#shadowcrest

a friend group (consisting of shadow milk [me being the oldest], black sapphire [a gay cis man who is older than the candy apple but younger than me], and candy apple [a lesbian demigirl who's OBSESSED with me and is younger than the black sapphire])

a polycule (consisting of shadow milk [me], pure vanilla [a bisexual cis man who's around the same age as the white lily and was friends with her since childhood], and white lily [a bisexual cis woman who's around the same age as the pure vanilla and was friends with him since childhood])

Instead, Raven softly tugged at her pockets and pulled out one of her handkerchiefs, a frayed cloth with carefully hand-stitched embroidery. She rubbed at her eyes and then replaced her fists with the fabric, sniffling as she hid her tears. Zatanna watched as her lips mouthed her mantra, the calming words eventually falling out in a near whisper, “Azarath. Mentrion. Zinthos.”

The magician reached out to put a hand on her daughter’s shoulder, pulling back as Raven let out a shuddering breath right before they made contact. Zee licked her suddenly dry lips, silently admonishing herself for nearly disturbing the memory before it was ready.

At the near interruption, Raven seemed to pause for a moment, tilting her head until her hair fell away from her ears. Her fingers dug even further into the handkerchief, pulling it taut over her eyes. Her chapped lips trembled and a choking breath forced its way out of her lungs, “You shouldn’t be here.”

Zatanna furrowed her brows, her fingers digging into her pants. Certainly the memory wasn’t talking to her…

Before the mother could let her thoughts run away, Raven roughly swiped at her eyes. Another breath heaved out of her, this time morphing into a sob as the teenager dropped the cloth and desperately hugged herself, “You shouldn’t be here!” Her voice cracked as it raised, “You haven’t even apologized for this time!”

Her indigo eyes were still squeezed impossibly tight but Zee felt the whirlwind of emotions from her daughter’s memory. Anger, resentment, worry, the tiniest flicker of fear, and pain. So, so much pain.  

Suddenly, so fast that Zatanna could almost swear she felt her own chest constrict at the emotional whiplash, Raven's eyes snapped open and she calmed down, her face abruptly reverting to the precariously held stoicism that Zee had walked in on. Shaking hands wiped at her ruddy cheeks and the demoness softly began her memory, noisily sniffling as the tiniest flicker of light made its presence on the wall that she faced.

The very same wall that held a lipstick marked Wonder Woman poster, a permanent chip where her desk had scuffed the paint when she’d first decorated her rarely used room, and a printed snapshot of her parents, fast asleep on the couch and drooling in the least attractive of ways.

Something in the sorceress’ chest twisted at the picture, taken by the empath herself all those years ago; she and Constantine had been so exhausted after the whole Arkham exorcism ordeal, they’d practically fallen asleep standing up. But despite her own fatigue Raven knew that Mom and Dad were back together at least for the night and she… she hadn’t wanted to miss any peace between them.

Peace that seemed to be so rare when Raven was a teenager.

Peace that only happened after she and John had spent some time apart, with Raven switching between cities as they calmed down from whatever argument they had had.

Peace that couldn’t even make it past half of a family dinner.

And as such, any hope of peace was nonexistent here. It was obvious in Raven’s tear-stained face and her shaky breathing, in how her trembling hands clasped over her biceps in a hug, in how her fingernails dug into her skin, and so painfully obvious in the slightly stained sundress she wore, wrinkled near the hem from when she had clutched at the fabric as she listened to her parents’ fight for the umpteenth time.

Zee stayed crouched near the floor, watching as the demoness shakily stood and stumbled to her desk. The mother wearily followed her footsteps, peeking over her daughter’s shoulder as pale hands yanked open one of the drawers, pulling out an old journal. Exhausted, the teenager plopped down into her chair and rubbed at her eyes again, flipping to a yellowed sketch that had been taped onto the very last page.

A wave of sorrow crashed over the room, heavy and intense as Raven tenderly ran her fingers over a hand-drawn sketch of Giovanni Zatara, the pads of her fingers tracing from the lines of his suit to his mustache. Zee took an involuntary step back as her daughter softly greeted the illustration, “Hey, again. Uh-- Grandpa?”

The empath let out a humorless laugh, “Sorry, I forgot if we decided on Grandpa or not. But who knows,” Raven sat up and rested her elbows on the desk, every motion practically screaming of how tired she was, “You could’ve been a Pop-pop type of guy, huh?” Her lips curled as she failed to contain a snicker, “That might’ve messed with Dad, though.”

