Chapter Text
When Tim Drake was seven years old, he had a nanny. He had had many nannies by the time he was seven (eight of them, to be exact), but this nanny was different. After the last nanny was caught with alcohol in Drake Manor, Janet decided that “ambitious college girls” were too much trouble for the job, despite their lower pay compared to more experienced nannies. As such, she looked for candidates fitting the only other nanny stereotype she could find: an old, working class woman whose children had all grown up.
Mrs. Nelson fit that description, though only barely. Though Tim never knew her age, instead classifying her simply as “old”, he later reflected that she couldn’t have been older than 65 at most. Her gray hair held no traces of its previous pigment, but her face was far less wrinkled than those of the elderly hags in Tim’s books.
Furthermore, though her children were mostly grown, with the eldest two being in college, her youngest was only 14. This ensured that she had to be home every night to tend to her daughter. However, since her manner was severe and matter-of-fact, Janet deemed her good enough before her and her husband’s rushed flight to Peru.
At first, Tim was a little scared of Mrs. Nelson. While fear was rarely his go-to response for anything, the woman’s knowing eyes unsettled him. She moved with a purpose that contrasted with Tim’s previous, more hands-off nannies, finishing household tasks in almost supernatural time. Even at seven, Tim was intelligent enough to know that a quick-witted old woman in Gotham was not to be underestimated.
After only a few weeks, however, he found his fear fading as he spent more time with her. Her all-knowing gaze was sharp, but it meant she caught him a moment before he tripped. Her manner was severe, but she helped him with his fourth-grade homework without judgment or reprimand when he got a question wrong. Her hands were quick to work and pull at his clothes, but they never raised to hit him, even when he was being especially annoying.
Instead, she cooked him meals every night, leaving enough for him for lunch the next day at school. She dropped him off every day for school, even if it meant her getting up extra early and taking time away from her daughter just to walk him to the bus stop. And, most importantly, she would tuck him into bed every night before she left and tell him stories.
“The historians and mythologists of the world rave about the strengths of men and warriors of ancient times,” she would often begin, “but those of us who listen carefully know that it was their wives who held the power.”
Tim would listen nightly, enraptured by the tales of Zipporah of Midian, who protected her husband from God’s wrath, as well as those about Izanami, who created the islands of Japan from her own body, and even Clytemnestra, who killed her husband to avenge her daughter.
His favorite by far, however, was that of Penelope, wife of Odysseus.
“Homer would have you believe that Odysseus survived solely on his cunning and divine intervention,” Mrs. Nelson would begin, eyes sparkling. “This is not untrue, in some senses. Odysseus was indeed clever, but his vanity and ego would have killed him long before his return home if not for his wife.”
“Penelope?” Tim would ask, even after he knew the answer.
“Exactly, child, Penelope. Every day, suitors of great wealth and power would invade her dining halls, seeking her supposedly-free hand in marriage. And every day, she would tell them she had to finish her dress first. She would weave all day, then unwind the fabric all night, repeating the process for ten long years.
“The men of Ancient Greece would have you believe that she was idle, waiting for her husband to come home and solve her problems, but this is far from the truth. For routine and ritual are not powerless things. In pouring her love for her son and husband into her weaving, she called out to the goddesses Hestia and Hera, praying for her son’s safety and her husband’s return.
“Her prayers did not go unanswered. Odysseus had just enough luck to survive his terrible decisions, and her son remained safe despite the murderous machinations of her suitors. Once her husband was home, they were able to dispatch the interlopers and, despite never lifting a finger in violence herself, Penelope saved her family.”
As a child who was almost always waiting for his parents to come home from abroad, Tim could only marvel at the power Penelope held. As he lay in bed, trying in vain to fall asleep, he began to picture how it would feel to have his parents return, safe and successful, from their highly important archeological work.
His dreams and fantasies of their homecoming started spilling beyond the night. He would think about it when he saw the ancient vases scattered around Drake Manor, and when he ate lunch alone at school, until they pounded in his head with every echoing step he took in the large, empty house.
One day, after Mrs. Nelson told the story again, he found the courage to ask, “Can I be like Penelope?”
Instead of laughing or shaking her head, the woman froze.
“What do you mean, child?” she asked, her voice uncharacteristically cautious.
“Well, she was able to bring her family home,” Tim answered, embarrassed. “Is that possible? To do something so often that it keeps your family safe?”
Some emotion flashed across Mrs. Nelson’s face before she smoothed it out and her body relaxed, if only slightly.
(It took years of replaying this moment in his head for Tim to identify the emotion as some mix of genuine sadness, pity, and what was probably a hint of maternal love. He never liked to dwell on why it took so long for him to recognize the last emotion.)
“For most people, a story is all that could ever be,” she said neutrally.
“But we aren’t most people, are we?” Tim prodded, smart enough at this age to recognize what was left unsaid.
After a moment of silence, Mrs. Nelson answered, her voice heavy.
“No. I am not most people, and neither are you.”
Tim had heard of magic, of course. The real kind, not the kind in fantasy books. He’d heard about it in relation to the heroes Zatara and Doctor Fate, and even in politics with the recent (metaphorical) emergence of Atlantis. In the real world, it existed, undoubtedly, but belonged in the same grandiose playing field as Superman and Martian Manhunter.
This kind of magic, small and everyday, was undoubtedly new to him.
“Oh we’ve always been here,” Mrs. Nelson said in her usual no-nonsense tone. “Magic has been around since before society, after all, so naturally us magical people slotted ourselves in nicely. We tend to stay under the radar, for the most part, but we’re always around. Not everyone with power is a superhero or supervillain, you know.”
“What about Batman?” little Tim asked, his favorite hero always at the front of his mind. “I thought he doesn’t like metas in Gotham.”
Mrs. Nelson just laughed sharply at that.
“Please, we’ve been in this city far longer than that man. Hell, I’ve probably lived here for longer than he’s been alive. He can’t kick me out any more than Mayor Hill can with his new ‘Refurbished Housing Plan’ or whatever name they’ve given it. Besides, anyone can do magic, even if they can’t do much.”
“Anyone?” Tim asked, excitedly. “Even me?”
“Sure, at least in theory,” Mrs. Nelson nodded, unfazed. “You probably won’t be making fireballs or banishing demons, but hearth magic is more subtle than that anyway, and it doesn’t take a lot of magic to get it going.”
“The hearth is the name for a fireplace, right?” Tim recalled, eager to learn.
“Close enough, but in this context it’s more general,” the nanny explained, having known Tim for long enough to know not to mince words. “The ‘hearth’ is used in magic to refer to the center of a household, at least metaphorically speaking. Nowadays, we don’t literally tend to a hearth or weave, but we do plenty of other chores to keep our homes clean and our family happy. And, at its heart, that’s what hearth magic is: keeping your home and family safe.”
“But I thought you said I don’t have any magic?” Tim asked, confused and enthralled at the same time.
“That’s true, you don’t have much of a spark for it,” Mrs. Nelson confirmed, making Tim frown. “However, hearth magic works differently from other magics in a key way: instead of drawing power from your magical energy and shaped by words, it draws from your emotions and is shaped through repeated ritual.”
“I don’t understand,” Tim complained. It was rare that he did not understand something and he didn’t like it.
“That’s alright, this is complicated stuff, even for adults,” Mrs. Nelson laughed. “Think of it like this: you know how weaving works from the stories I told you, right?”
“Uh huh,” Tim nodded.
“Right, well, imagine that my emotions towards my family – love, protectiveness, all that – are the thread. Then, when I do some sort of household task, like cooking, cleaning, or even helping my daughter with her hair, I weave those emotions into spells. And, like with cloth, my children wear those spells until they are used up. They might protect them from harm, or make them lucky, or ensure they get home safely, depending on what’s needed. However, they don’t last long, so I need to do those things every day so the effect lasts. Is that better?”
“Yes,” Tim answered. His mind raced with the possibilities, the logistics. He was used to analyzing and dissecting problems, but this was something else entirely. This was magic.
Over the course of the next seven months, Mrs. Nelson taught him hearth magic: how to imbue emotion into magic, how to direct that magic through effort, how to turn those rituals into real, tangible results.
Though, that last one was more theory than anything else. Mrs. Nelson started including him in her own rituals for the family, but she explained that he wasn’t actually part of her household, so the magic would likely not stick on him. She would keep trying, but magic was picky about some things.
As for Tim’s own efforts, well… Drake Manor remained cold and empty.
Despite this, he kept believing in magic. It was hard not to, not when he could feel it pull him as he helped Mrs. Nelson with the dusting, not when he noticed that even though his parents hadn’t returned, their flights out of the country were delayed in Gotham but always early when coming back. Not when he shared little smiles with Mrs. Nelson as they practiced together.
Tim wasn’t good at magic, not like he was at math and science and figuring out mystery novels before the reveal, but it was worth it to him. Even if his parents couldn’t stay for long, even if they always got a flight, no matter how late it ended up being, even if they offered only cold shoulders and barbed words when they were home, magic was worth it. He even had Mrs. Nelson with him.
Then one day, when he was eight and a half years old, Mrs. Nelson pulled him aside just after his parents got home from a two month long trip.
“I’m going to have a conversation with your parents, alright?” she said, uncharacteristically soft and even nervous. “Hopefully, you can even meet my daughter after, wouldn’t that be good?”
Tim nodded excitedly, then followed her upstairs. She tucked him into bed, kissed him on the forehead, and closed the door behind her. He listened carefully as her footsteps reverberated away, towards his mother’s office.
He never saw her again.
When eight and a half year old Tim Drake asked his mother when he’d see Mrs. Nelson again, her nose wrinkled in polite disgust.
“I’m afraid that woman has overstepped her boundaries,” Janet Drake said coolly. “Besides, I think you’re old enough to be home alone without a nanny.”
“But why did she leave?” Tim asked innocently.
“Honestly Timothy, it’s not healthy to get so attached to the help,” she replied, a sneer in her voice. “If you really must know, she asked to take on more than her paygrade, and that simply isn’t worth the effort. We hired her to get away from overly ambitious women, not to pay them more.”
“So, she just wanted more money?” Tim clarified, almost to himself.
“As I said, you’re old enough to be without a nanny now. Ruby Dallows just told me at the last gala that her nine-year-old daughter can spend the whole day by herself, and you’re far smarter than that brat. Don’t worry, we’ll even hire a housekeeper to make you meals, isn’t that nice? There’s an old Irish woman whose application looks promising…”
Tim nodded at the right times, kept his posture straight, and smiled when Janet looked at him. A week later, she left with his father on “a once in a lifetime find” near Prague. Their flight out of Gotham was only delayed by 15 minutes.
Tim felt empty.
For eight months, he continued doing his rituals. He dusted and meditated and even cooked, but nothing changed. He still believed, deep down, that magic was real and achievable, but as time went on the pull of his emotions became lesser. He burned meals and almost shattered an antique jar. His parent’s flights went back to being on time.
“I was never good at magic in the first place,” he’d say out loud to himself, if only because he didn’t want to hear the silence anymore. “Perhaps I just wasn’t made for it.”
He wasn’t just talking about magic.
He continued in this manner for eight months, his rituals becoming more far apart, until he barely did them at all. Nothing occupied him, not skateboarding, not books, not classes.
Then, on a late Tuesday night YouTube rabbit hole, Tim watched Robin perform a perfect quadruple somersault. And just like that, a different flame ignited inside him.
Chapter 2
Summary:
Tim, now Robin, rediscovers magic.
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
“You’re behind on intelligence briefings. In order to get up to speed, you’ll need to review the case files for every Justice League member by tomorrow’s patrol.”
Batman’s voice was cold and exact as he passed the Oracle-approved tablet (Bat tablet? Batlet? Batablet.) to Tim, who immediately took it. The boy quickly skimmed the aforementioned document, noting that the top right corner proclaimed it held 800 pages of text.
“Yes sir,” he answered diligently. He contemplated offering a smile, since that’s what Jason would have done, but decided against it. Bruce had been apathetic to his smiles since Tim had donned the Robin suit again upon his return from Europe two weeks ago. Besides, Bruce’s eyes were glued to the screen of the Batcomputer, ignoring Tim entirely.
Recognizing the lack of acknowledgement as the dismissal it was, Tim turned on his heel to return home and begin his vigilante homework. Both of them knew that 800 pages of dense text and diagrams were more than Tim could possibly read in a day, at least if he got enough sleep and went to school the next day. Bruce had also required Tim to maintain his stellar grades as a prerequisite for Robin, thus ensuring he couldn’t skip to read the documents during the day. If he didn’t finish by the arbitrarily chosen time tomorrow, he would be benched for not taking Robin seriously.
This was the exact kind of Catch-22 Bruce had been attempting for the last six months of training, but Tim had yet to be caught in it. This attempt would not be the one to get him, especially when it had such a simple solution: Tim simply would not sleep. Moreover, if he was feeling behind in the morning, he could simply mark himself present using his homeroom teacher’s email, which he’d learned last year had an astonishingly weak password. He was already ahead of all his classes by a week, so a little truancy wouldn’t hurt.
Tim smiled to himself as he sauntered back into the empty mausoleum that was Drake Manor. Bruce was getting lazy with his carefully-created predicaments. Perhaps this was the first step to getting real approval as Robin!
With renewed excitement from that thought, Tim threw himself into bed and began to read.
After four hours of reading, now 5AM, Tim’s boredom had begun to creep back in. How files detailing the uncensored histories and weaknesses of the strongest denizens of the Earth could be dry, Tim had no idea, but somehow Bruce had managed it.
It was with tired eyes that Tim flipped the page to that of John Constantine, mage and asshole extraordinaire. Tim snorted to himself at the thought; Bruce had not written that, of course, but anyone with even a toe in the magical community knew that you only got involved with Constantine if you were stupid, desperate, or both.
Instead of expounding on the more fascinating tales Tim had heard through the Gotham magic grapevine, the file quickly devolved into an extremely thorough explanation of how magical documents and explanations could be stored in digital format, despite magic inherently resisting such treatment.
Tim knew from experience that adding details about uncommon magics was the fastest way to corrupt a data file, not that he knew much about uncommon magics these days, so he was grudgingly impressed. Still, Bruce undoubtedly included this in order to bore Tim to death, since the older man clearly didn’t know about Tim’s brief history with the arcane.
However, it was only with mild interest that Tim read on about the data archetypes that obscured enough details to allow magic to remain unaware that it was being recorded, thus allowing Bruce to compile digital copies of the original, genuine Malleus Maleficarum as well as texts such as The Populist Tomes of Edith Hedge and—
Tim sat straight up in his bed, immediately awake. He’d spent two years between the ages of ten to twelve trying to track down a copy of The Populist Tomes after he’d read about it on r/realmagic on Reddit. It was one of the — if not the — most formative magic texts of the early twentieth century, and it was largely about hearth magic. From what u/zatannastan03 claimed, it almost single handedly brought hearth magic back into the modern limelight.
Unfortunately, the book was impossible to find online, and even more difficult to buy a physical copy. It made sense, as the magical community was careful not to let too much seep into public knowledge, not to mention that magic hated the internet, but Tim had always done his best work through the anonymity of the web. To learn the web had limits was thoroughly disappointing for 10-year-old Tim.
He’d even tried to go through the magical community in Gotham, going so far as to track down some pretty reputable contacts. That said, they didn’t trust outsiders and as interested as Tim was to become more involved with them…
It turned out that the name “Nelson” got thrown around pretty fast when hearth magic came up in Gotham. And Tim really didn’t want to bother Mrs. Nelson, or her family for that matter, when she’d only seen him as a job. It was clear from how she had never reached out again that he’d been a source of income for her, and that was all.
Which was fine! Tim wasn’t entitled to her genuine affection. He wasn’t her son. Just a charge, and maybe a student, and even then only for a few months. He was used to people meaning more to him than he did to them. That was just the way things had always been.
Speaking of which, Bruce expected him to finish reading the dossier on the Justice League, no matter how (unintentionally) interesting the tangent was. Tim opened the preview of the embedded hyperlink to The Populist Tomes of Edith Hedge, wrote the Batcyclopedia (thank you Dick for the name) reference number in his journal, and continued to read the driest recounting of John Constantine’s life ever known to man.
