Teen Titans – Side Stories and After – Snippets; Foxes Upon Foxes and Magical Girls Galore

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A New Beginnning Excert; Blood Bound for All Eternity

So, I decided to play with the Forbidden myth arc set, not the Titans but their counterparts before Roku's modern-day appearance; when his son Richard Ainsley (Prince Rokuro,) had set out on a quest to discover himself and his cursed heritage and father for the first time. Enjoy!

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Spirit era log; the year is 1267, the place is western Europe in our spirit realm's true domain. Sir Guardian relic, Veravakumu and Sir Wizard high magi Gregory tell me that we are to locate a knight to protect, and for they to train me in the ways of the earthen as one might. I appeal this logic, yet my sword and staff they claim won't be enough to stall the dragon in which I've sought till this day.

We walk into a deep, dark wood. While the boughs sway and carry an aura of deceit, I have learned to address my darkness to a degree and so ever allow my guardian Verra to watch over us. I hear branches cracking as the hard wood rots. A dying, magical forest. My hairs stand on end as the wind touches the nape of my neck in a curious way, as if to pull and drag at my senses from within. I stand, waiting to find our next path to trek forward and on. My hands clutch at my scabbard. I was gifted this tool by a sizable male in the last village by the name of Sir Victor Stonewall. He too warned my companions Verra, Prince Kayumon and Sir Greggory and I of this enchanted danger. I must pass through it, however. There is a witch with a connection to my father in these woods. What better way to discover an unkempt truththan to face such a place with eyes widened to the impossible? I am a curse son, and as such I am drawn to this plane by an invisible set of binds…

/

Verra and his companions are brought to flank me, protecting the prince as they do so always. I am a special package, there is nothing more to debate.

"We probably should –

"Nay," I shake my head. When did Sir Gregory seem so, cowardly?

"I must know. My father is a being of purely destructive magics, then my power is a curse as well. I want to know how to be at peace with my birthright…mother, Queen Catalina will not have a monster as her son otherwise…"

"My lord!" Kay looked to me that day with such dismay in his silvery orbs of a powerful relic. "We shall say nothing of her love to ye, for it is great! As such; upon your return, you are to inherit what belongs to ye, to marry the princess Alicia Daia and too secure the new bloodline."

"Ah, the young ones are betrothed, yet can one blame him?" Verra snorted, pawing his face. "Prince Richard is naïve to the ways of the heart, gentlemen. Cannot we mean to be –

"Wait!" Sir Gregory hushed the foxes to listen. While they've bickered on, a bit of wicker – wood had fallen onto their path. A shudder passed through this young prince's spine.

No. Bones. A grave site.

"We've gone too far along! What does the map –

"Why, you are in deep enough…. I believe, dearest relative…"

/

A shadow of doubt, looms.

A massive bat's wings spreads across the air to block what little light there was to remain. A cackle so horrifying, more so than this illusion of trees and skeletons echoed about this eerie landscape of twilight and recurrent night terrors. Her body is clad in a taught black, and her gloved hands are clawed as a demon' own. Her ears are not human, and her teeth are razor sharp to tear hide and flesh apart.

Richard's hands steadied as the figure with bat winged grace landed atop a mound of stumps. Real trees had existed once…. here, that this WAS a secluded forest. However, this woman had come after he and his companions in the town before. Right as a mage known as Lady Priestess Tara of the Green had also warned them of such dangers whilst up in her tower. Her companion the changing fae; Gareth Logar, had been there, claiming that the forest was a death sentence to princes, for a price.

Had it only been so that they'd reconsidered…

"Lady Veronica…blood witch." Gregory sniffed and wielded his staff above his head. "You have nothing that can sway our party. Why have you been dragging along behind us? The guardians protect the prince with their lives!"

Veronica tilted her head a bit while seated upon the whittled mound in an indecent pose. Her posture mimicked the skeletons. Early death. Had he not seen that…

Greg noticed as well how she was, relaxed, not here to start a fight with good kings and the like.

"Why the by came to I? This forest is a part of the western border. If he should pass through, then in sight lies the Kingdom of the White Oracle. The sorceress, and a dragon she lives to tame."

