can come. And that, child, that is Coyote too."

He grabbed her wrists, both in his spirit form and in his real form. "The only mercy you can give me now is to take me down—"

Her words quivered in a panic, and she squirmed in his grasp. "No, Grandfather, I cannot kill—"

"Within you lies the weapon, the only one to destroy me. Give me that pain, that pain that will take you if it continues in you. I cannot stop the change the drug has started in you, but I can take the pain."

"The change? I don't –"

"There is no time." Scars slashed the skin of his high cheekbones as she felt his healing work its way into her deepest self. His eyes searched hers, as if he could see all the way back to her body. "You have stopped breathing, child. Your body is dying. The effort of your journey is killing you. Breathe." Thin lines of blood trickled down the sides of his weathered face. "Let your life be my death-song."

She bled pain into him while the pulsing light of the soulscape began to fade.

"Go back to yourself. You cannot come with me."

Her answer screamed out of her. "No, no, Grandfather, you cannot—"

"I can. I will. I am." His soul pushed at hers, forcing it back from the depths of his own. The scars widened and deepened across his face, his chest and his arms. Every pain this shell had known, from the first gash she had taken from Garfield's side to the last broken bone she had healed, poured out of her and into his soul. His wrists and legs bent at awkward angles; his ribs were caving in. The dam of anguish in her flooded over him, and the instant release of what had taken many battles to build was ripping him apart.

(break)(break)

Gar saw the dim glow of fire spilling out of the mouth of the cave. The beastly part of his brain fairly glowed back with alarm – the alarm telegraphed to dogs and horses just before the ground begins to shake. Something strange, something weak, about the canyon wall before him forced him to the desert floor, where he took on the form of a mustang to better read that message, a message powerful enough to make him hesitate to pull Raven out of that cave. Charlie's Jeep groaned up beside him, strained by the speed.

The empath leaped out of the car. "There's some kind of energy transfer going on up there," he reported. "You feel it, too?" He pointed to the canyon wall. "This part of the canyon is not completely stable. I do not know what is happening up there, but if it's what I think it is, that entire column is going to collapse."

A spine-wrenching shriek escaped the light above them and ricocheted down the valley.

"Stay here," a falcon ordered as Beast Boy shot himself at the distant blaze.

(break)(break)

Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump-thump-thump-thump

"Breathe," Thunder Horse moaned in a hoarse whisper. "Breathe again."

She was rising against her will, the pressure in her skull decreasing. His raging pulse hushed.

"Live again. Walk with the Great Spirit, little one."

No, no, her soul shrieked, no, I could love this man...my family...

Inhale

Thump-thump-thump-thump

Exhale

He chanted his last words to her, each one fainter than the one before: "I chose this cave as my hiding-place for a reason. It binds us together, you and I. The words on the wall tell your story. They describe the wheel of your life turning. I knew someday that I might find you and bring you here."

She felt that letting-go, his soul's hands releasing her one finger at a time, the warmth replaced by a rushing chill. The disappearance that comes with death that she had felt from so many filled the space between them. That familiar presence-turning-absence pushed them apart.

"I have turned their meaning over in my mind again and again. And she has told me about you. She, the other part of you. She who told me you could save me. She sang to me about the one question you have always asked of yourself. Why. Why you are what you are. Why the fact of your existence makes you suffer so. I can tell you in part, but not all, granddaughter. Your spirit burns with the light of a sun, to drive out darkness. You are not a helpless slave to fate. Your war with the red devil is no accident, my dear Arjh-no-ree."

"It was your choice."

(break)(break)

Thunder Horse's body was howling. She was screeching, feeling each agony as it fled out of her and washed into him. Heat rose from their bodies as the pain took on a form and whipped through the cave. Sweating rocks began to shake around them.

Thump-thump-thump-inhale-thump-thump-exhale—thump-inhale-thump-exhale-thump-inhale.