Four days later, Tim found himself in the med bay later with a minor gunshot wound. Minor! It was barely a graze, but Bruce insisted that he stay overnight. Or, more accurately, Alfred insisted, and Bruce watched silently but didn’t disagree. Technically, Alfred wanted Tim to stay in one of the many guest rooms in Wayne Manor, but Tim knew better than to intrude like that, so he stayed downstairs. Bruce continued to stare in unnerving silence for several minutes before delving back into work. Honestly, it was worse than any lecture he could have given.
Regardless, Tim was in the Batcave with no assignments, for once, except for the unspoken assignment to go through the entire night and detail every mistake he made. However, he had always been a difficult child, as his parents liked to tell him, so he was categorically inclined not to do that out of spite.
It was with this desire to do literally anything else that Tim picked up the Batablet and personal journal beside his bed. Deciding that productivity was better than self-reflection or — God forbid — sleep, Tim flipped through his journal for any relevant thoughts he’d noted down.
It wasn’t long before he stumbled across a lone reference to a Batcylopedia entry. Excitement flared in his stomach as Tim’s mind immediately conjured his tangent from the other night. While the Bats were his passion and, at least recently, his life’s work, hearth magic had continued to be a guilty pleasure for him. He didn’t actively practice often, certainly not enough for any practical effects, but the wonder of it had never truly faded.
It was with this excitement that Tim pulled up the reference number on the Batablet, before hesitating. Bruce was unlikely to check Tim’s reading history, but if he did and realized Tim knew magic, however little, he might take that opportunity to use his “no metas in Gotham” rule to fire Tim as Robin. Sure, Tim didn’t have enough magical potential to technically be classified as a meta, just enough of a spark to work basic magic, but Bruce wouldn’t see it that way. He had been looking for an excuse to get rid of Tim for months now, after all.
Out of caution, Tim pulled up six other articles as well. They were largely random, but he included one on the mechanics of the Batmobile. There, now if Bruce looked into his access history, he would guess that Tim was trying to obscure himself reading about a cool car, since that was far more likely than wanting to read about magic that was normally looked down on for being “boring” and “feminine,” according to Reddit. He’d probably have to read every other article pulled up later, just in case.
Having secured his plausible deniability, Tim dove into the digitized copy of The Populist Tomes of Edith Hedge. The prose was a little flowery and self-important, but the contents sustained his attention. The first several chapters pertained to common household spells for cleanliness and keeping out bad spirits, which Tim largely skimmed.
After an hour, Tim arrived at the chapter titled “The Hearth and her History” and he perked up in anticipation. The first few pages were largely things he already knew: the hearth was actually the spiritual center of the household, not just a big fireplace, emotion and ritual, etc. All very interesting, and he read it carefully, but nothing groundbreaking to him.
Then, finally, a new passage:
Most agree that the creation of hearth magic was due to the efforts of Ancient Greek women. The goddess Hestia, eldest of the gods, was the virgin tender of the hearth, and thus had an active presence in almost every Greek household. She is not recorded thoroughly, as it was primarily men who commissioned the famous urns and mosaics we draw our knowledge from, but three cousins wormed their way into the men’s tales.
These three cousins, Helen, Clytemnestra, and Penelope, can be used to signify the three main ways that hearth magic can be used: discord, control, and protection.
First and most famously, we have Helen of Sparta, who eventually became Helen of Troy. As academics will surely know, Helen was the mythological scapegoat for the Trojan War after her husband, Menelaus, gathered all of the legions of Greece as revenge against Paris of Troy for “stealing” his wife.
In reality, this tale demonstrates how hearth magic affected reality. Helen was purportedly unhappy in her marriage to Menelaus, and magicians know that her bloodline was strong with hearth magic. By manifesting her negative emotions of fear and discontent into magic, she was able to subtly shift reality in her favor, for a time. This gave her greater opportunities in life while weakening Menelaus’ power over her, until she was fortunate enough to elope with the young, handsome Paris. Though this ended tragically for all parties involved, this is more likely due to Helen abandoning her home and hearth in Sparta rather than pushing her husband out, not the effects of the magic itself.
Second, Helen’s sister Clytemnestra was the husband of Menelaus’ brother, Agamemnon, King of Mycenae. While he was off fighting in Troy, however, she took a new lover and ruled her city in his stead. When he returned with a new concubine, the cursed prophet Cassandra, she murdered them both in their sleep with an axe.
Though Clytemnestra’s power over the hearth is not obvious from her base myth, she is often associated with the protection and power of her home. She is purported to have been able to control objects and sense everything that happened in her home, allowing her complete power while tending her hearth.
Last and most importantly, Helen and Clytemnestra’s cousin Penelope comes into play as one of the most influential hearth mages in history, with her magic arguably making the entire Odyssey possible. Her ritualistic weaving and unweaving of her wedding dress has been the basis of civilized hearth magic for millenia, protecting her husband and son for over a decade by pouring her love into a superficially useless task.
In modern contexts, we have adopted similar Penelopean rituals in order to ensure our loved ones are safe. In essence, household tasks imbued with love and magic can allow our homes to be safer, and to almost guarantee that our families can always get home safely.
The passage continued on in that manner, but Tim had what he wanted, at least for now. He’d known the power of the hearth as a child, but it had been years since he’d truly contemplated it outside of bringing his parents home. But here, written out so clearly, was exactly what he needed: a way that, with enough dedication on his part, guaranteed that Batman could always return to the Batcave alive.
Tim just needed to relearn magic. Easy.
After a decent amount of pen-and-paper planning, Tim had identified three major factors in implementing his plan: first and foremost, he needed to properly study magic again. Sure, he remembered the basics from childhood, but trying to protect Batman using seven months of magic he learned when he was seven was like trying to play Beethoven’s 29th after learning how a piano worked.
This one looked surprisingly easy. In true Batman fashion, Bruce had compiled almost one hundred magical texts in his magic-proof digital format, many of which Tim recognized from Reddit as the most essential magical theory references in history. After a bit of coding, it wouldn’t be too difficult to oversaturate his viewing history for Bruce, thus eliminating the possibility of him realizing what Tim was studying.
Second, Tim would have to establish a routine for his regular rituals. Most of this task could be postponed until he’d done more research, but one thing became immediately clear: the Batcave would have to be the center of the hearth. Intuitively, that meant Tim would likely have to take up the cleaning and maintenance of the Cave, which would encroach on Alfred’s territory.
Which brought Tim to his last issue: he would have to further encroach on the Bats’ territory in order to make this effective. Mrs. Nelson said she was never able to include Tim in her magic because she had her own household to take care of, which he wasn’t part of. Thus, it stood to reason that as long as Tim lived in Drake Manor, he wouldn’t be able to fully cultivate the magic he needed, no matter how much he tried.
One problem at a time. Tim had observed that while Bruce was officially Master of the House, Alfred was the one calling the shots, at least in the Manor. As such, it would be his approval that Tim would seek out first.
Still, Tim had never been great at talking to people, so he was nervous as he scheduled the perfect time to talk to the butler. After a week of observation, he concluded that the best time would be around 2:45 in the afternoon, just after the Englishman finished his tea but before he made himself begin cleaning the family wing at 3:00.
“Hey, Alfred?” Tim approached on one such afternoon.
“Master Tim, what can I do for you?” Alfred asked softly.
“I’ve been watching you work lately,” Tim began, knowing that Alfred had undoubtedly noticed his information gathering, “and I feel bad that you keep picking up after me, especially since you have so much work caring for Dick and Bruce.” And grieving Jason, he left unsaid, but doubtlessly heard by both.
“My boy, it is a joy to look after you,” Alfred said. Tim gave a genuine smile at that; he figured Alfred was only being polite, but the words still warmed him inside.
“Regardless, I know it’s more work than you let on,” Tim soldiered on. Alfred opened his mouth, a frown beginning in his eyes, so Tim continued before he got the chance to refute it, “I just wanted to help. I’ve noticed that you don’t like being in the Batcave very much, so maybe I could take over your cleaning duties there?”
There, it was out in the open. Thankfully, Tim really had noticed that Alfred really didn’t like cleaning the Batcave, which worked out well for both of them in this instance.
Surprisingly, instead of looking relieved or even pleased, Alfred pursed his lips in displeasure.
“As much as I appreciate the sentiment, Master Tim, I really can’t let you labor under the illusion that your presence here is any kind of burden that needs to be alleviated. While some help around the home would be valuable, it is not for one already so burdened as you. Between your newfound role as Robin, your schooling, and your home life with your parents, I cannot imagine that you have the time or energy to help me with housework.”
Externally, Tim maintained a small frown in disagreement. Internally, he was panicking. He hadn’t considered that Alfred would be this territorial of his job, even if he was hiding behind the flimsy reasoning of Tim’s well being.
In retrospect, it made sense to Tim. How many housekeepers had Janet fired for being too lazy, even when they’d been perfectly adequate? And how many nannies had been fired for being overly ambitious? While Alfred’s position with the Waynes was ironclad, more like family really, it made sense that he’d keep the same attitudes with his job roles that he’d probably needed before he found himself in their employment.
Not that Tim doubted that Alfred cared about his well being, of course, the man was far too kind for it to be a complete lie. But Tim was well aware of how this game was played, and the best misdirections were always founded in truth.
Which gave him an idea.
“I know, and I have been feeling overwhelmed lately, but–” Tim paused a bit, mainly for dramatic effect. “Well, my parents aren’t around a lot. It’d be nice to be here more often.”
The words were uncomfortably close to the truth, making his chest feel a little tight even though he knew it was just what Alfred needed to hear. He couldn’t help but avert his eyes, too uncomfortable with the concerned look Alfred was giving him.
“My boy, there is no need to do more work to justify your presence here,” Alfred said softly. “You are welcome here as often and as long as you want, especially when your parents aren’t around. I will simply communicate with your nanny to make sure you aren’t missed.”
“Oh don’t worry, I don’t have a nanny,” Tim reassured, reasserting eye contact now that they were in more familiar territory. “As I told Bruce when I started training, I won’t be missed at home. Our housekeeper is the only one else ever home, and she isn’t concerned when I’m out.”
Alfred’s eyes flashed with something startlingly close to anger, making Tim tense at what he might have said wrong, but it was gone in an instant. Tim forced himself to untense, despite knowing that Alfred would have noticed anyway.
“And your parents would not be worried if they were to arrive home to find you missing?” the butler questioned.
“Oh, they’re only home once every few months. In case of an emergency, I made a program a few years ago that tracks their flights and locations,” Tim assured him easily. “If they somehow were to come back to Gotham when I’m not expecting it, I would get a notification well in advance, which gives me plenty of time to get home.”
Not that that happened often. In fact, the first time that it happened, there was a bug in the notification system that Tim wasn’t aware of and he didn’t get home until two hours after his parents did. They hadn’t even noticed. (Tim didn’t like to think about it.)
“I see,” Alfred said slowly. Tim was quiet, letting him think it over. “Well, it simply would not do to have you all alone for that long. I know you value your independence, but I would feel much better if you were to stay here in the Manor while your parents are away. A young man such as yourself should not be alone for such long periods of time.”
Tim almost physically startled at that. He’d of course been planning to move in eventually to get the magic to work, but he’d been planning to do so slowly so as not to anger Bruce. He had expected to have to claw the right to live here out of him, not have it be offered on a silver platter.
“But Bruce doesn’t like it when I’m here,” Tim said out of shock. He winced when another flash of anger crossed Alfred’s face. Shit. “I mean, I know he’s still torn up about Jason, and I haven’t exactly shown the most understanding of his grief. I just don’t want to overstep with him.”
“I assure you, Master Tim, that will not be an issue,” Alfred assured sternly. “If Master Bruce has any problems with your presence, I will deal with them and him.” The old butler softened significantly. “Whether or not you wish to stay here is up to you, my boy. You don’t need to resort to doing chores just to have some company.”
Oh shit, the rituals! Tim thought. This conversation is such a disaster that I forgot I still need Alfred’s permission for them.
“I wouldn’t be against staying here, if that’s ok,” Tim said, emphasizing the shyness that he felt. Adults loved shy, quiet children, after all, even if Tim had already established himself with the Waynes as neither of those. “But, I’d still like to help with your work, especially if I do move in. I really don’t want to be a burden.”
That last sentence carried some of the desperation Tim felt, which was unintentional, but effective.
“Very well,” Alfred backed down, but he didn’t seem completely convinced. “I suppose you may assist with some of the chores I need to accomplish in the Cave. I will prepare a room for you. And have a word with Master Bruce.”
Tim bit back a protest as Alfred walked away. As much as Tim would love for Bruce to remain unbothered by Tim for as long as possible, there is no way that Batman wouldn’t notice him simply going upstairs every night instead of going back to Drake Manor.
Tim sighed, resigned. Despite how out of control the conversation seemed during it, it was undoubtedly a resounding success. Not only did he secure permission to do chores in the Batcave, but he had also somehow gotten himself a room at Wayne Manor. Plus, it was entirely Alfred’s idea, which meant Tim didn’t have to spend whatever scraps of goodwill he could come across to achieve it. Batman still wasn’t going to be happy that Tim was further encroaching on his space, but that was always going to be the case.
That meant that the only thing left in his plan to magically protect the Bats was more research. Tim straightened up. It was time to get to work.
Tim had been sent home that night to spend one final night in Drake Manor with the instructions to pack and ensure that his absence will be expected in the future. Both tasks only took a combined total of 30 minutes.
All he had to do on the second task was text Mrs. Mac that he had more judo classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays (the only days she’d come), and that he’d eat dinner with his classmates after so she didn’t need to bring food. She texted back 20 minutes later telling him to have fun and be safe, but that she’d miss him. It was very sweet of her, if unnecessary.
As for packing, he simply stuffed his clothes into one of the million spare suitcases his parents had shoved into a closet. Beyond that, his skateboard, and his school stuff, he really didn’t have much in his room. He did carefully remove his favorite Batman and Robin photos – the ones he didn’t give to Bruce – from their hiding place in his closet, but after that he had the rest of the night to study magic away from the prying eyes of the Bat.
Now, the next day, Tim was feeling the effects of a full three days without sleep as he dragged his suitcase through the front hall of Wayne Manor. (To be fair, he was working on actual cases for the first two nights. Bat-approved all-nighters shouldn’t count against sleep deprivation, in his opinion.)
“Come, Master Tim, I have prepared a room for you already,” Alfred appeared as if from thin air. Sometimes, Tim swore Alfred had magic too; Bruce had taught him how to appear suddenly like that and he still didn’t understand how the butler did it so seamlessly.
Tim followed the older man down the hall. He almost protested when they passed the guest wing to the family wing, but a subtle glance from Alfred when he made a disagreeing noise silenced him. He supposed it made sense; as intrusive as staying in the family wing seemed, it did make Alfred’s life easier by keeping most of his work in the same place. Not to mention it would be rude to protest after Alfred had already prepared a room for him.
The room Alfred led him to was bigger than his room at Drake Manor (he had the smallest bedroom in Drake Manor, given to him when he was also rather small and thus hadn’t needed a big room), but already seemed cozy with the tastefully patterned sheets and drapes that decorated the room. The rug on the hardwood was plush and soft on Tim’s feet as he stepped in, and Tim’s inner photographer noted that there was plenty of natural light.
For a moment, Tim stood in silent awe of how kind this was of Alfred, before realizing that the man was still in the room and waiting for a response.
“It’s perfect,” Tim told him, trying to keep the sudden urge to cry out of his voice. “Thank you.”
“It was my pleasure, Master Tim,” Alfred smiled faintly with a little bow. “I will leave you to settle in. Dinner is at six sharp, though of course you are welcome to the entire house at your leisure.”
On that note, the butler disappeared into the shadows of the hallway as swiftly as he had appeared.
Tim immediately collapsed onto the king sized bed, exhausted in the face of Alfred’s sincerity. Guilt coursed through him as he lay there on the softest mattress he’d ever felt. He knew this hadn’t been Jason’s room, but this, more than anything, felt like he was trying to replace his Robin. Hell, even taking Robin hadn’t felt like as much of a betrayal as that, since at least he’d only taken Robin to help save Bruce.