Raven smiled sadly at her grandfather’s grin, running her thumb over the long-dried inkstrokes that made up his bowtie, the gray streaks in his hair, the top hat that he proudly held in his hand, the blots of stars that made up the stage behind him. She bit her lip and sighed, “Sorry that I never come with good news.”

The picture was unaffected by her words and that seemed to open the floodgates. “They’ve been fighting,” Raven murmured.

Another chuckle, the sound somehow darkening the room and the specks of light that grew on its edges, “Again.” Zatanna wrung her hands together guiltily as her daughter practically whispered out, “I--I just don’t know anymore, Grandpa. I don’t even know what started this one!”

Unfortunately, memory or not Giovanni’s likeness did not speak; no condolences or advice were offered and the mother stubbornly blinked away the growing glassiness of her eyes. In the silence filled only with Raven’s trembling huffs, Zee allowed herself to wonder just where Raven had gotten a portrait of the mystic.

A bigger part of her wondered just how often her daughter had apparently visited Shadowcrest, just how many times she had confessed her worries to her only private connection to her grandfather, and just how long she had been internalizing her parents’ fighting.

As if on cue (so much so that Zatanna once again worried about how aware these memories were of her thoughts, let alone experiences that had already happened in the future) the empath spoke again, “Do you…” She paused and wet her lips, her fingers drumming against her arm as she brought the portrait up to eye level, “Do you think it’s me?”

Zee didn’t touch her daughter but leaned in closer, “Raven…”

The memory didn’t respond to her and kept going, “I know that a lot of their fights aren’t explicitly because of me, but sometimes I can’t help but wonder, Grandpa.”

Sapphire eyes slid shut and she let her head fall back onto the chair. Giovanni’s drawn eyes were somehow curious and she rambled, “You and Mom never got a chance to really know each other, I know… But do you think she ever,” Another pause as the teenager cleared her throat, letting words she had had fleeting thoughts about (but never, never allowed herself to even muse over) fall off her lips, “Do you think she ever regrets adopting me?”

A troublingly large splotch of light obliterated where half of the bed lay. Zatanna ignored the danger, wondering if she should interrupt the memory before it ended, lest her own heart be broken beyond repair.

“Do you think Dad does… at least sometimes?”

Too late.

Zatanna all but dropped onto one of the chair’s arms, her cheek resting on the memory’s temple. She touched Raven’s cheeks and wrapped her daughter in a hug the best she could, but the memory continued on, amending to her grandfather, “I… I don’t really think it’s true but sometimes with all the fighting…”

She sighed, the heavy breath making her shoulders slump, “It’s almost as if they’re staying together for me. Like… they need a proper time away but they don’t feel comfortable taking their hiatuses as long as I’m in the picture.”

The magician’s heart was practically dust at the passiveness that shrouded her daughter. No snarkiness of teenage years, no weariness of the weight she carried by being a superhero and a daughter split in two, no anger at the fact that she couldn’t confide in her parents about her insecurities as their daughter.

Just a lethargic acceptance of this particular aspect of her life, an emptiness that was extremely worrisome for a human, let alone an empath.

Hoping that the memory would address her, Zee admitted, “It’s not true, but I guess it does seem like that sometimes, doesn’t it?” Raven said nothing, even as her mother ran a hand through her hair, looking up at the room around them. When her daughter stayed silent she continued, “I thought you went to see Cass after this fight.”

“You like my outfit? I was gonna meet Cass after dinner but that plan’s shot,” Raven’s lips curled into a broken little smile as she ran her thumbs over her dress’ hem, tilting the journal so the portrait could take in her tear-stained ensemble. “Although, she probably would appreciate this dress better than you, Grandpa. She loves seeing me in spring colors.”

Zatanna’s fingertips laid on the empath’s stripe-covered shoulders, “I don’t understand; why won’t you talk to me? The other Ravens did.” Her sapphire eyes narrowed slightly as her daughter continued on, so casually that she wasn't certain the memory was improvising or of it had actually happened.

“I’ve told you about Cass, right? She’s great, Grandpa. I wish I could’ve introduced you two.” Raven licked her lips, her words hesitant, “She’s… she’s been talking to me, actually. About how I shouldn’t talk to you just yet.” Another pause and the teenager leaned back in the chair, closing her eyes as her mother’s cheek pressed against her own, “Not when you’re this close to the truth.”