"Wh… -

"Speak no more, witch of the red circle." Kayu sneered at her, yet Richard too felt her words as a warning to them all for…some intent he could not quite place.

"Who?" He does say, no. He does, demand to know. "Who is this oracle to the west?"

Her ruby lips smile with teeth protruding as a blood - leecher. A soul stealer as Verra called her around his comrades before.

"You grow well to mirror my king, young royal outcast…. little lamb. The one you seek is never far. Call to them, once you leave the sanctity of the blackened forest…."

Her wings pluck up to the air; perching and readying this strix to the skies beyond the forest floor. "I leave just this; the boy and king shall one day meet. In the temple of the gods with two mountain peaks to fall between them Now, let my allies lead you through the good wood. Gentlemen!" She laughed evilly as her wings picked up speed, nearly knocking me to the ground with my guardian companions. Gregory shields them from her dark craft, while Richard stared up into the sky at her wild red and green gaze. She has secrets and knows this wood, he will come to find. This country of Germanic origins was once her home.

Veronica Bethel…

A child of sin and betrayal. And the messenger of Richard's father, the Red Dragon, Lord Roku…

/

The party in cast out of the wood by a pack of shadow – borne wolves, brought from their slumber by the red necromancer. Richard does not speak of the red one, nor his father. He is not willing to ask his family of such histories until he is ready to face the man to call him across deserts and mountain passes as they have.

"Veronica. She I aware…" Kay slips from behind and helps Richard to stand a bit taller, just to see if the shadow's influence of that dark wood has harmed the prince in any way.

"That strix must have sent her as a spy." Veravakumu reverts to his stature of a warrior, not a fox. Gregory relaxes and turns to his elder companion of the two kits. "Yet, Richard is being whisked off by this charm he has placed on the child. You must not let a soul know. The prince may meet with the Oracle, but by no means is he to –

"A! My apples!" The boy runs to her… the foxes look on as Richard's youth and kindness have won over the thanks of a young miss. She had fallen while trying to reach at the boughs of a large apple tree. Such a short one, a white and grey garb as if –

"Child! Back away from her! She is –

"Ah! Não venha aqui! Escuro de sombra e sombra à luz do dia - tropece nele onde ele está!"

"Look out!" Gregory counters the magic she uses, as the priestess of this new plane to the guardians only puts up her arms, as a backlash of light knocks her to the ground.

"No!" Richard runs to her side. "I'm sorry!...Dear gods…we have to heal her! Help me, please –

"I…cannot be tainted, move."

Richard blinks into the eyes of another. Past her dark purple and violet waves, as well as her eyes of violet to match, she is small yet stronger than he in the arts. "GET OFF." She demands, and Richard does just this.

"Who…." Kay points a snout the priestess's way. "Who are you?"

She rises to dust off of her shawl and dress. "I?" She blinks at the foxes and magi. The prince cannot speak for he is confused. Was she not…

"The apple was ruined, so I was very upset. Here, you believed me incapable of plucking a second from this tree, yet it a sacred form." She explained. "I took and lost; thus I will not keep it, but return it to become the earth again."

"A, a goddess's priestess." Greg properly bowed with an apology to his lips. "We came from the forest and now find ourselves in a place not described on the map we cling to." He explained to the young but wise priestess.

"Then you are travelers, my apologies." The girl bowed a bit and returned to her basket. Her empty basket, sadly.

"I might then ask…." Richard smiled to her, trying to seem less of a bother as he masked his emotions to remain meek but sure. "Then, if only one may have an apple, may I try to retrieve one?"

/

"You are a strange child." The sighed and lifted her basket. "Of course, if you waste one more, I will be forced to leave offerings two – food to this sacred figure of the mother's grace." She smirked, trying to make the boy feel that this was a test. "I will not lose to it. Please. Stand away, Verra." Richard reassured his companion that he would not fall backwards as he had done in his younger days a the fox's pupil.

"Here we go…" Richard took in an inhale, letting it pass quickly as he stepped up to the trunk of the large provider. He knocked twice upon its base, then held out an opened palm as a second knock was louder than the first. The third looked to rattle it, and then…

It fell.

