Initially, Bruce planned to return Jason to the muggle world as soon as possible. He knew that muggles had a system in place to accommodate missing and misplaced members of their society, but he had yet to brush up against it, and getting information on how to contact that system and ensure Jason's safety within it took time.
Meanwhile, Jason seemed content to eat, rest, and explore the mansion. Unfortunately, he also seemed eager to pick up every single vaguely dangerous artifact he came across.
Need to find Jason? No need for magic. Just follow the shrieking of sentient library books and the sooty trail left behind from a spherical token with a tendency to ignite when disturbed.
At least the paintings liked him. They kept comparing him to Dick in their rare, private whispers.
After the long, bitter conversation explaining what a muggle was and the by-definition impossibilities that came along with being one, Jason took to the reveal of the magical world like a bird being let out of a cage for the first time. Cautious, alert, and then throwing himself into it all at once.
He chattered constantly, asking questions and commandeering a corner of the library to build himself a small fortress of magical books. He sat with breathless anticipation on the floor of the kitchen, legs crossed beneath him, watching the pots and pans and ingredients soar above his head as Alfred magically prepared each meal. He volunteered to feed and care for the owls in their perch and other magical animals that took refuge around the back of the manor in the winter months, mistaking stray kneazles for cats and having to be dissuaded from hauling out heating pads for a wild and very disgruntled fire salamander that lived out by the pond behind the garden shed.
The inevitable memory charm would be more difficult and more disorienting the longer this went on, but for the moment, indulgence kept the boy happy and safe.
('Indulgence,' he told himself, as Jason adapted Blackjack to be played with Exploding Snap cards. Alfred dealt them several rounds after dinner, before patrol, and Bruce remembered laughing.)
He introduced Jason to the Cave on the third day. Watched the awe on Jason's face as the family's grandfather clock appeared to grow apart from the wall to reveal a doorway. Instructed him to take refuge within immediately, should he have any reason to suspect danger.
"Like those guys from town," Jason said, looking up at him with sharp green eyes. "The snatchers, right?'
"Yeah," Bruce said, watching the entrance to his bunker, one hand on Jason's shoulder. "With any luck, I won't draw much attention from their masters, but it is always best to assume the worst. If I haven't explicitly told you someone is permitted to be in the manor, assume they only intend to harm you, and hide here immediately."
"And everyone from town?" Jason said, still watching him. "What about them? They don't even know they're s'posed to be in danger."
Bruce had little he could say to that but, "I'm trying to keep this area safe. Right now, the best way I can do that is pretending to be one of them."
"I want to help," Jason said, turning so his whole body was facing Bruce, his shoulders squared. "There's a war over us—we should know about it!"
Bruce felt a smile crack over his face. Firecracker kid. "Maybe one day the worlds will merge. But not right now. And running around shouting it in the streets will only get you carted off for disturbing the peace, or paint a huge target on you and everyone you tell. So don't even think about it. I'll do what I can, but right now, exposing magic to the world will only make Gotham Field the biggest target of all. In a worst-case scenario, it may even start a third war on top of this whole mess."
"A third war," Jason said, raising his eyebrows. "Okay, fine. Maybe telling the folk with militaries that there's genocidal magicians hidden under their noses isn't the best idea right now, 'specially if they can't tell the good and bad guys apart, but what's the second war?"
Much to Jason's annoyance, Bruce responded, "This one."
He took other precautions. Redoubled his protective charms on the manor. He didn't tell Jason the Dark Lord's name, so the taboo had no chance of being invoked—not even accidentally. He wrote to Dick about a houseguest. I think you would like him, though with any luck, he'll be on his way home by break.
Dick responded, Adriana (who I have mentioned to you before, a third year Slytherin) was released from the dungeons this evening. I took her to Madam Pomfrey to get the bruises and chain marks erased, as she would have been too sore to sit in classes tomorrow and could scarcely hold a quill steady enough to dip in ink. As we waited I asked her about the pet rabbit she sent home in September when she worried Hogwart's current climate would cause him harm; she misses him very much but speaking of him seemed to relax—
Bruce went out on walks several more times in the night and informed all Snatchers in the area to report directly to him, especially if they had any information regarding the half-invisible figure stunning them silently in the night. The phantom that dropped them off, stripped of all magical artifacts, in distant muggle law enforcement offices, where a handful of half-bloods, muggleborns, and squibs lying low among the police officers took measures to protect their muggle coworkers.