Exhale

Inhale

Her screams were hoarse now, calmer from loss of energy rather than from loss of terror. Vocal cords chafed raw in her throat as the chorus of their howls dwindled, and only her guttural solo scraped against the vibrating stones surrounding them.

Hands around her wrists burned into her skin. Other hands drug her away, and contact was severed as her mind broke the surface of consciousness.

"Raven, wake up!"

He is here.

One darkness gave way to another darkness, one sprinkled with stars. Cold smokeless air washed over her face as he lifted her out of the trembling cave. A muscular neck supported her face. Clouds of worry and relief surrounded them. The entire column of rock beneath them was giving way, and he was stumbling as the ground swayed.

Green man shifted into jade pterodactyl; he grasped her in his talons as he glided away from the landslide and found the earth once more. Rumbles louder than nearby claps of thunder tore through the air, and rock and dust and sand tumbled end over end in the empty void that had once been a cave. The etchings and scratchings of color and pain on its walls rent into countless indecipherable bits as they were crushed in the deafening collapse of the canyon wall. The maimed body of Thunder Horse was hidden deep in the sandstone rubble.

Charlie was waiting. He took her from Gar as he shifted back to human form. She was a limp rag doll in his arms.

"Think she's in shock?" Gar asked.

Charlie gestured with his head. "Get the blanket out of the back."

Beast Boy sprinted to the back of the Jeep.

"Are you all right?" her cousin asked her.

Her head swayed against his shoulder. Her words slurred their way out of her. "He came after me. Thunder Horse. But I—I stayed. To try to help him. It was our grandfather, he—"

"I know, child. We figured it out before we found you."

Her voice was small and choked. "He is gone. Thunder Horse is dead, Charles. He didn't—didn't hurt me." Each word sliced the inside of her throat. She croaked, "He took it from me, took my pains. He saved me. It killed him. Horribly. I couldn't – I couldn't stop--"

He lowered her feet to the ground. "I don't think there is anything you could have done, little sister." He brushed a loose hair away from her eyes. A sad relief radiated from her cousin. "This was not your doing."

Something was missing inside of her. The weight of pain on her shoulders was lifted, and she felt so light that she thought she would drift off the dusty desert floor.

It's gone. For the first time in my life, I feel no pain. It's gone. I don't know how to be.

Garfield's hand grasped her shoulder from behind.

"You—you—beautiful—stupid—zany—spunky—lunatic!" he sputtered as he spun her around to face him. "Don't scare me like that again." He grasped her other shoulder and began to shake her. "You're always pulling stunts like this. You don't do anything like that without backup again. Do you hear me? You mean too much to me—too much--"

Her lips parted to answer him, but no words could escape the tight muscles of her throat.

Drawing her close, he held her against him tightly and wrapped the blanket around her shoulders. She slipped her arms underneath his and gripped him even more tightly. She craned her head up to rest her cheek against his. The gleam of young Red Cloud's new star – my star, he said -- reflected in her moist eyes.

"You're okay, baby, you're okay," he mumbled against her cheek. "Oh, God, I've found you. I found you. And you're okay." He gripped her head and kissed her fiercely all over her face, making her heart race with his anxious touch. "I found you." Relief, anger, affection, frustration and exhaustion all mixed together to create a whirlwind of confusion in her brain, and the furry chaotic tastes of them coated her mouth. "I found you," he repeated, over and over.

Too much, this is too much, her inner voice shouted. Those last haunting tendrils of her grandfather's spirit steamed off of her in an invisible vapor. Hot salty tears stung her lips. You're here – he's gone...I was dying – one more bright light and one more shadow gone...my choice, how could this be my choice...he's seen another part of me but how...but you are here...how are you here...

The sudden absence of pain confused her muscles and her joints and her bones; even the withdrawal of that agony was a deep shock to her system. Her words were still frozen inside of her, buried in her aching throat, and all she could do was bury her head into him and weep.