He tried to tell himself that he was doing this for the same reason, that he was only here to establish himself for the magic needed to keep Batman safe, but it rang hollow even in his own head. He wanted this too much for it to be anything but a betrayal.
Tim must have fallen asleep, because it felt like only a few minutes later when Alfred knocked on his door announcing that it was time for dinner. Tim was quiet as he followed the butler to the dining room, which he’d been in only a few times before, one of which was at a gala hosted at Wayne Manor. Thankfully, Alfred did not comment on his silence.
It was just him and Bruce at the table to start with, as Alfred was usually too serious about his duties to sit down with them, but he must have noticed how stiflingly awkward it was, as he sat himself down across from Tim at the table after only a few minutes.
The food, a chicken pot pie with potato soup, was delicious, as all of Alfred’s meals were, but the tension in the air prevented Tim from fully enjoying it. After what felt like an hour (but was probably closer to five minutes) of silence, Bruce finally spoke up.
“So Tim, how do you like your new room?”
Tim couldn’t help glancing quickly at Alfred, who was eating his soup like he wasn’t paying attention. As if they weren’t all alert right now.
“I like it a lot, sir,” Tim answered politely, looking for any traps in his wording.
“You don’t need to call me ‘sir,’ Tim,” Bruce reprimanded gently.
“Oh right, sorry Bruce,” Tim corrected, giving a fake smile but cursing himself internally. “The room is great though, much better than I needed. Not that I don’t appreciate it, of course.” The last part was said in Alfred’s direction.
“Of course. I should have offered from the start.”
That’s not how you’ve been acting with trying to get me to quit Robin, part of Tim wanted to reply, but he didn’t let his smile falter. Not really knowing how to reply to that politely, Tim just nodded slightly and awkwardly went back to his soup.
Silence pressed down on them like an anvil, with only the delicate sounds of silverware wielded by those raised with etiquette training. Tim was careful not to look up from his food too much, but even he could see the glares Alfred was sending Bruce, as well as the unreadable looks Bruce was sending back.
Eventually, Bruce must have cracked, because he tried again.
“Tim, I understand that I have not been the most… welcoming mentor recently,” he began, hesitancy clear in his voice.
No shit, Tim thought before he clamped down on that line of thinking. It wasn’t productive and would cause trouble.
“However, I want you to know that you can come to me if you ever need anything.”
Tim waited to see if he would say more, but Bruce was just looking at him a little expectantly.
Tim realized he should probably say something. “I know, thank you.”
Bruce nodded a little and they began to go back to their food. Tim looked up when Alfred made a frustrated exhale through his nose, almost imperceptible to those not trained in observation. Bruce threw another unreadable look at his butler before turning back towards Tim.
“I just wanted to make sure that you know that you’re welcome here,” Bruce said, almost unbearably awkward.
It was then that Tim understood what was happening.
Everyone knew that Alfred prioritized manners over all else, and the first and foremost rule of hospitality was to always be polite to your guests. While Tim had conceptualized himself more as part of the help than a guest, it wasn’t hard to see why Alfred saw differently. Thus, when Tim idiotically mentioned that Bruce didn’t want him here, the butler saw that as unacceptable behavior from his former ward and basically-son.
And now, like a child after being scolded, Batman was trying to apologize in front of his basically-father.
“Bruce, don’t worry about me,” Tim said as he intentionally softened his smile. “I know we got off to a bit of a rough start, but I understand. You were and are still grieving. I know how hard that can be, and I don’t blame you. I’m here now, aren’t I?”
All of the tension in Bruce’s body drained out immediately as Tim finished. Alfred was giving Tim an odd look, but he didn’t look upset or expectant, so Tim put it aside for now.
Bruce looked as if he was going to say something, but after a moment he just nodded and went back to his food, so Tim followed suit and, after a moment more, as did Alfred. Disaster averted.
The tension now mostly gone from the room, some quiet conversation began over the course of dinner, mostly regulated to small talk. Any “downstairs” talk was quickly glared away by Alfred, who would then change the subject to something more ordinary, such as Tim’s recent photos or Bruce’s newest acquisition at Wayne Enterprises. It was surprisingly domestic. By the end of dinner, Tim barely remembered that there would probably be a Bat-reckoning once they were out of Alfred’s careful view.
Sure enough, after dinner was done and Alfred declared that he would be generous and do the dishes for the night, both Tim and Bruce silently agreed to take whatever conversation was about to happen down to the Batcave.
“I’ll patrol alone tonight so you can get settled in,” Bruce told him once they descended, all business. Normally, Tim might have called him out on that as a way to avoid Robin keeping him in line, but he was hesitant to try his luck tonight. After a longer silence, Bruce continued, “I want you to feel welcome here.”
Tim was surprised the man was sticking to pretense of politeness, but he supposed it made sense; Alfred knew everything, after all.
“Thank you,” Tim repeated, feeling the need to say something.
They were both quiet as Bruce donned his uniforms and prepared his gear. Tim made sure to mentally note how he preferred it done, for when Tim would include it into the rituals. As he set up the Batcomputer, however, Bruce paused.
“I looked into your parents’ flight records,” he said quietly, face turned away and obscured by the cowl. “I didn’t know they were gone that often. I would have let you stay sooner if I had.”
Oh, Tim thought, that’s what this is about.
Tim knew his parents were gone too often for it to be healthy. He had read about neglect and abuse as part of Batman’s training, and while his parents weren’t abusive, they were the definition of neglectful. Hell, even before Batman he’d known it was wrong. He was aware enough to know that most kids don’t turn to witchcraft just to try to get their parents to notice them.
Bruce, in his eternal martyrdom, had read this situation as him overlooking a neglect case in his own misery, and was thus trying to make up for it by allowing Tim to stay.
Of course, Tim knew that the situation was a little different. Most kids being left alone like that was awful, but Tim had been alone almost his entire life. He was used to it, and smart enough to take care of himself. He wouldn’t get himself killed by doing something stupid, so it wasn’t a big deal for him to be alone.
Bruce didn’t know that though, not really, so it made sense that he’d try to apologize in his stilted, Bruce-like way.
Tim nodded, still not sure how to respond in words, but he made an effort to look understanding.
He could feel Bruce’s attention move away as the mental conversation ended and they continued to prepare Batman for patrol. Normally, preparation didn’t take this long, but Tim could tell Bruce was double and triple checking everything. Was he stalling?
It was only when Tim began pulling up relevant case files on the Batcomputer that he felt Batman’s gaze slip back on him. Tim couldn’t see it, but it was impossible not to feel its weight. It was one of the reason’s Batman could be so terrifying, after all.
And that angry weight, which continued all the way until Bruce turned and left in the Batmobile, told the real story: while he might accept an outsider living in his house out of guilt, Bruce didn’t want Tim here.
Notes:
I love writing dialogue for Bruce cus I'm like "he wants to Tim to feel safe" so I have him say "Tim, I want you to feel safe." What a terrible communicator, it makes my life so easy.
Chapter 3
Summary:
An older Tim investigates a curse and the Red Hood.
Chapter Text
In the three years since Tim had moved into Wayne Manor to protect the Bats with magic, he had refined his magic extensively. Not just hearth magic either; he’d read every book on magic in the Batcyclopedia, as well as a few more borrowed from magical heroes under the promise that he didn't show them to Batman. He wasn’t magical enough by a long shot to do much of anything useful with it. He couldn’t shoot fireballs or summon spirits or communicate with the dead — not that he’d want to, anyway, he had a healthy amount of Bat pride — but he could interpret runes and understand magical theory, which he used to strengthen his protective magic over Batman and Nightwing.
Which is why it was so frustrating that he couldn’t figure out how they were cursed.
The ‘what’ portion of the curse was pretty simple, on some level: for the last six months or so, Batman and Nightwing have been slowly getting more and more unlucky. Not enough to truly notice, beyond an offhand comment or two, but enough that it genuinely made their lives more difficult, at least on a small level.
On the other hand, Tim had privately noticed his luck increasing, with the bus to school always showing up right when he got to the stop, whether he be early or late, or running into exactly the criminal he was looking for while on solo patrol. Alfred had mentioned similar luck happening to him recently as well.
That led Tim to quickly identify it as a luck-sapping curse. It was, after all, one of the simpler spells to cast, though it wasn’t common due to a few limiting factors. First, it took a significant amount of power to cast, so it was still not a beginner spell despite its simplicity. Second, the caster could not drain the luck into themself, and it was difficult in general to guide the luck to a specific target. Otherwise, heroes like Zatanna could just make themselves lucky constantly by taking a villain’s luck. Finally, if the lucky and unlucky people were in the same vicinity, the entire effect would cancel out.
It was the final point that convinced Tim it was a curse: he was only especially lucky while alone, but patrols with Batman or Nightwing went normally.
The ‘why’ was also rather obvious: they were vigilantes. Any nefarious magic user with enough magic could theoretically curse them with bad luck, uncaring of who received the good luck. Tim, being an active magic user, would resist or at least notice such a thing being cast on him (plus he was smaller fry to villains), so he was ignored. Tim and Alfred, being the most consistent people in their lives, then became the targets of that good luck.
The frustrating part was the how. After all, Tim’s hearth protections were specifically configured to, among other things, protect them from malevolent magic and curses. It was theoretically possible for some curse to overpower his protections, but definitely not without Tim at least noticing it being cast. It should have been impossible.
But here Tim was, literally scratching his head in confusion and frustration as he worked on the runography in his secret notebook. He’d done the arithmetic four separate times now and the magical equation simply did not balance.
At least the rest of the protections are still in place, some tiny, optimistic part of Tim thought. And he had to concede that tiny, optimistic Tim wasn’t wrong: he’d checked the output on his magic and it was normal. Great, even. Last year it prevented Bane from breaking Batman’s back, instead only dislocating a disc, which, while terrible, was not life threatening. Hell, just last week Tim had seen a straight-shot bullet miss Nightwing entirely by curving out of the way.
Tim’s frustrated musings were interrupted by a knock at the door. He quickly hid his book in the secret compartment under his desk. Not a moment later, Dick opened the door with a smile.
“You really just opened that door without waiting for a response first?” Tim sassed lazily. “What if I had been masturbating?”
“Please, as if I don’t know when you jerk off,” Dick waved off with horrifying nonchalance. Tim decided immediately to disregard the entire statement. “Anyway, you’ve been moping up here for too long, let’s go do something.”
“I have not been moping,” Tim argued, but got up regardless. Dick was like a dog with a bone once he decided he was bored. “What is it you want to do?”
“I don’t know, something,” Dick whined like he wasn’t a fully grown adult.
“Why don’t we watch a movie?” Tim countered.
“Ugh, no,” Dick said with a disproportionate amount of disgust for a man who allegedly liked movies. “I want to do something fun.”
“Then you can teach me that flip you showed off on Thursday’s patrol,” Tim offered instead.
“Yes! I’m down for that.”
With that, they headed down to the Cave in their usual fashions. That is, Tim walked like a normal human being while Dick somehow made the journey into an acrobatics routine that Olympic athletes would balk at, chatting the whole way.
As they descended into the Batcave itself, however, Dick became slightly more somber, with far less talking and fewer acrobatics. By the time they reached the bottom, he was frowning at Tim.
“What?” Tim asked defensively.
“You weren’t listening to anything I said, were you?” he asked, sounding concerned.
“I never listen to you,” Tim lied, though he had been ignoring Dick this time around.
“As much as I make jokes about you moping, you are allowed to grieve, you know,” Dick said gently.
“What would I be grieving?” Tim asked pedantically, throat tightening.
“I don’t know, the fact that your dad didn’t even invite you to his wedding?” Dick said, more harshly than before.
“The wedding was small and in Hawaii, he knew I wouldn’t have been able to come anyway,” Tim bit out, but couldn’t help how the comment stung. Ever since Jack Drake woke up from a coma eight months ago to find that his wife was long dead and his son was living with Bruce Wayne, Tim’s relationship with him had been strained, not that it was ever great to begin with.
It hadn’t helped that Bruce had immediately blackmailed the man into sharing custody with him. Not that Jack wanted custody of Tim, not really, but it had hurt his pride. Still, not inviting Tim to his wedding, only a few months after he learned his first wife died, was a new low.
“You’re really going to pretend that it didn’t hurt you,” Dick drawled harshly for some reason. “How about the fact that your girlfriend died last month?”
Dick winced at his own words, clearly regretting them the second they came out.
“I have grieved Stephanie,” Tim replied coldly, his voice turning sharp. “Though we broke up a while ago, not that it really matters. Why the fuck are you up my ass about it now?”
“Sorry, sorry, I just…” Dick trailed off. “I’m worried about you. It feels like you’ve been spending all of your time here in the Cave. I get that you don’t want to join any superhero teams, but it feels like you aren’t talking to any of your civilian friends either.”
Of course I can’t join another team, I need to be here to keep the magic intact, Tim thought, but couldn’t say, for obvious reasons. Civilian friends were in the same boat. He tried to keep in touch, but they didn’t understand when he had to cancel for Bat duties. Stephanie had been the exception, but…
“I just don’t want you to push away your trauma,” Dick continued, oblivious to Tim’s inner monologue. “If it gets too bad, you might start coping like, well…”
Bruce was the unspoken word there, which Tim had to admit was fair. The man had decided dressing up like a bat and terrorizing criminals was better than properly grieving his parents, and no one even wanted to think back on how horribly he coped with Jason’s loss.
“Alright, I’ve been having a hard time,” Tim conceded, “but I’m doing fine, I promise. Really, I’m processing my emotions and all that jazz, so I’m not going to go all… well, Batman on everyone.”
Dick cracked a small smile at that.
“Well I’m here if you need me,” the man said gently. He grinned, “Literally, since somehow you convinced me to live here on weekends, you little shit.”
“Yeah, well, it wasn’t hard,” Tim shrugged, like he hadn’t spent considerable time and energy slowly trying to convince Dick to move back in so that the magic would be more effective on him. “I just promised that Alfred would make food and your lazy ass came running.”
“That it did, little brother, that it did,” Dick laughed. His face sobered again, and Tim was worried he’d try to talk about feeling again. “That reminds me though, I got a message from B. He warned me to stay away from the Red Hood. What do you know about him?”
“Not much, except that he’s a crime lord who hates Bats and uses one of Joker’s old aliases,” Tim answered truthfully. “We don’t know who he is or anything else really, but Bruce has been all worked up since he dropped a line about the ‘rocky relationship between Robins and crowbars’ in our last fight.”
Dick understandably tensed at the obvious reference to Jason’s death.
“Yeah, that would do it,” Dick said, almost under his breath. He then straightened and put on a very forced smile. “How about I teach you that flip now, hm?”
Tim forced a smile of his own and nodded.
A few hours later, Tim was lying on a mat, thoroughly wiped from Dick’s overly enthusiastic version of training. Dick had just gone back upstairs to shower and probably nap before patrol, but Tim had things to do and think about. He pushed himself up and grabbed the towel to wipe off most of the remaining sweat, then set himself to work to clean the Cave.
After three years, it was basically instinct to enter a semi-meditative state, focusing on his feelings of love and protectiveness for Bruce, Dick, and Alfred. He immediately felt the light strands of magic flow from his core into his fingers, ready to be put to good use.
If anyone watched Tim clean the cave, they would scoff at the order in which Tim cleaned. In fact, every member of the family had commented on it at least once. What they didn’t realize was that Tim had adapted his routine over the years so his path across the cave drew an apotropaic rune used in Atlantean magic, crafting another barrier of protection for the Cave’s residence.
It was with practiced ease that Tim redrew this rune as he cleaned and ran maintenance, the magic sinking into every grappling hook and batarang and costume. Finally, after half an hour, Tim ended his circuit where he always did: the display case.
The large glass case that served as Jason’s memorial had remained unchanged since the first time Tim had entered the Cave all those years ago. The torn Robin costume was never mended, the mannequin was never replaced, and the plaque at the bottom still read “A Good Soldier.” Dick had explained one somber night that Bruce had the plaque made as a reprimand to himself, self-flagellation of the highest emotional order. It still made everyone else uncomfortable to remember Jason that way.