If ever a Snatcher escaped the hold, they tended to return to Bruce directly, meaning to inform him of being attacked in his area.
While Jason hid in the cave, Bruce held the Snatcher in the front hall, thanked them very politely, and paid them for their pains. Alfred brought in tea while Bruce promised he was making efforts to find the muggle-lover and ensure they was properly punished, going so far as to place a bounty on the head of the vigilante. He mentioned in passing that if the Snatcher wanted to move on to elsewhere, they would not be judged, considering their terrible ordeal. Some did, but not most. Fair enough. He found different, more high-security muggle holding areas to leave them at, the second time around.
October ended. November bled on. Jason continued trying to feed the fire salamander behind the garden shed, and Dick kept writing letters, swearing he was still alive and well.
000
It was December, winter break, and Jason was not yet gone.
Bruce blamed his own selfishness. He knew Jason would be better off elsewhere, with other muggles, as far from the strife of Britain's wizarding world as he could get—but Bruce was selfish, and he knew it.
He could have sent Jason away months ago. Sent him off to a boarding school abroad, if necessary. Sent him to the muggle's 'child protective services,' as was the original plan.
Hell, Bruce could have given him several thousand galleons' worth in muggle currency, bought him a travel pass, and sent him on his merry way.
But it was winter break, and Jason was in the manor, reading in a chair by the library's grand fireplace while Bruce apparated onto the train platform and waited for Dick to emerge.
This year, the hoard of green robes exiting the train was smaller than Bruce had come to expect. A moment later he realized there were fewer of all the colors than he'd come to expect. His stomach twisted with the thought that only half-blood and pureblood students remained at Hogwarts. There had been more muggleborns than he'd thought.
(There was a tangent connected to that thought, immediately trying to decide where all those muggleborn students had gone, and he cut it off and filed it away for another time. Not anything he could do about it, now. Too late. He'd picked his stance and if he wavered now, it would all collapse around him. Prioritize. Gotham and family, first.)
Despite the lack of muggleborns, there were still significant numbers of students pouring out of the compartments, though nothing to how many students there been in Bruce's day. The number of students had been low for years, and he had accepted that. Casualties of Voldemort's last reign of terror left the number of Hogwarts attendees at record lows for the last decade and a half, and now—
(Merlin. What would this war do to their world?)
Dick trotted out after a fashion, and the moment they caught sight of each other, he bounded forward.
Bruce hailed him as he came, smile thin but as best as he could manage. Though Dick had nearly grown tall enough to look Bruce in the eye, he placed a hand on Dick's shoulder when he was close enough and gave a squeeze, as he had when the boy was younger.
It was not much of a show of affection, (the Malfoys were not on the platform this year, but if they were, he knew Narcissa would have been hugging her boy by now. Draco was one year older than Dick. Draco had advised Dick towards arithmancy at the end of second year. Had Draco killed, yet?) but any thought of trying to make up for his silent welcome fled as he realized Dick had a shadow.
"Father," Dick said, in the clipped way he did, because he hated the word, but the last four years meant he didn't having any better, "may I introduce Damian? He's Talia al Ghul's son. It's his first year."
Cold ice filled his gut. Colder than the December air around them.
An al Ghul. Joy.
Bruce turned to look at the boy and smiled down at him, blithe.
Damian al Ghul had the looks of a harpy. Pointed faced. Sharp eyes. A scowl that tried very hard to be his most prominent feature. Yes, quite like a harpy.
He was short, stocky, and looked all-in-all rather unlike his mother, though it was very possible he took after his father. Whoever that may have been.
If Bruce had to grow up and live with Ra's al Ghul after becoming of age, he may well have had a kid out of wedlock, too—admittedly, it would have helped his story of Dick's ancestry.
As it was, aside from traveling the world, his mid-twenties rebellion consisted mostly of illegal dueling tournaments and shouldering perhaps a smidge too closely with the Dark Arts—which may have been part of the reason the Wayne family was once again considered acceptable for Death Eaters and blood supremacists to proposition, though he wasn't about to say for certain. As long as it kept Dick safe, he would only examine the origins of his reputation to replicate them, not to question.