The apple landed in the boy's palm, face up, as if he knew where it would land.

Grateful to the pretty staple, he thanked the boughs for their direction, and to his side he handed the pretty red and golden treat to the priestess who stared from beside him.

"There was only one question, the tree too spoke of. Was it willing to part with a dear child?" He smiled as she seemed to do the same with a blush back to this dark-haired boy with a sword. He had not raised it, used magic, yet understood the words of the spirit attached to this great wonder.

"Come. We may speak inside my home. I do not wish to alarm, yet your ability to know is why I did not stop you."

Verra scratched his ears as Kay lowered his, and Greg had reason to believe that a goddess resided in that girl.

/

The commune was a part of the Portugal border, as she claimed we'd walked right through a magical forest to arrive. Richard nodded to this, as did Gregory and his companion guardian foxes. Her name was Priestess of the Crescendo; a division of the Dodona Sect, Ravenna, and that she had been reborn many times to see to a travesty that had carried on into this era.

"You were one borne of royal blood, so too was I once, yet in truth I was simply gifted." She brought a tea pot from her ventures to sit between them as her fingers worked to poor a murky brew into each of the travelers' cups.

"This tea shall heal what has been taken. The trip was cast along with shadows and demon at every turn." She crinkled her nose to state. "I smelled the miasma strongly, as this is one of my many gifts."

"Have you lived long with this foresight?" Gregory asked the fellow sorceress. She did not smile, yet simply worked as she poured a cup for the young prince. "This was fated by my ruler, so I did not expect such a day to arrive, nay." She admitted, "Yet, I am glad to have been reunited. So? Did you speak to the Goddess of the Earth mother? Lady Tara?" Asked the dark-haired priestess, curiously.

"You speak as if you are rather close." Kay noticed how she wasn't unfamiliar with titles, as if too relaxed to speak them proper.

"Yes. We were once, close…And then a certain curtain had drawn itself over the land of Ire…" She said forlornly.

"Tara was a goddess's servant." Spoke Richard to his host. "She was very close with the changing fae, one –

"I know of him, and could not care to ask. For today, we shall speak only of your journey. And, my own."

/

Richard looked up at Ravenna as she stopped to a knock at her home's front door. Well, more so a terrace that was low enough to allow another to knock.

A letter had come from the king of her world. A monster had been terrorizing her people for a decade and she'd not f –

"Lady Ravenna?"

The witch blinked as her fingers held tightly to the parchment slip. She turned on her heel to speak to her new companions. "We shall journey by day break. You may find all that you need in my home, and I advise you to avoid going into town…. There, will be danger there to avoid…" She said below her shawl.

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"Was Ravenna sort of, odd to you?" As the foxes slept on the ground to preserve space Greg had the seated cushion, while Richard took the only guest bedroom in the Lady's quaint little space.

"How rude." Greg nuzzled into his cozier mound as he reprimanded Kayu's suspiciou tendencies. "As a goddess's messenger of the divine, we cannot question the mistress of this home. Tomorrow, we shall part and set forth to the Venezia, where I realize a trap could await us….Yet I must speak to Lady Arianna." He sighed into the pillows. "Verra? You are to tackle the task of keeping Veonica and her kin away from the prince….And I deduce that Ravenna will wish to join us –

"She cannot leave here!" Hissed the dark fox on the floor. "She is sacred! Did you not hear? She was gifted foresight, and knew of his arrival…We cannot let our guards down."

The three nodded in agreement. As for Richard's few dreams he too had that night, they were unperturbed by gods and daemon for once. As for tomorrow, the nightmare would unceremoniously continue to plague them as before.

/

Up on high in the mountains, a great beast had awoken the townsfolk. The bells chimed thrice; danger. There was an attack. Ravenna rose to greet the night as the green in the air was in warning of sulfur and a danger she had once faced in a past life.

~ Rorek. ~

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A biting blood to his lip, the creature staggered to its hollow, oh how it relished before! The winged sound of bats and raven leaped to its ears of a faire one.

"Lord of Knoll…"

"Lordship…you've come." The dark wood was home to those forgotten, for only towards the north did lie this fae son's last home. He was never to return…

The shadow – figure which addressed the light-haired sorcerer smiled below its clothed throat.