It was here that Tim ended his rituals every few days for a similar reason: to reflect on Jason as he cleaned. Tim never knew his predecessor, not personally, but he had spent years watching him from afar, taking pictures and just observing him. Stories about him were rare in the Wayne household, but that made them all the more precious: how Jason liked his tea, what his favorite books were, the time he pranked Bruce by adding red food dye and a penny to his coffee and convincing him he’d actually added blood after Bruce drank it.
Here, cleaning the memorial, Tim would focus on his hope to be like him, his determination to keep his legacy alive, and, above all, his grief that he’d never truly know his brother.
It was indulgent and unnecessary, adding nothing to the magic but Tim’s own wishful thinking, but… it just felt wrong to do anything else. To leave Jason out of the magic was like claiming Jason wasn’t part of the family, and Tim could never imply that, even just to himself.
Today, after finishing the cleaning, Tim mind wandered to his earlier conversation with Dick. It was rather odd, in hindsight, how the Red Hood could possibly know about the details of Jason’s death. It had long been theorized by the criminal and civilian populations that the second Robin had died, and some had even put together that it was the Joker who committed the crime, but the details were as far from public knowledge as possible. The fact that he’d even known about the crowbar, something they’d only figured out from the Joker’s crazed gloating…
And then there was the luck-sapping curse. Red Hood easily had the motive, given his apparent hatred of the Bats, and if he had enough magic to scry about Jason’s death, or maybe even perform a seance, then he definitely would be powerful enough to cast a curse like that. It was a longshot, but every theory had to start somewhere.
Tim would have to investigate himself. He’d have to be careful, though; patrolling around Crime Alley as Robin would be a death sentence, and if there was a chance Red Hood knew their civilian IDs, then going as Tim Drake could be just as dangerous.
He’d just have to be someone else then.
Nelson Hardy wasn’t usually Tim’s go-to alias. It lacked the edge of Alan Draper and the complete disguise of Caroline Hill, but what it did have was connections. Magical connections, to be exactly.
A little contour and a prosthetic nose was all it took to become Nelson, but it was enough to distinguish himself from minor celebrity teenager Tim Drake. It helped that he’d gotten Zatanna to “verify” his identity with a few key magical contacts after she owed him a favor. No one in the magical community would ever question Zatanna Zatara, not after all she’d done to protect and champion them.
A day after his conversation with Dick, Nelson Hardy hit the Crime Alley streets a half hour before sunset. It was the perfect time for information gathering: light enough that people still scurried around, but late enough that the most benign of its dangerous nightlife crawled out of the woodwork.
(He secretly would have preferred a full hour before sunset, but the bags under his eyes were especially difficult to hide, even for his standards. He chose not to reflect on why that might be.)
Tim’s first task was to comb the Alley for any significant magic. Luckily, he’d acquired a tool as Robin from Dr. Fate for that exact purpose. He even had Bat-approval for the artifact in general, though this was far from its sanctioned use case. It didn’t take long for him to weave through the crowds past the major spots where Red Hood was known to operate, but the device didn’t ping anything interesting. Disappointing, but all that meant was that Red Hood was smart enough not to shit where he eats, magically speaking.
The second step was a little more dangerous: tracking down contacts. Ironically, the very curse Tim was investigating helped him, and he got lucky. After only 15 minutes of traversing the Alley in search of a familiar face, he ran across Aphrodite.
Aphrodite (or Carla Wilson, when she was at the DMV) was a sex worker that Tim (or rather, Nelson) had met at one of the cafés in Gotham that subtly hosted events for homo magi. She wasn’t particularly powerful, specializing in superficial healing magic, but she had a keen eye and a good judge of character, both of which were essential for surviving on a Crime Alley corner.
She was also exactly the kind of person Tim needed in order to get a better read on the Red Hood. Thank you, luck-sapping curse.
“Nelson? Is that your ugly mug I see?” Aphrodite called out when he approached.
“Miss Aphrodite, good to see you!” Tim replied rather genuinely in the squirrely voice he reserved for Nelson. When he was at a normal distance, he continued, quieter, “I was just looking for a like minded friend.”
“Oh?” her eyes grew sharper, but not unkind, as her eyebrow raised. “I’ve got customers coming soon, so you better make it quick.”
“Always business, huh Miss Aphrodite?” He replied a little obnoxiously. “Very well then. What can you tell me about the Red Hood?”
With that, her eyes did turn unkind.
“What do you want with Hood?” she practically spat, body language screaming with suspicion.
“Ah, I can see how that might have come out a bit aggressively,” Tim backpedaled, surprised by the defensiveness and nickname. He filed it away for later. “My dad’s gotten hit with a curse, luck-sapping, and I don’t know how the hell it got past my defenses. Don’t know what he did to piss off the Red Hood, but dad’s convinced the guy has got it out for him. Any chance the guy is a mage?”
Aphrodite straight up laughed at that, her malice receding.
“Oh kid, you crack me up,” she cackled. “Trust me, we tested the waters with him for magic, on the down low, and that dude hasn’t done shit.” Tim must have looked surprised, since she snorted again and continued, “I know you’re new to this, kiddo, but we try to keep an eye out for those who have our types of gifts. We usually don’t try with big players like him, but he had something weird about him. Hell, he still does, but it’s all residue, not anything active, you feel? My bet is that he got caught up in the middle of some fucked up ritual a while back. Who knows though? It’s not my business.”
The “it’s not your business either, so fuck off” was strongly implied, but Tim wouldn’t waste this opportunity, even if he did trust Aphrodite’s assessment.
“And as a person?” Tim pushed. “You seemed mighty defensive of him earlier. You getting soft on a newbie crime lord?”
Her eyes hardened again, but Tim was expecting this time.
“Look kid, I’ll cut you some slack cus I know you don’t talk like you actually live around these parts, Bristol boy,” she said coldly, sending a small spike of fear down Tim’s spine. Shit. “Red Hood’s the best thing that’s happened to this shit neighborhood since Tony’s opened. We all thought he was some murdering Batman at first too, reigning justice on us from high without giving a shit about the common person, but he actually takes care of us. Shit, last week his gang gave out more blankets when it snowed than the fucking Wayne Foundation. Do you know how many fucking blankets the Wayne Foundation gives out?”
Tim nodded, intimately familiar with how many blankets the Wayne Foundation gave out annually.
“As for the man, I like him,” Aphrodite continued, calmer now that she had an intrigued audience. “I mean, he’s a dick, but a guy gave Hester trouble a few weeks ago and he not only shot the guy in the dick, but made sure Hester got to the clinic alright. And yes, she’s fine, I can see you worrying your little head, but all I’m saying is that Hood is good people.”
She paused for a moment, thinking.
“You know, most of his ‘targets’ are the scum of the earth,” she said carefully. “The only people I’ve seen him really hate without a clear reason are the Bats, and I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt about that too. You sure your daddy isn’t doing anything nasty?”
It sounded like a pointed question, but Tim could hear the even more pointed question under it, clear as day: “Are you Robin?”
The magical community was not naive, and Tim knew that a powerhouse like Zatanna wouldn’t endorse any rando she met on the street, and the magical community of Gotham knew that too. They’d all survived by playing a delicate game of deniability, but every so often someone liked to toe the line like this. In retrospect, he wasn’t surprised; he’d intentionally pushed Aphrodite’s buttons, so she was returning the favor.
“Nah, I think dad’s just a paranoid old bastard,” Tim grinned, not really lying. “If that’s all you got, I’d better run before your customers get fussy, or worse. See you around, Carla.”
And with that unsubtle escape, he turned and power walked away.
“Don’t call me that while I’m on the job, asshole!” She yelled at his back. “We all know your shit name is a fake too!”
Tim did know that they knew that, but like he said, it was a delicate game of deniability. Too bad Aphrodite would rather shove the board off the table than play.
While the trip to Crime Alley had been a failure in determining anything more about the curse, Tim considered it a success in gathering intel about the Red Hood. Specifically, he had likely been involved in some freaky magic prior to coming to Gotham. If Bruce’s estimate that he had trained with the League of Assassins was correct, then that tied with his alleged bouts of rage could indicate an interaction with a Lazarus Pit.
Moreover, Aphrodite’s reaction to Tim’s intrusive questioning, or more accurately, her character assessment, was equally fascinating. The sex worker was generally the cautious type, so for her to defend the Red Hood so strongly…
Well, Tim was starting to suspect that the Red Hood wasn’t some sort of Joker wannabe, like they originally assumed. Why he chose that name, though, was still unclear. He seemed far too well-informed to be unaware of the name’s origin.
None of this gave much about his background or who he was. He seemed protective of Crime Alley, almost to a personal level, and had displayed a personal understanding of how Gotham and its underworld worked. That, on one hand, would point towards him being a Gothamite, specifically a Crime Alley native.
However, the League potential background was far more concerning. Bruce had effectively stopped most League involvement in Gotham since he defected over a decade ago, and he had known pretty much the League’s entire structure at that point. For Ra’s or Talia to have taken and trained a new operative from Gotham without Bruce ever knowing was almost impossible, given his level of paranoia.
But he clearly showed League training, and he knew far too much to be a simple Gothamite. His knowledge of Jason’s death was also concerningly detailed.
He has Bat training too, a part of his mind whispered, the detail everyone had noticed but were too scared to bring up. There was one Bat who grew up in Crime Alley, who would definitely know the details of Jason’s death. Can’t Lazarus Pits revive the recently dead?
No. Tim refused to contemplate that line of thought. If Jason were alive, he would’ve come home, if only to see Alfred. He wasn’t cruel.
Regardless, nothing Tim had learned could be entered into the Red Hood’s file. After all, he hadn’t gained permission for a potentially dangerous outing, and he sure as hell wasn’t giving up his source.
From the top of the Cave stairs, the door behind the grandfather clock door opened and Dick and Bruce’s voices filtered into the Cave. Tim, still sitting in front of the Batcomputer, couldn’t make out what they were talking about, but their worried tones were clear enough. Tim quickly closed the Red Hood file, leaving no digital trace he was ever in it.
“Time for patrol?” Tim asked as they stepped onto the main platform. It was almost an hour earlier than scheduled, but patrol times got moved around a lot.
“For us, yes,” Bruce said gruffly, immediately raising alarms in Tim’s head. “Red Hood declared his ‘intentions’ towards Robin to one of his lieutenants this afternoon. In easy range of our bugs, before looking directly at the camera. You’re benched until this blows over.”
“What?” Tim practically yelled, jumping up from his chair. “If anything, the fact that he knows we heard about the threat is more suspicious. If it’ll make you feel better to keep me away from Crime Alley, fine, but to bench me entirely is just playing into his hand.”
Bruce grunted in disagreement, but said nothing else. Frustrated, Tim looked to Dick for support.
“I’m sorry, baby bird, but I actually agree with Bruce on this one,” the traitor apologized. Tim thought that was rich, since Dick had never agreed with Bruce during Tim’s entire tenure as Robin. “Red Hood has a disturbing amount of knowledge, and we don’t know what else he knows. It’s better to play this one safe.”
“And if he knows our identities?” Tim countered, making the other two tense. “Are you going to keep me locked up in the Manor until the end of time, just in case he knows and attacks me at school?”
“Of course not,” Dick assured him, but Bruce looked annoyingly contemplative of that idea. “Hopefully this will all blow over soon and we can all go back to normal.”
But Tim knew it wouldn’t be over soon. For one, today had taught him that Red Hood was far too entrenched in Crime Alley to be ousted easily, and certainly not with the support of civilians like Aphrodite. The loyalty of Crime Alley residents was hard to come by, but almost undying once acquired.
Moreover, Bruce and Dick were cursed right now. They’d need some luck to take down Red Hood, and luck they did not have. Tim could cancel that out, if he were there, but he couldn’t tell them that. Hell, he couldn’t tell them any of that, since his little trip wasn’t allowed anyway.
Actually, that connection might be significant. Had Red Hood seen Nelson Hardy today, and recognized him as Tim Drake and therefore Robin? Or had Aphrodite actually narced on him? The latter didn’t seem likely, given her secrecy of magic folk, but also, if she thought he was Robin she might not consider him magic at all.
Damn, maybe he should lay low, even if not for the reasons Bruce and Dick thought.
“Fine, I’ll stay in,” Tim huffed, causing suspicion in both other men. Which was fair, considering Tim would not have taken a benching lying down, had he not had more information under his belt than what the others knew. “But be careful. Leave nothing to chance.”
With that warning, he stormed out of the cave. A bit dramatic, perhaps, but Tim thought he was allowed a little drama.
The next several hours were painfully uneventful, but Tim kept occupied by reorganizing the entire cold case catalog on the Batcomputer, having snuck back downstairs after they left for patrol. Alfred kept sending him meaningful glances, probably in an attempt to get him to sleep or something trivial like that, but Tim ignored him.
Unfortunately, the boredom did not last long. After only three hours of patrol, the Batmobile sped back into the Cave with no warning. Alfred immediately took off to ready the med bay while Tim scrambled to the car in order to assist with whatever was wrong.
The hood slid back to reveal a panicked Bruce and a bloody Nightwing. Tim swore and practically picked Dick up from his chest, quickly honing in on the gunshot wound in his calf.
“Some two-bit thug got in a good shot, but it missed the artery,” Dick explained, as if he wouldn’t be dead already if it hit an artery. “Our comms weren’t responding, or else we would have called you in advance.”
“Shit, we weren’t manning comms tonight, we thought Oracle was,” Tim explained as Bruce rushed to his other side. Together, they quickly moved to the med bay where Alfred was waiting in latex gloves and a mask.
“Yeah, well, she got called away by the Birds of Prey,” Dick joked, laughing at his own terrible rhyme. “It was just rotten luck all around.”
Tim was thankful Dick was already on the metal table or else he would have dropped him. He barely registered as Bruce led Tim upstairs while Alfred got to work on Dick’s leg. Bruce must have said something, but Tim didn’t even hear it, and a moment later Bruce descended again to be with his son.
Rotten luck, Dick had said, trying to absolve him of guilt. As if rotten luck wasn’t Tim’s fault in the first place. If he’d been more clever, smarter, then he would’ve solved the curse weeks ago. If he’d been more determined, better in the field, then maybe they wouldn’t have benched him for being the weak link in the Red Hood case. And if he’d been a better mage, they wouldn’t have gotten cursed in the first place. Maybe his emotions — his love — wasn’t strong enough to protect them.
Tim shook himself. This wasn’t the time to feel sorry for himself. This was the time to be better.
He’d give everything he had to his family, even if he died trying.
Tim hadn’t slept in two days, but that wasn’t even a factor anymore. Enough caffeine ensured he maintained his effectiveness. Not to mention sleep deprivation often made him more creative, and creativity was exactly what Tim needed to solve this curse.
Six hours ago, Bruce had benched him from all Bat-related activities and cases on the grounds that Tim “needed sleep.” That was fine though, since it was just a reminder that Tim wasn’t useful until he figured out what was going on with the curse. Bruce had left for patrol two hours ago.
Alfred was also annoyed at him for neglecting his own wellbeing, but what else was new. He’d left an hour ago for his weekly poker night with his Royal Navy friends.
Dick was in Bludhaven recovering from his gunshot wound from last week and catching up on his cases there.
Basically, Tim was home alone and would be for a while, which meant this was the perfect time to really dig out the magic books and theorize. He still had access to the Batcave itself, even if he didn’t technically have access to the computer, but Tim stored digital copies of all the books he needed anyway.
Now, with twelve pages of runes scattered over the floor, Tim thought he was finally making progress. If he was right, then the luck-sapping curse didn’t ping or even cross his protective magics because it originated from hearth magic itself. Instead of raising a defense against the curse, his own hearth magic simply accepted it as his own.
The new question was how it looked and acted like his magic. Or, to pose a more likely question, why his magic was acting against him.
Looking at the magic detector readings, however, Tim could see a difference in the curse. It wasn’t his magic, but it was uncannily similar. Like someone had looked at Tim’s magic and just twisted instead while adding their own fuel. Instead of granting luck, it took it away. But again, how –
A bang that resonated through the Batcave silenced Tim’s thoughts, putting him on high alert. Another bang sounded, like metal on metal, and Tim gracefully swept up the papers on the floor and turned towards the closest SOS button. If it was a false alarm, then oh well, but better to be cautious than not, especially if –
The power cut out entirely, the lights cutting out for a second before the ominous, red backup lights rebooted. Nothing else rebooted.