Talia, though. The Talia he'd first met in Hogwarts was already so steeped in the Dark Arts, Bruce wouldn't have been surprised if her father forced an unbreakable vow as a child to keep her bound to him.
(They'd been close, once. In sixth year, Talia might've been one of the few people Bruce would have ever considered calling a friend. It hadn't been enough to survive through Voldemort's first rise while Bruce was following the wind, but it was enough to try and reestablish contact for a short while once he'd returned. Half a decade of trying to pry her from her father's grasp, and it had never been the same again.)
"Damian, wonderful to meet you," Bruce said, trying to make the fake smile on his face something that people who weren't Dick would be fooled by. He offered out his hand to the small boy. "Bruce Wayne."
"I know who you are," Damian said, not shaking his hand.
"I said I'd wait with him until his mother arrived," Dick said.
"Did something come up? She's usually so punctual," Bruce said, addressing the space in between both boys.
"She is occupied with arranging the annual Yuletide Celebration," Damian said, his pointed chin in the air. "Which I have been instructed to personally invite you to."
With a flick of his wrist, he produced a cream colored envelope from the folds of his dark cloak and presented it to Bruce with all the air of importance an eleven year old could.
Dick looked alarmed. "I didn't know about that. B, I didn't know about this, promise. Where did you even get that? Have you been holding onto it since September?"
"As usual, your powers of observation are abysmal," said Damian. He twitched the hand holding the envelope once more. "Well?"
"Right, sorry," Bruce said, and took the envelope from him, running a thumb over the al Ghul crest, molded into green wax. "We're very honored to be invited. Aren't we, Dickie?"
"Right," Dick said, nodding quickly and glancing towards Damian. "It'll be fun to see you again before school."
Bruce wasn't so sure about that, but nodded along with his boy and tucked the envelope into his own pouch of holding. "Now, your mother is coming, isn't she?"
000
Dick crumbled the moment the front door of the manor closed behind him.
It began as sagging. His shoulders slumped. His knees bent more than usual. Then, his head hung, and it was all downhill from there.
"Steady, chum," Bruce said, wrapping an arm around his boy's shoulders. "Let's get you into a chair, all right? I'm sure Alfred's got something wonderful for dinner. Then you can rest."
Dick nodded, eyes closed, and let Bruce lead him to the dining room. The tall windows had their curtains drawn closed, and the only light was soft, coming from the glass chandeliers flickering above them. Wordlessly, Bruce pulled a wooden high-backed chair from the table and transformed it into a plush armchair. Dick sank into it, boneless, his eyes closed.
"Are you hurt?" Bruce asked.
"Tired," Dick said, hardly moving. "Just tired."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure, Bruce."
(It was nice to hear his name again. It was nice to hear anything from Dick other than the clipped, imposed title of 'father.')
The boy was newly sixteen, having turned the year on the first of December. He hadn't yet grown into his limbs all the way, but his shoulders seemed undeniably broader than they had when he'd departed three months ago. His hair needed cutting. There were faint bags under his eyes. His cheekbones were jutting more than ever, the last of his childhood softness worn away by time.
Bruce sat on the thick arm of the chair and gathered his boy against himself, feeling the twiney arms and bones shiver under his hand.
"Talk," Bruce said. He wouldn't have much to say in response, he never did, but, "It's helped you before. Talking."
Dick drew a shaky breath and buried his face into Bruce's shoulder, his sharp chin jutting and his nose stabbing, and his shivering not subsiding in the least. Bruce pulled an arm back long enough to retrieve his wand and flick a series of silent privacy wards around them, his face keeping blank and his mind carefully occlumens-blank.
It was muffled, and gasping, and broken, but Bruce listened, and his son told him about Hogwarts.
000
Lmao, for all of five minutes I convinced myself this would be a threeshot. Not gonna be any extra longer for having more chapters, but I'll be able to make more aesthetically pleasing breaks
if there are any scenes you want to see, comment with them and I'll see about putting them in! the timeline is pretty well set, but if there's an idea that really strikes true but I can't fit it in, I may just write it out anyway and post as a separate story and turn this into an AO3 series
psa: Joker will NOT be killing Jason in this fic, thank you, that is all