What Sleeps in Shadows

Chapter Fourteen

"So... this is where you're spending your holiday?"

Raven flushed and looked over at Zachary as he sidled up next to her and glanced around the room. It had been mostly cleaned from the party before, but there was still a bit of a mess, and she could see him eyeing trash scattered throughout the room. It wasn't even her own house and somehow she felt ashamed of its state. Raven glanced around before meeting Zachary's stare, just barely catching the teasing smile pulling at the edges of his lips.

"I mean, there are worse places than Wayne Manor, I guess." He cocked his head to the side and stared at her, as if he was trying to piece together all of the information she had left out of their text conversations over the last few months. "This is a shot in the dark, but does my family's visit here have anything to do with your... trial period on earth?" He leaned back against his heels and crossed his arms over his chest.

Raven winced, pulling her shoulders in on themselves. "Yes? No?" she stumbled over an answer, and she finally shook her head, looking away. "Maybe?"

Right now, on the other side of the manor, Zatanna and John were having a very private conversation with Bruce and Damian, and Raven was almost certain it was about her and her heritage. Damian hadn't told Bruce what Raven was, only that she wasn't from around here, and that she went to his school. If Bruce knew the truth about her - the real truth - she doubted she would have been welcomed so easily into his home.

She could feel the pit in her stomach grow deeper, as if it was trying to swallow all of her emotions before she had a chance to feel them. Finally, she met Zachary's stare again, her lips tugging down into a frown. "What would you like that answer to be?"

"Honestly?" Zachary smirked, and he tilted his head towards her, her expression softening around the edges. "Whatever you want it to be. If you're not comfortable telling me all about the secret reason you're here on earth, then I'm not going to pry if you don't want me to." He glanced around the room before jerking his thumb over his shoulder. "You want to go somewhere a little more private and talk about it?"

She did, but there were only about four rooms in the whole manor she knew how to get to, and two of them were next to Bruce's office where John and Zatanna were. Chewing on her lower lip, she motioned for Zachary to follow her down the hall, just barely remembering a path to the veranda outside. The stone walkway was dusted with snow again, but the sun was up and it felt just barely warm enough that Raven knew she could probably stand outside longer than normal. Zachary followed her out there, and they both leaned against the stone railing as they stared across the lawn. There was a long stretch of silence until Zachary finally broke it, his words filling the silence between them.

"So..." His tone was surprisingly conversational, and less accusatory than she was expecting. Raven watched him from the corner of her eye, but they didn't move. "We're here, warding Wayne Manor against some pretty hefty dark magic from a fanatical cult, and my cousin and uncle are currently having an in-depth conversation with Bruce Wayne and Damian Wayne about you, so... I'm guessing your holiday break isn't exactly going as planned, huh?"

Raven looked down at the lawn, pitching forward to rest her hands against the stone railing. "I guess... I guess I should have expected that nothing would stay normal. That's maybe asking too much of my life."

Zachary looked over at her, his eyes apologetic and his expression soft. He seemed to take her in for a moment before looking back out at the lawn. "Well, if I knew it was going to be this insane here, I would have invited you over to my place. At least then you wouldn't have had to put up with my cousin and Damian. I bet he's just a bundle of joy around the holidays."