Especially if the potential intruder cut the power.
Tim tapped the SOS button anyway, just in case, but he was sure that the signal would be cut, despite the contingencies. If the intruder was smart enough to know how to cut the power, they’d know how to cut the signal. The backup lights were only on because the emergency batteries were literally built into them.
Tim grabbed his staff and shrugged on the closest, easy-to-wear armor he could find, which only covered his chest. He didn’t bother with a domino. This only confirmed that the Red Hood knew who he was.
Sure enough, the bright red helmet was the first thing that emerged from the shadows before the rest of his body followed. The mental image of how he must have moved to achieve that would have made Tim snicker if it weren’t so genuinely intimidating under the red light. Somehow, the guns holstered to the crime lord’s thighs still glistened in the dismal light.
Tim was so fucked.
“Home all alone, little bird?” the mechanized voice cooed mockingly. “Should have stayed with the big bad Bat, after you invaded my home.”
“Unfortunately, I didn’t see your home in Crime Alley, or else I would have actually paid a visit,” Tim quipped back, as if he wasn’t physically trembling in fear. He had watched videos of Hood’s fights. He knew he was outclassed by a longshot, and being lucky only went so far. “As it was, a little stroll around the neighborhood didn’t hurt anyone.”
“Oh yeah? What about the girl you harassed?” Red Hood practically snarled, the voice modulator making it sound inhuman.
“Aphrodite?” Tim asked, genuinely surprised. Guess that means she didn’t narc, for what that’s worth. Too bad I’ll be too dead soon to thank her. “That woman would sooner kick my head off than let me bother her when she didn’t want it. She didn’t even tell me anything about you, except that she likes you.”
“You came to my territory and picked on my girls for information?” Red Hood growled, getting even angrier as he circled Tim like prey. “You’ve got some nerve, Replacement.”
“Just the one girl, and she’s a friend,” Tim defended, for some reason. Then, the rest of the statement hit him, and he paled. “Replacement?”
“Oh, so they never told you about me?” Tim could somehow hear the bloodthirsty grin in his voice, even with the modulator. Unfortunately, Red Hood raised his hands to his mask, and suddenly Tim didn’t need to hear the grin.
Jason Peter Todd did not look the same as the last time Tim had seen him. He had a white streak in the front of his hair, acid green (Lazarus Green) eyes, and was several years older. It was undoubtedly him though, from the jawline to the nose to every perfect detail that Tim had captured on camera for two years.
The deranged grin was not like Jason Todd, though. Privately, Tim thought it would have looked more in place on the Joker.
“Nothing, Replacement? No one mentioned the failure that came before you?” Jason asked, his anger not even a little masked by the fake joy.
Mentioned, Jason said, as if Tim hadn’t spent the last three years in his shadow, like he hadn’t tried to pick up the pieces left in the wake of Jason’s death, like Tim himself hadn’t spent an hour every three afternoons for the last three years mourning him.
Like he wasn’t loved and missed in a way that Tim would never be, when Jason killed him.
Tim snarled, spinning his bo staff in an intentionally showy way. It was a clear invitation.
Jason took it.
Tim could barely process the fight through his own uncharacteristic anger, only reacting and lashing out in the ways that were so ingrained in his body. He was cognizant enough to keep himself from being sloppy, to let the emotion empower him rather than drag him down, but it barely mattered. As he thought, the Red Hood – Jason – was a force of destruction, chaotic but well trained and powerful enough that he could probably take on Batman, even if he wouldn’t win that fight.
And Tim, despite being skilled in his own right, had always been the physically weakest of the Robins. His strength lay in his intelligence, but this was no test of wit.
It took an embarrassingly short period of time for Jason’s boot to crash down on his bo staff, splintering it in two. Alarmed, Tim jumped back to create some distance to regroup, but Jason was too fast. A hand caught his arm and pulled just as Tim left the ground, causing him to crash into the Cave floor. His nose was definitely broken.
A moment later, Tim screamed as one of the halves of his bo staff pierced his arm before being immediately ripped out again. Jason flipped him over with ease as Tim attempted to recover from the pain, but before Tim could escape, Jason’s boot stood on his armored chest and the other half of the bo staff pierced his other arm, pinning it.
With two useless arms and a man twice his weight pinning him under his foot, Tim knew this was the end.
“Damn Replacement, you really are weak,” Jason laughed. Genuinely laughed, like this was fun. “Here I thought, being the ‘better, upgraded model,’ you’d put up more of a fight.”
That sounded like he was quoting someone else, some useless part of Tim’s brain that never shut up thought. Who planted that idea in his head? Ra’s? Talia?
Shut the fuck up, I’m about to die here! It doesn’t matter! the rest of Tim screamed.
“Any last words, Replacement?” Jason smirked, unsheathing a knife. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure Batman hears them, promise.”
Hear them as a taunt, no doubt, Tim was sure. Still, despite how prepared Tim generally felt to die for his family, he’d never really thought about his last words. He’d definitely never thought about what they might be in this context, with Jason miraculously standing over him but affirming all the terrible things Tim already knew.
Still, if Tim was going out, he was petty enough to cause as much emotional damage to Jason as he could before he did. How to do that was a tough shot, more of a guessing game than anything else, but Tim was nothing if not a detective.
“My death can’t break anything in them that didn’t already shatter when you died,” Tim wheezed out, weak but still perfectly clear. “You really could have come home at any time.”
Tim watched as Jason’s face ignited with anger, but even that instinctual reaction was a facade. Barely hidden behind it, pain, confusion, anguish, and fear were clear as day.
Gotcha.
Unfortunately, Tim’s little victory did not last long as Jason’s face immediately hardened into something cold.
“I’ll never come home, Replacement,” he growled, anger still present but colder now. “And now, neither will you.”
In the second it took for the knife to swing down, Tim processed this statement and felt true, genuine anger at Jason. Not at the circumstances like before, not at himself for not being good enough, but at Jason.
Jason had everything Tim had ever wanted in his grasp. Bruce’s heart, Dick’s laugh, Alfred’s proud smile, he could have all of it with a few apologies and a knock on the front door. Tim had worshiped Jason, had almost literally prayed to him for years, but this man was throwing a tantrum over, what? The fact that they had moved on, even barely? That Tim had dragged them, kicking and screaming, away from self-destruction and towards normal grief?
Tim would have had more, but the knife arced down quickly towards his throat, and his time was up. It made contact.
Instead of puncturing though, the knife shattered.
Tim barely had time to be surprised before the shockwave made by the impact, abnormally large, pushed him down, making him hit his head against the floor.
That was nothing compared to what it did to Jason though.
The shockwave coursed through his arm with alarming force, shredding his jacket and the sleeve underneath to reveal the damage it did to the arm itself: his cracked skin was quickly forming into bruises as it twisted out of shape. The man screamed as he fell back, clutching his hand in vain.
There’s no way that wasn’t magic, Tim thought uselessly, already feeling himself grow lightheaded. Oh, right, I’ll still probably die of blood loss, even with my throat intact.
The last thing Tim saw before passing out was Batman inexplicably in the Cave, running over to him.
Chapter 4
Summary:
A magical expert visits
Chapter Text
Tim rarely had the luxury of waking up slowly, but it seemed this was one of those times. Unfortunately, he never had the luxury of waking up without remembering how he fell asleep, so he was immediately surprised that he was waking up at all.
For a moment, in his drowsiness, he considered that maybe he was dead and waking up in the afterlife — but then he recalled that he had gone with Batman to Hell last year, and it definitely had not smelled like a damp cave.
So, for better or for worse, Tim was alive and probably in the Batcave. The pain he felt in his arms when he tried to move them, as well as the feeling of an IV, corroborated that hypothesis. Better, because Tim enjoyed being alive, or had at least started to appreciate it after the aforementioned trip to Hell. Worse, because he definitely had not secured his magical research before getting viciously attacked by the man who was technically his adopted brother.
Also, he got attacked and almost murdered by the man who was technically his adopted brother, and now had to tell Bruce that his allegedly-dead adopted son was not dead, but did try to kill his very alive technically-adopted son.
Joy.
Figuring it was better to face his problems head on, Tim cracked his eyes open, wincing a little at the bright light above him, but it wasn’t painful enough for it to be a concussion. He turned his head slightly to see Bruce a few feet away examining several sheets of paper. From the latex gloves to the many little black and white hair samples in some test tubes to what was probably spit in another, it wasn’t hard for Tim to figure out that he’d been running DNA samples. Bruce’s glaring at the results told Tim everything he already knew. Surely Bruce knew the truth too, but Bruce wouldn’t be Bruce if he weren’t paranoid beyond reason.
Speaking of paranoia, it only took Bruce two seconds to realize Tim was awake, which had not been enough time to come up with a quippy line about defying death. It was probably for the best; Bruce didn’t seem in the mood for jokes about dying children right now, what with Jason being back.
“You’re awake,” Bruce stated, voice filled with undisguised relief. Tim was so taken aback by hearing actual emotion in Bruce’s voice that he almost reconsidered that he was actually dead, but he dismissed the notion based on having no other evidence. “The Red Hood has been apprehended and put into a containment cell. You’re safe here.”
Ah, seeing Jason alive and mostly well would make Bruce feel relieved, even if Jason’s attitude could use an improvement.
“And everyone else?” Tim asked almost instinctively. He flinched at how raspy his voice was. Bruce handed him a glass of water, which he drank.
“Alfred’s on his way home now,” Bruce explained. “It took me half an hour to restore any communication within the manor, so he did not leave until then, but he should be back in about 15 minutes. Dick is also preparing to come home, but will be longer since he is waiting for Starfire to ferry him here on emergency notice.”
Alfred’s poker club was 38 minutes away by car, which implied that he’d been out for approximately 50 minutes to an hour, give or take. That felt a little long to be unconscious for blood loss, assuming he had been treated quickly, but not surprising considering he hadn’t slept in two days.
“You have two puncture wounds in your arms, a broken nose, and several bruises, but you are surprisingly unharmed, given the intensity of the fight,” Bruce continued his report. “Red Hood installed his own cameras, presumably to use the footage as emotional leverage later.”
Bruce’s slight shake in his voice indicated that that leverage would have been highly effective. To be honest, Tim was a little unnerved by how emotional Bruce was about all this. He must have really not expected Jason to be alive.
“And Jason?” Tim asked, watching Bruce carefully.
The man tensed.
“The Red Hood undoubtedly had exposure to a Lazarus Pit,” Bruce said in full Batman voice. “His right arm was completely shattered in the blast, which allowed me to apprehend him quickly so I could treat you. However, we cannot be sure that the Red Hood is really—”
“Bruce,” Tim interrupted, knowing that that line of thought would be nothing good. “It’s Jason. It made a lot of sense before he revealed his face, and it makes even more sense now. Occam’s Razor. I’m sorry.”
And Tim was sorry. Sorry that Jason had come back angry at Tim, sorry that he’d felt the need to do all this, sorry that he hadn’t been good enough at fighting to remain uninjured so that Bruce could spend time with his miraculously-resurrected son.
Silence reigned as Bruce looked away.
“You’re right,” Bruce muttered. “But it doesn’t change anything.”
“Bruce, this changes everything,” Tim argued. “Jason is alive. Sure, he killed a few criminals and is a crime lord himself now, but he’s alive. How could that be anything but good news?”
“He tried to kill you!” Bruce exclaimed.
“Yeah, so the Lazarus Pit has some nasty side effects,” Tim qualified, “but that’s hardly the end of the world. I’ve had more damaging fights with far worse net outcomes.”
“Tim, you almost dying will never be an acceptable outcome,” Bruce protested.
“Even if it gets you your son back?” Tim retorted. Before he could respond, Tim continued, “Regardless, it happened, and now things can go back to normal.”
Admittedly, he wasn’t entirely sure where he would fit into this normal once Jason was back, since the family wouldn’t need him as an emotional crutch anymore, but that was an issue for later. Worst case scenario, he could stick around as Alfred’s apprentice or something, which would have the benefit of keeping the magical protections alive.
Shit — the magic.
“Bruce, about the magical runes on the table…” Tim trailed off, not really sure how to explain.
“Don’t worry Tim, I’ve called in an expert,” Bruce said, apparently missing some information. Though how much, Tim wasn’t sure. “Zatanna is currently indisposed, but Jason Blood has agreed to come on short notice. He’ll tell us what happened, and what those runes are.”
Oh good, Bruce hasn’t figured out I’m magic, was Tim’s immediate reaction. It was immediately followed by, Oh god, Jason Blood is immediately going to notice that I can do magic.
Even if Tim didn’t know what the hell happened to Jason’s arm, Blood would still easily recognize the luck-sapping curse on Bruce, as well as the runes depicting a luck-sapping curse. Though it wouldn’t be too hard to prove that he didn’t cast the curse himself, given he was also a target, it would still thoroughly blow his cover as a normal, non-magical person.
On the other hand, Jason was back, so Tim was bound to be fired from Robin anyway. Might as well have an actual expert solve the curse at the same time. Besides, getting fired for secretly being a mage was cooler than having a fight with Bruce and running away. Definitely not as dramatic as dying though. Just another way Tim couldn’t compare to Jason.
Either way, there was nothing to be done about it. Tim just sighed and resigned himself to waiting until everyone else showed up.
Mercifully, it only took an hour for everyone to show up. Alfred arrived first and immediately took over supervising Tim’s medical care, looking worried all the while. After the butler was satisfied, however, Bruce pulled the old man away. They stood too far away for Tim to hear what they were talking about, but it didn’t take a genius to figure it out when Alfred headed to the containment cells immediately after.
It was no secret that Alfred’s favorite had been Jason, no matter how many times the man claimed that he had no favorites. Dick had been the first and Tim had been the support, but Jason was the one who went to plays with him and talked about literature and even helped Alfred cook. It was from Alfred that Tim had heard most of the stories about Jason’s time in the manor, what tricks he played and all his favorite meals.
It made sense that the man would want to visit his grandson after he returned from the dead. Tim wasn’t bitter, really.
Dick took significantly longer to arrive, to no one’s surprise, but after an additional 30 minutes he descended down the long staircase to the Cave. Alfred had already informed Dick of the situation through the phone, after getting mad at Bruce for neglecting to do so, so it was no surprise that Dick was already crying.
The acrobat ran to Tim first, enveloping him in a warm, if careful, hug. It made Tim feel warm and fuzzy inside, and he made sure to savor it. He had no idea when he’d next get a hug from anyone, let alone Dick Grayson.
Though it was sweet that Dick checked in on Tim first, it wasn’t surprising when he cautiously slinked off towards the containment cells. Tim was too far away from them to hear or even see what was happening over there, what with the med bay being in a remote corner for privacy. It was also probably to keep Jason from seeing him and flying into another rage until they could get the side effects of the Lazarus Pit under control.
Curiously enough, Bruce stayed with Tim the entire time, only leaving his side when he informed Alfred of the situation. On one hand, Tim was shocked. That Bruce wasn’t spending every possible moment with Jason was almost unfathomable, not after Jason had died in his arms. On the other hand, it made some sense. The Red Hood was a killer, one that Bruce had met and fought before, and Batman was clearly one of his triggers. While removing himself from the situation was out of character for Bruce, it was probably the best solution in the short term, at least until Jason Blood arrived.
Speaking of which, Jason Blood was the last to arrive. The buzzer on the manor sounded not long after Dick came home, and Alfred dutifully went upstairs to greet their guest. Not five minutes later, Jason Blood stepped into the cave with his usual serious demeanor.
The man looked good for being over 15 centuries old and bound to a demon. At a glance, he appeared to be around fifty, wearing his signature brown suit over a black turtleneck. His black hair held a single white streak running through it.
Tim internally giggled a bit: here in the cave were two Jasons, both of whom had died and been brought back, both of whom had a white streak of hair. Tim shook himself out of his amusement. It was probably the painkillers kicking in.
“Jason,” Bruce greeted with a nod, foreshadowing how confusing this interaction was likely going to be with names. “Thank you for coming on such short notice.”
“Bruce,” the man returned. “Of course, it sounds like a complicated case. I’m always happy to assist, especially when that assistance does not necessitate Etrigan.”