Before the mystic could interrupt, Raven pivoted from the subject, “But, you know, Dad told me the truth a lot. When he was blackout drunk and it was just me and him.” She slowly bent the corner of Giovanni’s portrait, smoothing the paper half a second later.

Bending, smoothing. Bending, smoothing. Bend it again then smooth it over. Causing the mess and then having to fix it. Over and over and over again.

Her indigo gaze stayed fixed just under the Wonder Woman poster, not three inches from where a spot of light was slowly growing in size. “He talked in his sleep sometimes,” The demoness laughed, the sound terribly forced. More and more light ate away at the floorboards behind them and she dipped her pinky into one blinding splotch that consumed the drawer’s knob, uncaring as it burned her skin, “I didn’t like listening to him.”

No, burning wasn’t an adequate explanation. Not when the light seemed to pull the girl’s cells apart in near geometric blocks, as small as a clump of dirt. It reminded Zatanna of how characters disintegrated in superhero movies, nowhere near as real as the living memory that she now interacted with.

Uncaring of how the light sluggishly crawled up her finger and onto her hand, Raven mused to the picture, “It doesn’t count as eavesdropping if I’m just making sure my dad doesn’t die of alcohol poisoning, right?”

The sketch of Giovanni Zatara moved, its eyes crumbling white as the corners started to succumb to the blinding light. Raven smiled.

Zee pressed closer to her daughter’s shoulder as she turned to the opposite wall, her stomach dropping as the light completely consumed the other half of the room. Finally, as if aware of the magician’s growing concern, Raven turned to her mother. Her indigo eyes were shiny yet dull, containing a million emotions, accusing and pleading and guilty all at once.

Her chin tilted to the window and the untainted clouds that lingered beyond it. “That light’s already taken the door. The window’ll have do.”

She turned her attention back to her now-obliterated pinky and that white splotch of light, uncaring as more and more light crept up her arm and around the room. Zatanna rushed to the window, her steps hesitant and completely stopping as her daughter spoke to her back, “Even though it’s never happened, I always rationalized it to myself, you know?”

The memory cleared her throat, “That all the smoking and drinking would catch up to him before a broken heart could.” Raven laughed, the sound flat and devoid of all humor as she added, “You’re already so stable… and I figured if Dad could deal with all this fighting and lying then I could too.”

Zatanna ran her tongue over her teeth, “Your father’s strong, Blackbird.” She glanced over her shoulder at the teenager, worriedly noting how close the light was getting, even if its route was abnormally slow compared to before, “So are you.”

“Yeah, well,” Her eyes met Zatanna’s again, a spark of life that reminded the magician that despite all of this she was getting close, “You know I'm going to fix my family. You need to fix yours.”

Zee nodded and climbed onto the windowsill, blinking down at the endless expanse of dark rain clouds. Raven’s room at Shadowcrest wasn’t too high up, but this memory made Rapunzel’s view seem like child’s play. She couldn’t even pinpoint exactly where the clouds morphed from rainy gray to pure darkness. Her sapphire eyes flicked to her daughter then she immediately moved her face away, her mind racing as she immediately tried to forget the image of Raven slowly being consumed by white light.

Still, none of this made sense. Why was the light moving so slow? Did lingering, did having a conversation with her daughter really speed up the memory’s timer that much? Maybe the heart-to-hearts would have to wait until she found the lost memories after all.

Or maybe Raven was telling her to just watch for once.

But even if one of her ideas, even if all those theories were true, just how long did this memory last? Surely not as long as Raven’s conversation with Jason, right? The knot in her stomach wretched as she noted the light creeping up from the brick foundation of Shadowcrest. Not as fast as in the library, but enough to cause alarm. Especially with such an endless drop awaiting her.

Whether it was the panic that thoroughly spread through her chest or the thought of a past memory, this version of Raven decided to speak to her directly. Softly, even though she must have been burning from the light already, Raven (not the memory; her Raven) said the words to spur the sorceress out of her overthinking and into action:

“Please, Mom.”

Those words made that dark expanse beyond the clouds seemed familiar. Not true darkness, instead an inky shadow, the type that could come out from underneath a cloak in magic tendrils; something inherently dangerous, but nothing that would ever cause her harm.

A blackness that could very well host four red eyes if it truly needed to.