Work Text:
Vera never got to know her mother. She had only ever heard stories about her kindness, her bravery, and her compassion. She had only ever heard about how beautiful her mother was. How her copper hair would shine in the light of both the sun and moon. How her green eyes twinkled like the morning dew on fresh grass. How her smile could charm the hearts of even the coldest men, and brighten up a room like the first ray of sun after the storm.
She remembered the smile, albeit vaguely. Remembering her mother now brought nothing but pain and thoughts of ‘what if?’ back to the surface of Vera’s mind. But she remembered the smile. And oh, how right they were, her mother's smile brought warmth into the hearts of so many, herself included. Her mother's smile shone like a bright light among those all so distant memories.
Vera never got to know her mother, yet she was told how much she loved her for the time she could. How when she was born she swore to protect her until her final day in the Spiral. The countless nights over her first year of life fussing over the smallest sneeze, wishing to bring up the most wonderful daughter she could. Her mother swore to protect her until her last breath. That last breath came too soon.
Vera never got to know her mother, not because her mother left, not because she was murdered, although she may as well have been. Her mother died of an unknown sickness that wracked her body. Her peach skin turned an unhealthy gray, and her once healthy hair had become greasy and wiry, but her smile…oh her smile remained the same.
Vera’s few memories of her mother come from the time of her sickness. Fits of coughing as Theurgists came in and out of her mother and father's bedroom, all with skills below her mother's own. Her mother was in pain, her mother was dying, but she managed a smile for her through it all. Her and her father.
She never knew her father either, though she did remember more of him than her mother, although Vera felt that although she remembered her father more, she knew more about her mother.
Her father was an older man with long black hair and a braided black beard. He had silver-blue eyes and pale skin, in stark contrast to her mother's emerald green eyes and tanned skin. Malistaire Drake and Sylvia Spitfire were two far ends of the spectrum, that the spiral had pushed together despite all odds and differences.
Sylvia brought joy into Malistaire’s life. She was his life. After the destruction of his and his brother's home of Dragonspyre, he found solace in her. He found a friend, a partner, a lover, and a wife. Her death left him distraught, an empty shell of a man was all that was left behind.
Vera didn't know all the details about their relationship, she was around nine when her mother passed. But she remembered how different her father was after Sylvia’s death.
She remembered how he would sit in the almost pitch black of night, with the moonlight streaming in through the Death School Tower’s window, just staring for hours on end at old photos of his wife, how he distanced himself from those in Wizard City more than he already was. Most of all she remembered his reaction to her, his daughter, Sylvia’s daughter.
Her uncle Cyrus made remarks about how she resembled her father, but Malistaire only saw Sylvia in her. Maybe just because she was the only living reminder of his wife, maybe for some other reason that she didn't yet know. But Vera reminded Malistaire of his dead wife to an unbearable point. He wouldn't speak to her, no matter what she would do. He wouldn't meet her eyes, he wouldn't glance in her direction in the slightest. The only reason she knew that he remembered that he had a daughter was the second serving of food on the table every meal. He brought her a birthday gift on her birthday each year one year it was a spellbook for her to use once she was enrolled, once it was an amber necklace, her favorite was the dragon egg that came to hatch her first friend, Vaden. She remembered the notes he left now and then with messages about how it was a difficult time for him. Him. Never them.
Then it happened. Three years after the death of her mother, almost to the day. She was thirteen then and remembered it like it was yesterday, even now. Her father looked at her for almost the first time since her mother passed. She remembered how hollow his cheeks were, how unnaturally pale he was in contrast to the dark circles around his eyes. He didnt look like the caring father she remembered all those years ago. And she supposed he hadn't been that man for many years now.
It was late at night, Vera had been asleep within the dark walls of her bedroom. Her father had woken her from her slumber, fully dressed from what her blurry eyes could make out in that dark room. He spoke fast, his words didnt make sense to her young mind. But now, years later, she understood what he had said.
But back then, what she understood from his words, was that he was taking her to her uncle's tower for the rest of the night and that he would retrieve her when he finished what he set out to do. And that when he was done, they would be a family again.
Vera was too frightened to ask what he meant at the time, and only followed her father towards the Myth tower. Her uncle, Cyrus Drake, a balding man with crystal blue eyes, dressed in yellow and blue night robes answered quickly. Concern filled his eyes for his twin, her father. They spoke in hushed tones, she remembered her father’s voice raised as the conversation continued. Eventually, her father walked away, Cyrus ran a hand over his face before turning to his niece.
Vera looked up at him with wide eyes. Still not fully awake throughout the whole endeavor. He gently picked her up, telling her that her father would be back to gather her in a few hours. Vera remembered finally asking her first question of the night.
“Where is daddy going?”
Cyrus didnt answer. He didnt know how to answer her question. After all, how do you answer a question that you yourself do not know an answer to?
The next morning, the Death school, and its accompanying tower had all but disappeared from Ravenwood Academy, leaving nothing but a gaping cavern in between the schools of Myth and Fire. The next morning, Vera was told she would never see her father again.
Rumors spread from that day to the next, and for the next three years.
She was sixteen now. She was standing at the edge of the bottomless pit where her home used to be. Where her home should be. It was three years to the day of her fathers disappearance, and almost six years to the day of her mother’s death. She came here today and had come here every year since, to lament the possibilities of the life she could lived, instead of the one she was living.
Every day since her father and the Death school disappeared rumors spread. Rumors of how her father had gone mad with the grief of her mother's death and ripped the death school from the roots of Bartleby. Rumors of a figure dressed in black with inverted eyes seen around the city. Her father had become a ghost story among the children of Wizard City. And now she had to pay the price of his actions. Everywhere Vera went, looks followed. Those who knew her father looked at her with pity, and those who believed the rumors looked at her with caution.
Then Bartleby was attacked. A few months ago headmaster Merle Ambrose gathered all of the professors, to discuss a situation that had arisen. Bartleby’s eyes of History had been stolen leaving the grandfather tree partially incapacitated. When this news became public information throughout the school year, a new rumor spread, that Malistaire Drake had come back and stolen the eye.
She and her uncle didnt want to believe the rumors. Her father was gone, and even if he was alive, what reason would he have for stealing the eye of the grandfather tree rather than just coming home?
So here she stood, her toes hovering over an empty pit, her heels steady on the ground. She had no intention of falling, she had to live until the truth was uncovered. If her father truly was alive, where was he? Had he become the horrible creature the plethora of rumors and stories had made him out to be? And why?
Why did he leave her behind?