Tim privately thought that Jason Blood hadn’t been “happy” in several millenia, if ever, but he kindly kept that thought to himself. Still, Tim was also grateful that this case did not need a blood-thirsty, fire-breathing, eternally-rhyming demon who was just as likely to cause a massacre as to help. That trip to Hell had been very enlightening for many reasons.
“The knife shows no sign of enchantment, as suspected,” Blood declared, apparently having looked at the shattered knife while Tim was zoning out. “You, however, do.”
“Me?” Bruce said, his surprise obvious. Tim thought he must really be off his game if he was showing surprise in front of an outsider, no matter how trusted Blood was. “Not Tim?”
Blood’s gaze flicked to Tim and lingered, but soon found its way back to Bruce.
“No, the boy has traces, but nothing potent,” Blood confirmed. “You, on the other hand, appear to be suffering from a curse that makes you unlucky. Your usual protections are still intact though. How odd.”
“Regardless, that is not why I called you here,” Bruce said, frustrating Tim. Why couldn’t the man just look after himself every once and a while? He literally was just told that he was cursed!
“Yes, show me the attacker,” Blood said, easily shifting his focus. The mage knew better than to argue priorities with the Batman.
“All scientific signs point towards it legitimately being Jason,” Bruce elaborated. They began to walk away.
“Wait,” Tim called out. The men paused. “I’m coming too.” He refused to miss this.
“Tim,” Bruce started, his voice a mix of gentle and frustrated.
“No, I’m coming,” Tim interrupted before Bruce could start. “Wheel me over if you have to, but I’m coming.”
“His input could be valuable,” Blood offered. Bruce shot the man a confused look, but Tim immediately realized that Blood knew he practiced magic, at least to some extent. He’d probably always known and just assumed Bruce knew as well.
Still, Bruce relented. It took several awkward minutes to get Tim mobile, but before long they were all standing in front of the glass wall of Jason’s containment cell. Dick was pacing nervously while Alfred stood still as a statue, face unreadable.
In the cell, Jason looked wrecked. Physically, his jacket and gear had been removed, leaving him in a black tee shirt and pants. Between his lack of weapons and the massive, visceral bruises enveloping his arm, he looked far less intimidating than before. His eyes were equally miserable, glaring at Dick before flitting back to Alfred in anguish.
As Tim, Bruce, and the other Jason approached, everyone froze. Alfred recovered the fastest, quickly rushing over to help Tim sit in a chair in front of the cell. Though Jason didn’t move, his eyes glanced over Tim before settling coldly on Bruce, where they stayed. Dick simply moved to Tim’s side, looking just as awkward and tense as when he was pacing.
“I see,” Jason Blood began, somehow startling both Dick and Jason. He inclined his head towards Jason’s arm. “That is a rather nasty injury. How did it happen?”
There was silence as Jason glared heavily at Blood, seemingly assessing him.
“He tried to cut my throat with the knife,” Tim answered, breaking the silence. “Instead of cutting though, the knife shattered. There was a directional shockwave that traveled up his arm.”
“Wouldn’t the shock have put him in worse condition than this?” Dick butted in.
“Not if it’s magic,” Tim reminded him. Or perhaps informed him, given the lack of magical theory training Bruce gave. “Magical wounds don’t leave as much lasting damage as physical wounds.”
“Correct,” Blood affirmed, making some desperate, attention-seeking part of Tim rush. “However, I believe I have done this out of order, forgive me. We met a few times while you were Robin, but in case your memory has failed you, I’m Jason Blood, expert on the occult. I occasionally work with the Justice League, but my primary residence is here in Gotham as a supernatural consultant.”
“I remember,” Jason said coldly, but without anger.
“Good,” Blood nodded. “I have been called here to assess the magical damage on your arm, as well as to see if there are any other supernatural influences on your person.”
“I’m not being controlled,” Jason snarled, anger once again bubbling.
“Probably not, no,” Blood agreed amicably, “but I do sense the traces of the Lazarus Pit on you. Do you deny feeling the overwhelming rage coursing through your every cell, as if consuming you?”
Jason stayed quiet, this time.
“While there is no cure for Lazarus Syndrome,” Blood continued as if everyone wasn’t hanging on his every word, “there are many techniques and treatments to help alleviate the symptoms as your body adjusts to the toxin out over time.”
“There are no cures for the rage except feeding it,” Jason said, but he sounded unsure.
Blood’s nose wrinkled.
“That is one of the lies perpetuated by that ridiculous upstart and his cult of killers,” Blood stated, disgust peppering his voice. “He knows full well that a single exposure can almost always be treated such that the mental effects recede within a year, but chooses not to share that information. Angry followers are easier to manipulate than emotionally stable ones, after all.”
Everyone let that sink in for a moment. It wasn’t every day you heard Ra’s al Ghul, the immortal Demon’s Head and one of the most powerful men in the world, be called a “ridiculous upstart.”
“Of course, if you were exposed multiple times, that is a different story,” Blood continued. “Eventually, the effects become too potent for treatment, such as with the Demon’s Head himself, and insanity is the only prognosis.”
“No,” Jason said, subdued now. “Just the once.”
“Good. I can prescribe you elderweed and daily meditation later, but for now the more pressing issue is your arm. May I look at it?”
Jason looked back at the mage, stared for a second, then nodded slowly. Bruce quietly moved to the door to the cell, entering the code so that Blood could enter. Jason did not move as the door opened and closed and no one worried for Blood’s safety. If Jason foolishly attacked, he’d end up facing Etrigan the Demon.
After several quiet minutes, Blood nodded to Bruce, who reopened the cell to allow him out.
“You mentioned some runic drawings?” he asked Bruce.
“They aren’t relevant to Jason’s arm,” Tim cut in before Bruce could respond. Everyone’s gazes locked onto him, making Tim swallow. “Or at least, they shouldn’t be.”
“Hmm,” Blood considered. “Regardless, I should like to see them anyway.”
Bruce hesitated, looking at Tim with something bordering suspicion, but after a moment pulled the papers from a folder sitting nearby. Blood flipped through them idly, rotating some of them, and nodded.
“I presume you were looking into the cause of Bruce’s curse?” Blood asked Tim, drawing surprised exclamations from Alfred and Dick. Tim felt Bruce’s gaze sharpen.
“Yes, his and Dick’s,” Tim confirmed, the jig up. “I noticed it several weeks ago, with Alfred and I being the positive recipients. I determined the curse was able to slip past their protections due to its similarity to said protections, but who could do such a thing or how is beyond my understanding. Jason entered the Cave while I was still researching.”
“I see, that is rather helpful to know,” Blood assured him. Tim felt some of the pressure in his chest loosen fractionally, though the weight of everyone’s stares undid whatever progress that was.
“Wait, how do you know about magic?” Dick interrupted, speaking for the first time since Blood’s arrival. “And Bruce and I are cursed?”
“Yes,” Blood answered the second question, seeming confused himself. “As I informed Bruce upon my initial inspection, you both appear to be inflicted with a luck-sapping curse. In essence, whatever good luck you have is taken away and given to another target, in this case apparently Tim and Alfred.”
“And you knew about this?” Bruce asked Tim, eyes hard. Tim nodded, head gazing towards the ground. “How?”
Tim didn’t answer. His throat felt like there was a boulder stuck in it, and he could feel tears start to form in his eyes.
“What are you aware of regarding your magical protections?” Blood asked slowly, clearly realizing that he had misread the situation, or more accurately everyone’s knowledge of the situation.
“We use cold steel as an integral part of all of our uniforms,” Bruce answered, which wasn’t untrue. Of course, Tim had swapped out the steel inserts for ones with protective runes two years ago to be more effective.
Blood was quiet, as if waiting for more, but nothing came. The man looked towards Tim, who only avoided his gaze. After a long, awkward minute, Blood spoke.
“For the last three years, your personal magic protections have been improving dramatically,” he said, slow and careful. “I’m no expert in it, but it seemed like you had harnessed some amount of hearth magic to add to your defenses. I was impressed, as hearth magic is time consuming and emotionally tiring, but I recognized it as a clever application of low-level sorcery. It didn’t take long into our unscheduled excursion to the Underworld last year for me to pinpoint Robin as the linchpin and caster of the spells.”
“Is this true?” Bruce asked quietly after a moment, carefully looking to the empty space to the left of Tim’s head.
“Yes,” Tim choked out. “My last nanny taught me before she left. I learned more by reading the magical texts stored on the Batcomputer, but I wasn’t strong enough to protect you from the curse. I’m sorry.”
“Tim,” Dick began, but stopped, clearly at a loss for words.
“I would not underestimate your prowess, young one,” Blood said after another minute of quiet. “Your protections over your family are well made and strong, from what I can see. You should be proud of your work.” After a moment of hesitation, he continued, “Furthermore, I believe you may hold more strength than you realize. Based on my observations, the magic that shattered Jason’s arm was also hearth magic of the same source as Bruce’s protections.”
“I broke Jason’s arm?” Tim asked, horrified. “It didn’t feel like I was using magic though.”
“No? Then perhaps it was the same thing that cursed Bruce,” Blood posited. “To be completely honest though, I believe I have done all I can here.”
“What?” Tim said, startled. “But you didn’t even break Bruce and Dick’s curse!”
“No, and I don’t believe I can,” Blood said apologetically. “All of this magic is rooted in hearth magic. As I have been cursed not to have a family for the past 15 centuries, my knowledge of hearth magic is at best severely limited. However,” Blood raised his hand before Tim could speak again, “I do have a contact who I believe is skilled enough with hearth magic to be able to diagnose, if not solve, the problem. He is based in Gotham and knows the value of secrets. With your permission, I could warp him to and from the Cave directly so that your identities would not be compromised.”
“I don’t feel comfortable letting a stranger into the Cave,” Bruce said harshly, but a look towards Jason made him sigh, “but if you trust this person, I will give him a chance.”
For Jason, Tim knew, familiar longing in his chest. He’d do anything to help Jason.
They agreed for Blood to bring in the new consultant next week, after Bruce had the opportunity to conduct a thorough background check, assuming the consultant agreed and was available. In the meantime, Alfred brought Tim upstairs as Dick stayed with Jason.
“I admit I did not suspect magic was the reason you were so insistent on taking over the chores downstairs,” Alfred said as he set up Tim’s painkillers. Tim had explained how the magic worked after some less-than-gentle prodding from Batman. “I supposed I should have known better than to believe any child would willingly clean, not after seeing the state of your room.”
“Didn’t Jason help you with chores all the time?” Tim asked, too exhausted to care about the toes he was stepping on.
“Master Jason only began helping with chores to ‘lessen his burden,’ as he once claimed,” Alfred corrected. “A sentiment I’m sure you remember echoing. Once he was sure of his place in the family, he never lifted a finger to help outside of the kitchen. I will admit I am relieved that that is not the reason you continue your chores.”
No, Tim had known from the beginning that no amount of housework would ever make him less of a hindrance.
“Regardless of the reason, I do have to thank you,” Alfred continued. “Though it should not have been your responsibility, you have kept everyone in this family safe, whether it be through action or magic. And for that, Master Tim, I will always be grateful.”
Tim smiled at him, but inside barely any part of him stirred. If he were being honest, he would rather be allowed to stay than have Alfred’s gratitude.
But Tim knew better than to ask for something so unreasonable.
Supposedly, the mage who Jason Blood was bringing in had passed whatever background checks Bruce had enacted, though the consultant could only come after three weeks, not one. Between all three boys in the Wayne household being severely injured, Alfred trying desperately to care for them, and all of them adjusting to the fact that Jason was alive but clinically insane, no one had really bothered to think much of it.
Tim, when not lying uselessly in bed, had postponed his search for a cure to the curse and was instead slowly packing his things. The Waynes were keeping him around to help tie up the remaining magical loose ends, but it was likely he would be expected to leave soon after. They would be polite about it, knowing them, making token arguments and offers to stay, followed by invitations to dinner once he left, but Tim knew they were just waiting for him to be out of their hair.
It was clear from the way that Bruce was avoiding him most of the time, and when they were forced to be in the same room the man just stared at him. Or how Dick asked him about hearth magic every time they talked, like he was measuring up how much of his successes over the years were cheapened by Tim’s meddling. Even Alfred was subtly preparing for his departure, taking over Tim’s chores in the Batcave.
The most obvious, of course, was Jason. After five days of Blood’s treatment for Lazarus and a (tear-filled) visit from Leslie, Jason was deemed stable enough to be allowed to roam the Manor on house arrest, and even the Batcave under supervision, even if he was far from fully recovered. For the first few days, Jason and Tim had mutually avoided each other, but eventually Jason sought out Tim.
“Look, this is going to suck for both of us, so let’s get it out of the way,” Jason had immediately said when he practically cornered Tim in the east living room. “I’m still mad that Bruce made you Robin after I died in the costume. I still think Robin shouldn’t exist and we’d all be better if everyone kept the heroics to actual, consenting adults, but that’s not on you. And I shouldn’t have attacked you, or whatever.”
Tim immediately brightened at the apology, but his cheerfulness died when he analyzed what Jason said: Tim shouldn’t be Robin. It was worse, actually, because it had been Tim’s idea to be Robin, so really the apology didn’t even apply, even if Jason thought it should with his limited knowledge. Still, it was the thought that counted.
More importantly though, it was clear that Jason was looking for closure. It would help him to put the things he’d done under the influence of Lazarus Syndrome behind him, which meant Tim only really had one course of action.
“Thank you for saying that,” Tim said, mostly sincere. “I forgive you.”
Jason almost physically flinched, confusing Tim.
“What, just like that?” Jason almost yelled, eyes brightening as the anger clearly rose back up.
“Just like that,” Tim affirmed. His heart rate was getting faster at the threat of danger, but he forced his breathing to be slow and calm. He didn’t want Jason to think he was scared of him, or else that might push him away from the family.
Jason stared at him for a minute, face unreadable but eyes still green. Eventually, they dimmed, and he threw his hands up in exasperation.
“Whatever,” Jason murmured and practically stormed out the door. Tim didn’t really understand the exact issue, but the problem was clear: Tim himself.
So, when the Batfamily gathered in the Batcave the next night to discuss what would be done about the Red Hood, Tim knew what he had to say.
“Jason should go back to Crime Alley as the Red Hood,” Tim asserted after the conversation started, drawing surprised looks from pretty much everyone. “He’s been gone a week already, and the longer he’s gone, the more unstable the situation becomes. It’s better he go back, even if just for a little bit, just to reassure his presence and to make sure no one like Black Mask tries to make a move.”
“Are you sure about this?” Dick was the first to ask. “I mean, you are the one here that he hurt the most.”
“I’m sure,” Tim said, looking right into Jason’s shocked, green eyes. He ignored the way his heart pounded in fear. He had to make this up to Jason.
“This decision isn’t up to you,” Bruce growled, all Batman. “The Red Hood was a murderer and a crime lord. Now is our opportunity for a clean break.”
“And create a power vacuum in the poorest part of Gotham?” Tim challenged. “I know you disagree with his methods, Bruce, but they work. Park Row has had the lowest violent crimes rates that it’s had in the last 25 years, and the people trust him. I agree that he could cut down on the murder, but Jason is doing good work.”
Bruce frowned even harder.
“The Red Hood is a killer–”
“Jason is your son,” Tim stated, getting annoyed. “If he is staying here in the Manor, then you can’t act like he isn’t. You’ve worked with killers in the past. Hell, some of the most prominent members of the Justice League kill! Don’t hold him to a higher standard than Wonder Woman just because you can’t get your head out of your ass.”
At this point, Jason and Dick were staring at Tim in open-mouthed shock while Bruce looked like he just swallowed a lemon.
“I agree with Tim,” Barbara’s Oracle voice chimed in from the computer. “Red Hood is a stabilizing influence on Crime Alley. If Jason agrees, we can assague most of our fears of his mental state regressing by having him come back to the Manor after his patrol, with him giving instructions to expect him to be more unavailable for the next few weeks.”
They all looked to Jason at that, who, after a moment, sighed.
“Fine,” he relented. “I can agree to that. Not like I can do much with a busted arm anyway, and I really would not like to lose myself to the rage. I’ll be leaving my lieutenants with a way to contact me directly, though, so you better not have a problem with that.”