"You long to seek them, then go. I release you for now to do as I wish." The being let a free hand sway as a bind on the light haired fae's face was taken. "A dragon is what the people desire. For ye shall be it…. Wake the dawn, and have him to return from where he hides from me…" A purr in the dark, as the fae being felt bile rise. Such a fixation…so disturbed was he, yet…

The light fae growled and went at the daemon's throat only to be tossed back by the masked foe's soldiers of sin and torment. "GO. I will not rewrite your sentence. They must earn your trust, otherwise…." The king let the blood fall as the dragon gave a great shout, a call to the air as it vanished quickly beyond the mist.

The blood that seeped from its own jaws turned to fire, black and green, for it was of two sides. Two curses…

Son of Knoll. Son of dark dragons….

And, child of sin. He was not to look back, for he could never return to the land of dragons.

He only lived to breathe fire upon the land.

/

"Dogged! – Alert his majesty!" The guards at the palace turned to find their riders. "Send word to the mages of this commune, to tell them of the danger. They must face it for the sake of preserving the kingdom –

A wild roar as the men stood and cowered. The guards pointed to the men on horse. "GO! Stay on course, do not turn back – for if you do, the land will be nothing!"

/

The bells, fire, and water wells were swelling up. Readying for an onslaught. Richard awoke to the guardians being divided. Groaning and trying to stay awake, Richard called to Verra as he appeared.

"You are full of soot!" Richard gasped at the appearance of his ally, who just chuckled by the reaction.

"I was stoking the fires." Veravakumu lied. "Go to freshen up, young lord. Yet, do so carefully. I'll only be a breadth away per our contract."

Richard nodded as Verra, not Veravakumu came to greet the boy as a cat waiting to be fed.

Richard worried that there was any other reason, yet as he rose, he saw Ravenna making her magic happen in the kitchen. "You rose quite late." She said, earning a shrug from the child her own age. "Where are Sir Gregory and –

"They went about to collect and replenish any provisions for your trip to Venezia." She sighed. "I want to meet the beings of the Star Capital; will you be headed to the Temple of Orion? The White Knight? My old self met him, once. We had an affinity to magic."

"I knew Arianna many years ago in our youth." Richard smiled and nervously turned a bit redder. "We, were playmates at my mother's –

"She is not, though." The dark eyed young woman frowned. "She's not your betrothed, and your mother is not…"

Richard sighed, "I did find this from my companions." His face fell. "My real mother; yet none will speak of who she was…as if, I received this curse from –

"You did not, as the goddess doth state." Ravenna interrupted and placed a tea mug in front of the boy to grip, clumsily at first.

"The mother is sacred when she is valued."

"Then…" Richard's eyes drooped. "It is true –

The door swung back, and Ravenna dropped her cups, while Richard stood gripping his with a shake wrist.

"FIRE!! DRAGON!! RUN!! RUN TO THE BORDER!! SOMEONE!!!" A man flailed helplessly as he was burned where he stood, while the two teens could do nothing.

The door swung shut as Ravenna let it, then she gripped Richard's as they fled. She would not stay. He was here…even after she…

"Why was that man ablaze?? Ravenna!!" Richard had Verra on his shoulder as a smaller pet, the three not looking back as Ravenna's abode was set in the same way – to ruin. A cinders and smoke made up the burial of her teas, books, and relics, the girl held not an ounce of sorrow. "Come. To the –

Before them was the face and tail of a dark - black and purple bellied beast.

A dragon, and a set of red eyes made both teens stop where they'd stood.

"Rorek…" Ravenna gulped, while Richard was without a clue.

~FOUND YOU……~ The demonic dragon craned its massive neck to meet the sorceress's face. ~YOU HID FROM US…. NOW, WE SHALL HAVE YOU – AND YOUR QUEST WILL BE DONE!! ~ A cloud of mist, no, smoke engulfed her, as Richard was left on the hill to watch as Ravenna was taken.

He cried out and flung himself after the beast, only to fail as a feeling struck at his heart…

The toxic cloud made him sleep, as Verra returned to a wolf form to catch the boy. Ravenna…. had been stolen…

/