“I don’t, for one,” Dick jumped in.
“I agree,” Tim added, forcing Bruce to be the last one.
They were all silent as they glared at Bruce, waiting for him to object. Then, the most unexpected thing happened: he didn’t.
“Fine,” Bruce growled. “But I expect you back here after three hours. If there is a single fatality, I will know.”
And with that, he stormed out of the cave, leaving everyone shocked.
“Did he just… approve of me being Red Hood?” Jason asked, echoing everyone’s thoughts.
“Putting that aside,” Dick said, “what the hell was that Tim? I’ve never seen you lose your cool like that. You been holding out on us, baby bird?”
“Uh, I mean, no?” Tim tried to answer awkwardly. “I haven’t yelled at him like that since the last time he intentionally threw himself in front of a bullet. It’s just — he was being so stupid. Like, his son has literally returned from the dead, and he’s all hung up about the fact that he killed a few drug lords? Where’s the Bruce who almost killed a bunch of random muggers because he missed Jason so much? Or hell, I’d even take the Bruce who almost killed the Joker!”
“Wait wait wait, back up,” Jason stopped him. “Bruce almost killed the Joker? When?”
“And he threw himself in front of a bullet?” Dick asked, eyes wide. “Multiple times?”
“Yes, he almost killed the Joker, but Superman stopped him,” Tim explained, a little annoyed. “Then the Joker fell and seemingly died but actually didn’t, it was a whole thing. And yeah, Dick, did you not miss how Bruce was passively suicidal after Jason’s death? It was literally why I went and asked you to come back to be Robin that first time. It’s not like me becoming Robin just magically solved all of that.” He flinched at his own word choice, but no one else seemed to notice.
“I thought you were being hyperbolic,” Dick muttered, cheeks red.
“I was not,” Tim stated. “Anyway, Bruce is being stupid again, like he always is when Jason comes up. I should probably go talk to him to make sure he doesn’t do something stupid too, like try to arrest Wonder Woman for murder. Good luck on patrol, Jason.”
With that, Tim fled up the stairs without waiting for a response.
Chapter Text
For the next two weeks, the status quo stayed relatively similar. Jason went into Crime Alley twice, but was frequently on calls speaking with his underlings, though he glared anytime anyone got close enough to hear what he was saying. Bruce continued to mope about the fact that one of his sons was a murderer and his ward was a secret magician.
Dick, on the other hand, had interspersed his overly-friendly interrogations about magic with periods of contemplative staring at Tim, who was not a fan of this change. At least Alfred was still the same, though he still wasn’t letting Tim do his rituals under the guise of recovery.
Tim, in preparing for his inevitable absence, had been looking at apartments in Gotham. Unfortunately, he had limited access to funds on account of his dad reclaiming his trust fund after waking up, so he also had to start looking into cybersecurity jobs that he could trick into thinking he was 18 and a high school graduate. It shouldn’t be too hard.
Finally, the day came when the hearth magic consultant would come. Probably one of Tim’s last days in Wayne Manor, if all went well. At this point, he just wanted the anticipation to be over.
Everyone gathered in the cave, either in full uniform or, in Jason and Alfred’s cases, in normal clothing with a domino mask. The air literally crackled with tension as the air itself shattered, the cracks expanding until they formed a broken doorway in space. Through the doorway stepped Jason Blood, followed by an unfamiliar man.
The man was younger than Tim expected, 30 at most, with auburn hair and slightly round cheeks. He looked, for lack of a better description, completely ordinary. Tim knew that appearances could be deceiving, but something about the man told him that this man wasn’t dangerous, even if he was accomplished in magic.
“Well, that was unsettling,” the man said matter-of-factly as the tears in space closed. He had a light Gotham accent which Tim marked as vaguely from Tricorner. “I’ve never had to travel by rift before. It felt more mind-numbing than I was expecting.”
“If that is all from my end, I will be leaving now,” Blood declared unceremoniously before immediately summoning another rift and walking through. It closed behind him.
“How am I going to get home then?” the man asked somewhat uselessly at the space, before shaking his head. “Right, well, I suppose introductions are in order. My name is Daniel and I’m here to act as a consultant in hearth magic. I’m familiar with most of you here, at least the ones in costume, but I’m guessing the other two people here are part of the family as well?”
“Yes,” Tim confirmed immediately, stepping forward. In their strategy meeting beforehand, they agreed to let Tim be the primary speaker, given his knowledge of magic. “You may call them Red and Agent A. In case Mr. Blood didn’t inform you, I was the one to weave the hearth protections, though they did not include Red, as we did not realize he was alive until recently.”
“He did tell me some of that, as well as most of the details of the injuries and curses, yes,” Daniel said. “I’ll need to do my own inspections of everything, of course, though I understand the main house is off-limits for obvious reasons. I’ll be using mageglass as an interpreter.”
“You can’t see magic?” Jason asked, as if Tim couldn’t have told him the answer to that.
“Given that I’m not bound inextricably to a demon, no I can’t,” the magician said with an eye roll. “Your crowd, the ones like Zatanna and Constantine, have special spells they use to see magic, but the rest of us just use reading stones or mageglass. Now, the hearthflame?”
Tim sheepishly picked a rock out of his pocket. At first glance, the rock seemed completely ordinary, like any other stone you’d find in a cave. At second, third, and hundredth glances, the stone still seemed like a normal rock, because it was.
Daniel raised an eyebrow, unimpressed.
“Look, I needed something discreet,” Tim defended. “Everything in the Batcave is liable to get replaced at any time, or even destroyed. Literally none of the equipment here is the same as when Batman first started, and a lot of it has been replaced in the last three years I’ve been Robin. The rocks, however, are completely unnoticeable and thus irreplaceable.”
“And the emotional connection?” Daniel asked, still unimpressed.
“This is the rock that hit me on the temple during one of my trips into the city to take pictures of Batman and Robin, from before I was Robin,” Tim explained, knowing that it wasn’t nearly enough to hint at his identity. “Robin found me bleeding and patched me up, so I kept the rock. It meant a lot to me.”
“That was you?” Jason almost yelled, only to be shushed by Dick.
“I really don’t want to analyze any detail of that,” Daniel admitted, “but I suppose that’s a good enough connection, at least to tie you to this place, as well as your memories. If I may?”
Tim handed over the rock as Daniel pulled out a pair of horned rimmed glasses. The lenses, however, shimmered rainbow for an instant. Mageglass.
The man looked at the rock carefully from behind his glasses, then around the cave and at the family, only to almost startle in surprise. He looked back at the rock, shock evident on his face, before looking carefully at Tim. After a second, realization lit up his face.
“Holy shit, you’re Tim Drake!” the man exclaimed.
The tension in the room skyrocketed as Tim froze. Out of the corner of his eye, Tim saw Dick pull out his escrima sticks and Jason reach for his empty thigh holsters out of habit.
“Oh my god, I did not mean to say that,” Daniel floundered, raising his hands in a universal “harmless” gesture. “Really, I promise I didn’t know coming into this. It’s just that my mom only ever took one student other than her kids, and she had a really distinct way of weaving magic! And, well, you are the right age and all, so it does make some sense. Though I thought you got adopted by–”
Daniel looked towards Batman and froze, stopping mid sentence, like he suddenly just realized that he now knew one of the best kept secrets on the planet.
“You know what, I don’t know anything,” the man said, backpedaling. “I’m a dumb idiot who knows nothing, just ignore me completely—”
“You’re Mrs. Nelson’s son?” Tim finally asked, unfreezing, drawing everyone’s attention. Daniel paused in his rant, then sighed.
“Yes, my name is Daniel Nelson,” the man confirmed. “Mom talked about you a lot. It really is good to meet you, even if the circumstances aren’t great.”
“She talked about me?” Tim repeated uselessly, until the past tense kicked in. “She’s not around anymore?”
Daniel winced.
“No, she passed away two years ago,” he said. “Throat cancer. Quit smoking twenty years ago, but it still caught up to her.”
“I’m sorry,” Tim said apologetically.
“Don’t be,” Daniel assured, surprisingly genuine. “I know she didn’t really get along with your parents, so we never expected you to know.”
There was an awkward silence as everyone slowly put away their weapons. The tension mostly drained, but some lingered. Daniel cleared his throat.
“Anyway, I ought to inspect the foundations of the magic. I’ll come to each of you as I need to to ask some questions and all that, but for now, just pretend I’m not here. Please. If you all keep watching me like this, I’m going to have a heart attack.”
Jason chuckled, lifting the remaining tension as Daniel scurried away to look at the Cave.
“Mrs. Nelson?” Dick asked Tim.
“My last nanny,” Tim explained. “She taught me the foundations of hearth magic so I could try to bring my parents back home. I think she knew it wouldn’t work, but she was nice. I knew she had kids that were older, but I never met them before she left.”
“How old were you?” Dick asked sympathetically.
“Seven, when she came; eight when she left. She only taught me for seven months.”
“So what, your parents decided you were fine on your own when you were eight?” Jason asked almost challengingly. After a few seconds of silence, he deflated a little. “Shit.”
“Yeah,” Dick commiserated.
“Most of my magic came from learning through the magic books in the Batcyclopedia though,” Tim pivoted. “Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if my magic was a veritable Frankenstein’s monster of mismatched magics.”
“You actually alluded to Frankenstein correctly,” Jason sounded almost in awe.
“Yeah?” Tim narrowed his eyes at him. “It’s not that hard, and every ‘literature enthusiast’ in the world won’t stop correcting everyone else about it.”
“Whatever,” Jason dismissed, though his cheeks were red.
The next two hours or so were unexpectedly boring, with Daniel mostly pulling everyone else aside as Tim tried in vain to not stare awkwardly. Upon inspection, Tim could see Mrs. Nelson in his face, from the nose to the jawline to the unexpectedly intense eyes that felt like they could see every move.
It sent an ache through Tim that he had thought he’d killed years ago. The idea that Mrs. Nelson had passed wasn’t rattling to him; in his brain, she’d been gone since he was eight, perpetually out of reach. That she’d only died two years ago was more so. Had she seen Tim as Robin and been proud, even if she didn’t know it was him? Had she heard whispers about a young boy looking into hearth magic in Gotham and wondered?
He shook his head, trying to shake the thoughts. This was a woman who took care of him, as her job, for less than a year before she quit. He wasn’t going to diminish her relationship with her children by acting like she had been his long lost mother just because she apparently mentioned him to her kids sometimes.
Eventually, though, Daniel finished his survey, and called them all together.
“Alright, I think I know what’s going on,” the man said, exhaustion already peppering his voice. It was the exhaustion of a doctor with a bad diagnosis, and Tim immediately felt his stomach drop. “To start off with, what do you know about the categories of hearth magic?”
Since this was directed at Tim, he answered, “There are the aspects Penelope, Helen, and Clytemnestra. I built my magic mainly on Penelopean theory, specifically on the principle of helping those who are away come home safely.”
“Ugh, you’ve been reading Edith Hedge,” Daniel groaned, making Tim tense in embarrassment. “Wait, no, that’s not bad! You couldn’t have known without a teacher, and that isn’t even wrong, per se. But Edith Hedge is to hearth magic what Sigmond Freud is to psychology. They both published highly influential books that were basically book reports with highly selective ‘research’, but their impact is more in bringing interest to the field than being truly right.
“Still, Edith at least got some of the main points down, we just call them different things nowadays. Penelope we call protection magic, Clytemnestra is manipulation, and Helen is discord. The first two are usually fully intentional, but discord magic isn’t typically cast by people.”
“Who’s it cast by then?” Tim asked, confused.
“Have you heard of the Theory of Emergent Consciousness?” Daniel asked. Tim shook his head. “That’s not surprising, if you learned through books. It’s a relatively new theory, and magical books are almost always 50 years or so behind the times.
“Basically, the theory states that as magic interacts with more people and places and emotions, it begins to form a sort of awareness. Not enough to think or be a person itself, in general, but enough to recognize patterns and even make decisions. This has been applied to magical objects and constructs in the past, but recently the theory implies that it can be applied to far greater forces.
“Hearth magic, in its general shape, is one of the oldest magics in the world. Edith claimed it was ‘founded’ in ancient Greece, but that’s just as true as claiming that ‘thinking’ was invented in Athens. The Greeks were doing what everyone was doing, they were just better at writing it down. In truth, every civilization in the world has shown traces of hearth magic for as long as there have been family units and houses.
“As such, it makes sense that it would start to gain some sentience. This sentience, which we call Hestia for brevity, has basically seen every family and home in the world that’s existed for the past four thousand years. It has seen every instance of love, abuse, and everything in between. Are you with me so far?”
Tim and the rest of the family nodded, if slowly. It made sense, given how many evil magic objects and disembodied forces the Justice League had encountered. Not to mention that mages often talked about magic like it was alive, so it being sentient wasn’t much of a stretch. In Tim’s own experience, he knew magic hated the Internet, so it had to have the capacity to hate, at least.
“Right,” Daniel sighed, seemingly psyching himself up for something. “So, it has been postulated that discord magic, or Helen’s magic, in Hedge’s words, is usually perpetrated by Hestia, not the casters themselves. It sees a miserable mage and tries to improve their life by throwing their abusers into chaos and helping them in turn.”
Tim’s sense of dread grew as he saw where this was going.
“But where does it get the magic from?” Tim asked, desperate to derail the current train of thought. “A giant magical sentience still can’t pull magic from nowhere. Even if it had some hidden store somewhere, you’d still see it pulling that magic from that source.”
“Yes, well, Hestia isn’t the only magical entity around, in terms of hearth magic,” Daniel explained. “Since hearth magic is derived from emotions of family, it can convert any strong center of emotions into magic. In fact, any practitioner of hearth magic can do it pretty easily to an untapped wellspring of emotion. You’ve been doing it unintentionally here for years.”
Tim’s mind spun as he tried to make sense of that. It was Bruce who first made the connection though.
“Wayne Manor,” he said, voice neutral. “It’s been a family home for hundreds of years, and historically a relatively happy one, until recently. If emotions can be stored like that, it would be a solid cache of them.”
“Exactly,” Daniel nodded. “Normally, Tim wouldn’t have nearly enough internal magic to make a practical difference in his magic. Maybe a little good luck, here and there, but preventing Batman’s back from breaking? Regularly curving bullets? All those little miracles you all told me about are far too powerful for just him.”
“So I’ve been using the Manor as a battery,” Tim confirmed, feeling awful. He couldn’t even protect the Bats without making himself a leech. Then, dread hit as it all connected. “So when the magic supplying the curses and the explosion that broke Red’s arm looked the same as mine…”
“It’s because it all drew from the Manor’s latent magic upstairs, yes,” Daniel confirmed.
“But I’m not abused!” Tim yelled, feeling panicked. Had all of it been his fault?
“Maybe not,” Daniel agreed, “but look at it from Hestia’s perspective. The child, you, enters this family’s life when they are grieving the loss of another child, hoping to ease their pain. He feels like he’s only there to serve a purpose, to stop them from self-destructing, but he doesn’t actually feel like part of the family.”
“How could you know that?” Tim interrupted, going cold everywhere. “You interviewed everyone but me.”
“Yes, but I didn’t need to,” Daniel said, sounding guilty. “You wove all of your emotions into your magic. All of them. That’s not uncommon, especially for children and those without good teachers, of which you are both. It meant I could read everything you’ve felt about this family like an open book. I’m sorry for the invasion of privacy and sharing those feelings now, but it’s important.”
“Tim, how could you feel that way? You don’t still feel that way, do you?” Dick interjected, looking heartbroken.
“I wasn’t finished,” Daniel cut him off coldly. “As I was saying, that wouldn’t have been too bad, at first. Lots of children have feelings like that, especially as they enter a new family.
“No, the issue was that it kept being reinforced. At least to the eyes of the magic, no one valued Tim. They didn’t tuck him in or play with him or did anything else that indicated that they cared. They even took him out on their dangerous adventures, and he’d come back just as injured as them. The only one, to it, who seemed to show affection in a way it understood was Agent A, who provided food and comfort and service.”
“That’s not what happened,” Tim insisted, growing desperate.
“It doesn’t matter what happened; it only matters what Hestia observed,” Daniel retorted. “All of that maybe could have been ignored, if not excused, if not for two facts: one, your feelings of isolation got worse, and two, you got better at magic.”
“They got worse?” Dick almost yelled, shocked. “Tim, you have to know that we love you, right?”
“What does getting better magic have to do with anything?” Tim asked, desperate again to avoid the harsh intensity radiating from the Waynes.
“Learning magic through books is incredibly rare, and, in the scheme of history, a very recent possibility,” Daniel told him, also ignoring Dick. “For hearth magic, which is mostly passed along through families, it’s almost unheard of. Hestia assumed that you had to be learning from someone, and that person was clearly not doing for you what you were doing for the others. Thus, in its semi-conscious mind, they were actively neglecting your upkeep.”
“So it cursed them,” Tim concluded, despondent despite having realized the conclusion minutes ago.
“Yes,” Daniel confirmed, unmoved. “It recognized that Agent A cared, so it used the house’s magic to curse the offenders, Batman and Nightwing, while benefiting you and Agent A, as it has been known to do in the past. That said, things only got worse when Red returned. You included him in your rituals, yes?”
“Of course,” Tim confirmed, mostly for the sake of the others. “I thought about Jason when I cleaned the display.”
“So the magic knew him, or at least your feelings about him with regards to the family,” Daniel nodded. “The Manor likely corroborated that, if that’s possible. So, when he came back and you recognized him as he tried to kill you…”
“I felt anger, before he tried to cut my throat,” Tim connected. “The emotion would’ve been enough for Hestia to act, to actually manifest combative magic in order to protect me. To it, Jason trying to kill me after I mourned him would’ve been a betrayal. It literally exploded in rage.”
“And it will just get worse,” Daniel finished. “As long as the rest of the family refuses to demonstrate, through rituals, that they care for you, then Hestia will continue to reign destruction and curses down until they leave or die.”
“This is ridiculous,” Dick cut in again, his temper rearing its head. “Tim has been part of this family for years, he has to know that we love him!”
“Hey, don’t shoot the messenger,” Daniel defended, although he looked pissed at Dick. “I’m just telling you what the magic tells me, but it was a pretty clear reading. The rest you have to sort it out for yourself.”
“Well that isn’t true, right?” Dick whirled on Tim, making him flinch. Dick softened, looking hurt. “Right, Tim?”
“If I may, Master Nightwing,” Alfred cut in, sounding as level headed as ever. Tim, however, could see the undercurrent of sadness in his posture, recognizable from how he’d been when Tim first joined the family. “If Master Tim does not feel valued, that is hardly his fault, is it? I admit that I have not always been the best at expressing my emotions, but that is hardly a unique trait in this family. It is best that we look to improve ourselves, to improve the situation.”
“Yeah, I don’t think that’s going to cut it,” Jason disagreed. “If the kid felt confident enough that he wasn’t valued to literally cause divine intervention, then we definitely need to rethink more than just our communication strategies. Like, we don’t always treat each other the best.”
“Oh, that’s rich coming from the guy who tried to murder his own brother,” Dick snarled, rage resurging.
“Yeah, alright, I admit that that wasn’t my finest moment,” Jason conceded, “but I think we just established that that was far from the beginning of the problem. Thinking back on my time as Robin, how often were you here, showing me affection? I’m willing to bet it wasn’t much better for the kid.”
“I did better, after—” Dick cut himself off. “After I lost the chance with you, I tried to do better by Tim. I’m here every weekend now.”
“Master Nightwing, I would like to point out that you only began spending the weekends in Gotham at Master Tim’s behest,” Alfred interjected, his tone uncharacteristically sharp. “Perhaps all of us need to consider how we have contributed to these rather unfortunate circumstances.”
“Speaking of all of us,” Jason said, turning to face Bruce, “you’ve been awfully quiet, Batman. Nothing to say about how you’re three for three on making your kids feel unloved and unwelcome?”
“This is different from you and Dick,” Tim jumped in, heart rate only speeding up.
“No, you’re right, this is so much worse,” Jason laughed semi-maniacally. “At least Dick and I knew we were part of the family. Hell, I still knew you were coming for me, in that warehouse. But if the same thing happened to the kid he’d probably think he deserved it or some shit.”
That struck a nerve in Tim, making his temper flare, but he remained quiet.
“Red, you’re getting overly emotional,” Bruce said coarsely.
“Overly emotional?” Jason cried. “There’s a kid here who thinks you hate him after you’ve all lived together for three years! If anything, the rest of you aren’t getting emotional enough.”
“Red, if you’re going to be volatile, we’ll need to remove you from the situation,” Bruce said, stone cold. Jason flinched.
“Jason doesn’t need to leave,” Tim jumped in, annoyed at Bruce for being unfair to his son.
“Stop defending me,” Jason said viciously, his eyes glowing green. Tim took a step back on instinct. Jason took a deep breath. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Bruce is right. I’m making this about myself and my emotions, when it should be about you. You’re clearly still terrified of me, which is completely reasonable, so if my presence is doing more harm than good, then I should leave.”
“No!” Tim yelled, desperation clawing at him. “We just got you back! If anyone should leave, it should be me.”
“Got me back?” Jason repeated, perplexed. “Kid, I’m going upstairs, not — wait, are you implying that you should leave like, leave leave? Permanently leave?”
“This is all my fault,” Tim confessed, though they already heard that from Daniel. “If I never came to the Manor, they would never have gotten cursed and you would’ve come back to the family without resorting to violence.”
“Tim, I woke up from a Lazarus Pit to Talia al Ghul whispering in my ear that Bruce never loved me,” Jason said. “My ‘reunion’ was always going to end in violence. That’s not on you.”
“Regardless, my actions still led to Batman and Nightwing almost getting killed on several occasions,” Tim continued.
“It also sounds like it saved them on even more occasions,” Jason countered. “Even if it was your fault they’re cursed — which it isn’t, their emotional ineptitude is on them — then that still wouldn’t mean you had to leave the family.”
“No, I’ve been preparing to leave since you came back,” Tim clarified. “You’re home, so the whole reason I’m here is void. This just gives a reason why I should do it faster.”
“Hold up,” Dick jumped in, “why would Jason being home mean you had to leave?”
“I just said that,” Tim said, frustrated that they wanted him to spell it out. “I was only ever Robin to keep you all from falling apart without Jason. Now that he’s back, I’m unnecessary. Not to mention that Jason doesn’t even want me to be Robin anymore, so that makes me useless on two counts. Worse, even.”
“Woah kid, I did not tell you to quit Robin,” Jason said. “I meant that you shouldn’t have had to be Robin in the first place, not that you had to quit now that you’ve got the gig.”
“But it was my idea to be Robin,” Tim explained, fighting himself from tearing up. Why were they making him explain what they already knew? “It was my selfish idea, dressed up as a way to help. Just like how it was my idea to start trying to mess around with magic I didn’t understand, which just made everything worse. It would be best for everyone if I just left.”
“No, it wouldn’t,” Jason disagreed. “As much as I hate to admit it, you’re doing good work as Robin. One of the reasons I was so mad about you being Robin was because you were so much better than me at it.”
“No I wasn’t,” Tim argued, hating the tears forming in his eyes. “I was nothing but your replacement. Bruce never wanted me here. I can’t make him laugh, or— or even smile. I was just here to fill in so he didn’t kill himself.”
“Tim, no,” Bruce spoke again, though his facade cracked as desperation crept into his voice, surprising Tim. “I wasn’t kind to you in the beginning, that’s true, but I’ve wanted you here for years. You’re my son.”
“No, I’m not,” Tim’s voice cracked. Anger was starting to boil inside him. “I’ve never been your son. I’m your coworker, your assistant, but we never spend time together outside of the Cave or patrol. You don’t love me like you do Dick or Jason. I was your stalker, remember? I would know.”
“But I adopted you years ago!” Bruce sounded astonished, as if this had never occurred to him. “You’ve lived here for even longer.”
“Yeah, because it’s convenient!” Tim explained, truly angry now. “Because my parents didn’t even want me, and I needed the magic to work, and you needed live-in help for your depression, and because it was easier for you to explain why I had to disappear sometimes.”
“Tim, you have to know we love you,” Dick repeated, also desperate.
“No you don’t!” Tim yelled. “You ‘love’ me because I’m here, because I’m useful, but I’m not anymore and you’ll realize that.”
“How could you possibly say that?” Dick gasped.
“Because no one loves me!” Tim cried. “No one’s ever loved me! Not my parents, not you, not anyone. I’m unloveable!”
“Tim—”
“No.”
Everyone silenced at the wave of power following the single syllable. They all turned, surprised, at Daniel, who looked surprised with himself. He sighed.
“Sorry, I know I said I wouldn’t get involved with this, but mom would never forgive me if I let that go uncorrected,” the mage said wearily, sounding sad. “Mom loved you. Really, truly loved you. She talked about you all the time, right up until she died.”
“No,” Tim denied. “She took care of me, but that isn’t the same as love. She left.”
“Kid, she was a nanny for ten years, she took care of a lot of kids,” Daniel elaborated. “You were the only one she talked about like that. Definitely the only one she taught.
“And she didn’t quit. She tried to take you from the Drakes. Subtly, of course, but she was gonna take you over to our house when she could, put you under the protection of our magic, make you family. She even started calling you our new little brother, for a while.”
“What happened?” Tim prompted quietly after Daniel paused.
“The Drakes fired her. I don’t know if they saw through it, or they just didn’t want their kid getting close with the ‘help’, but they fired her as soon as she implied that you could stay at our house sometimes. Mom was never one for half-measures though, so she immediately tried to blackmail them. She kept proof you were neglected, that there were times no one was home when she had to go home and that they didn’t care.
“Those bastards didn’t take that well. They threatened to blacklist her if she even tried, and pointed out that they’d just pay off the judge even if she did go forward with it. They told her that if she ever contacted you again, they’d make sure she never worked again.
“Mom might’ve done it anyway, if not for the fact that Isabelle was still in high school. Dad was long gone, and if Mom got blacklisted, she was scared that Isabelle would have had to drop out to support us. So she gave in, but she never stopped loving you. She told me on her deathbed that her biggest regret was not getting you out of that big, empty house, no matter what it took.”
“That — I can’t…” Tim stuttered, tears running freely down his cheek.
“I know it’s a lot,” Daniel sympathized. “Mom always was a lot, in both the good and bad ways. But she loved you. Hell, when your parents died, Laura and I even talked about if one of us should take you in ourselves, since you were basically our little brother. But then Bruce Wayne snatched you up, and we figured it was probably for the best, not that we’d win that battle anyway.” He looked towards Batman. “Though now I wonder if it really was for the best,” he muttered under his breath.
“But...” Tim trailed off, at a loss for words.
“Sorry, again, that was also a lot,” Daniel winced. “I sort of got that from her. But all that’s to say that you definitely aren’t unloveable. If no one else, Mom loved the hell out of you.”
“I must say I agree,” Alfred chimed in. “Master Tim, I have loved you since the moment you stood in Batman’s office and told him to, and I quote, ‘get his head out of his ass before he got someone killed’. That love has only grown since then, and I am so, so sorry that you ever thought otherwise.”
“I love you too Tim,” Dick said. “I say it a lot, but I guess it doesn’t get through that big brain of yours. You’re my little brother, and you always will be.”
“We’re not there yet,” Jason went next. “I tried to kill you three weeks ago, so it would be kinda fucked up if we were. But I was wrong to ever try that, and you’re not all that bad. Hell, anyone who can talk to Batman like that is a hero in my book. Maybe… one day.”
Everyone turned expectantly to Bruce, but the man seemed unable to speak. Tim swallowed.
“Bruce, it’s okay,” Tim reassured. “You don’t need to say anything. You’re not obligated—”
“No,” Bruce asserted, firm but gentle. “Everyone else is right. I’ve never been good at expressing myself, but that’s no excuse for me to stop trying. This is, more than anyone else’s, my fault. And it’s my responsibility to fix it.
“I love you, Tim. It took me far too long to, as you put it, ‘get my head out of my ass’ and appreciate you, but I did get there. You have saved me more times than I can count, both in the field and from myself. You are smart, interesting, and wholly selfless, and even when those qualities get you in trouble, they are still assets.
“But it’s more than what you bring to the field. I love your photography and how passionate you are about Star Trek and how you always take Alfred’s workload into consideration when you play a prank. I love you not because of what you can do for me, but because you are my son. Truly, wholly, you are just as much my son as Dick or Jason, no more or less. And I love you. All of you.”
With that truly astonishing showing of emotion from the Batman, the group fell silent. Tim could barely see through his tears, even as he tried to wipe them away. After a long, awkward minute, Bruce stepped towards him and wrapped him in a hug.
That was all Tim could take as his quiet tears turned into ugly, raspy sobs. They heaved his chest as Bruce continued to hold him tightly. Eventually, he tired himself out as he regained control of his breathing.
“Don’t leave,” Bruce pleaded quietly in his ear.
“I’ll stay,” Tim promised.
They still had more to work out. Sixteen years of believing oneself to be unloveable didn’t go away in one conversation, and Bruce and Dick were still cursed, but for the first time, Tim thought they’d work through it. They’d be okay.
The main part of the solution, as it turned out, was for everyone to learn how to properly do rituals themselves, even with no magic involved. Apparently, the best way to communicate to the embodiment of hearth magic that you cared for someone was to do hearth magic.
That meant, for the first time in Wayne Manor history, there was a chore chart.
“Why am I involved in this?” Jason whined as he helped Tim clean the kitchen. “I don’t even live here. It’s not like I’m the one who’s cursed.”
“You basically live here,” Tim rolled his eyes. “Besides, now we’re just taking off some of Alfred's workload. Tell me honestly that you’ve ever seen him happier and you can stop.”
Jason grumbled, but continued to scrub the counter ferociously. The housework also had the added benefit of everyone appreciating Alfred more, not that they didn’t in the first place.
Tim wasn’t unhappy about the rituals, but he was annoyed at the other stipulation. Apparently Tim had to “dedicate himself to more than his family,” which meant “rekindling his hobbies” and “making new friends.” Tim did not appreciate these suggestions, especially since he couldn’t corroborate that theory in any text or tome. The fact that Bruce was the one who suggested that, with Dick’s enthusiastic approval, made Tim even more skeptical.
“Fine, they made it up,” Daniel admitted over the phone after half an hour of Tim interrogating him. “It really won’t help your magic at all. But you know why I went with it? Because it’s good for you. And honestly, that might help with the magic anyway.”
So, Tim relented. He reached back out to Ives and Bernard, who were gracious enough to accept his apologies. He went with them to the new skateboarding park in the Narrows, just for fun. He went with Bruce to get a new camera, then bullied Jason into letting him photograph Crime Alley, as long as he had the permission from the subjects and went as a civilian.
Lastly, Dick finally convinced him to join a superhero group. Dick wanted him to join the Titans, but Tim already had his eye on a new team.
“You’re sure you’re okay with me joining?” Tim asked nervously. “I know most of you are kind of of the ‘fuck established heroes’ camp.”
“You’re fine,” his guide said, laughing at his language. “My mentor is Wonder Woman. As long as you aren’t judgemental, you’ll be welcome. Besides, we’re a little heavy on brawn and not so much on brains, as much as I hate to admit it.”
Tim laughed, but didn’t disagree. The individual members were smart, but they had a bad habit of punching first and asking questions later.
Cassie grinned at him as she threw open the doors of the hall.
“Welcome to Young Justice.”
Notes:
First of all, thank you all so much for the support and comments! This has been one of my favorite fics to write, so I'm glad so many people have liked it as well. I hope the end was satisfying to all of you who commented your theories.
Originally, I was going to make this a three-part series, with the next part being "Helen" from Bruce's POV. Ultimately, I decided that the fic was pretty boring and there were only a few scenes I was interested in writing, and that they wouldn't be any good without like 10k of context.
However, I am still in the process of writing a sequel from Jason's POV that I plan to publish. It will probably be a while before I post any of it, but if you're interested, please keep an eye out for "Clytemnestra"!EDIT: Please do not keep an eye out for "Clytemnestra". I wrote like a third of it and it just wasn't working, and now I've moved on to other projects that I'm more passionate about. I'm not deleting the comment for historical purposes but if you liked this then just read my other fics.
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