Raven finally walked out of her bathroom, pulling her hair into a ponytail. She folded her arms as she walked over to the counter as the kid looked through her fridge.
“Do you have any juice?” he asked.
“Cool!” he said and she sidestepped him as she plucked it up, pulled down a sniffer.
“I’ll do the pouring,” she said. After pouring a sniffer of OJ before handing it to him. “What are you doing here kid? Aren’t your parents?”
“My mom is the Evil Queen,” he stated.
“He doesn’t know he’s my dad!” he said cheerfully. Raven glared at the kid.
“She let me come!” he said.
“I don’t think so, it was a closed adoption. This is New York City, no mother of any standing would let you come here alone, you’re eight. So, where’s your mom, and what are you doing here?” she asked.
“I…” he started. “I came for you,” he said.
“Alright, I’m calling the cops,” she decided.
“I’ll tell them you kidnapped me,” he countered. She glared at that smug, confident glare; God he looked like his father; a bit infuriating.
“And they’ll believe you because I’m your birth mom,” she sighed. “Alright, where do you live?”
“Miller Harbor, Maine!” he chirped.
Raven stared balefully at him. Daniel sat there looking smug, looking like his father, and she sighed as she propped her chin up on her fist while she leaned on the counter. “I take it as in the only way you’re going home is if I drive you?”
“Give me ten minutes, and do not touch the ice cream!” she warned.
“But it’s Caramel Fudge!” he whined.
“Don’t even think about it,” she warned; knowing full well she was about to have an eight year old smothered in chocolate, vanilla and caramel if she wasn’t careful. Raven shot off a text to Luci and Maze to inform them that something had popped up and she would not be back in time to cover Clara’s performance. Getting dressed she was tugging on her boots and the heavy leather jacket she had for going to colder places. She also grabbed some weather gear; just in case, and her go bag while pocketing her knives and walking out to see the kid smothered in ice cream; her ice cream. “Seriously?” she sighed in amusement as he stopped midbite.
“That was a full pint,” she said plucking it from his sticky fingers and putting it in the fridge again.
“Go wash up and we’ll get something on the way to Maine.”
Daniel jogged off to her bathroom then. It was now that Raven noticed the thick book popping out the back of his discarded backpack. Book was as big as him, which had her picking up the backpack and peeking inside, there was nothing ominous about it or within it. There was however a serious knife, a tactical knife, which she pocketed.
Owner of Black Jack Books, was a bit surprised when he saw the mayor standing at his door, banging on his shop door frantically. He couldn’t remember a single time when she had ever come to his shop, which was why he was a bit curious; despite his inebriated state, and swaggered over.
“What are you doing?” he demanded. The woman spun furiously on him, as her blue eyes narrowed.
“Where is he!?” she demanded.
“Who?” he asked, playing dumb.
“Don’t play stupid Jason!” she snapped. “Daniel is missing!”
“Lad’s probably out looking for adventure, they do that at eight, your highness,” he retorted. “And isn’t this a matter for the sheriff?” He was leaning on the wall of his shop; Artemis would not be happy if it was broken into and the mayor looked ready to break every window she could reach. Jason also didn’t have time for replacing windows, autumn was cold and fishing season was busy, and he couldn’t afford to be late to the docks for work. Despite owning the shop, he had insisted on sailing and fishing; it was honest labor that kept him sane because the mayor would drive him batty. (Battier than Sheriff Dick Grayson or Veterinarian Dr. Damian al Ghul could.)
The only reason he hadn’t dismissed her out of hand immediately was Daniel; Danny, the lad was invasive, inquisitive, intelligent, talented, and above all, ballsy. Jason had had the lad toddling after him for some unknown reason since the lad could walk. Danny had taken his first steps to Jason the first time they had met, said his first word for him, and for some unknown reason, always screamed for him when he was sick or injured. Danny’s mother had tried to curb this behavior, but since the lad was three and needed stitches, she had ceased that. No one could calm the tot when he had cracked his head open and blood was spewing everywhere; until they called in Jason, and Jason spent the next hours with the kid keeping him calm while Danny got twenty-one stitches, serious check over with x-rays, scans, and the works, but the kid was alright. Rebounded the next day and since then, was Jason’s shadow.
“He isn’t anywhere in town!” she shrieked.
“Lad will turn up, he couldn’t have gone anywhere,” he groaned rubbing his face over.
The mayor stormed off, he sighed as he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fuck!” he hissed before running off to find Danny before he found trouble; or worse, his mother found him.
Raven looked at the marker of the town, Daniel; or Danny as he insisted his dad called him, had fallen dead asleep in her back seat. She had hazardously pulled her spare coat over the tiny body and put a blanket from her emergency kit under his head. They were here now.
“Hey, kid, Danny,” she said as they pulled up to a dead end; the road literally disappeared into the water, her phone said it was just after midnight when she pulled up. Getting out of the car she walked to the backseat, carefully opening the door, and shaking his shoulder gently.
“We’re here, Danny, now where are we supposed to go?”
“69 not telling you,” he muttered sourly as he rolled over and curled up into a tight little ball, disappearing beneath her jacket.
“Oh no you don’t!” she hissed pulling him out of the car, the kid yelped fully awake as she set him down on his feet. He didn’t look unsettled at the manhandling, but he wasn’t awake.
“Where are we heading?” she asked cocking her brow.
“We need to take the ferry,” he muttered.
“Good, and when does that come?”
“In the morning?” he said uncertainly.
“How’d you get over here then?”
“Rowboat!” he said proudly. She frowned as she rubbed her hands over her face; this kid was going to be the death of her. No mother wanted to ever hear that their kid had rowed to shore, in the autumn on the Atlantic, but the kid looked so damn proud of himself that she couldn’t outright berate him.
“Do you have a number I can call of someone who operates the ferry?”
“No one ever comes to Miller’s Harbor,” he said solemnly.
“Uh-huh, sure they don’t, the number kid,” she warned him before he rattled off a phone number which had her dialing it.
“Hello? Danny, this better be you or your rear is in a world of hurt when I get my hands on you,” a sharp, male voice; that sounded very stressed, tired, scared and worried informed her. That about summed up how she felt in these last hours, and just as intensely as when Danny had informed her he had rowed here.
“Lemme guess, Danny is a small, curly black haired, aquamarine eye color, freckled troublemaker who loves red and ice cream?” she asked as Danny made himself at home in her backseat again. His eyes had an unusual violet hue when he stared at her through the window, his nose was red from the cold.
“Who the hell is this?” the voice demanded.
“Currently, I have Danny, I need a ride into town apparently to take him home,” she said.
“How the hell did he get over there?”
“I would rather we just get him home, it’s been a long, exhausting night,” she said.
“I’ll be there in twenty, I gotta get my first mate up and get over there.”
“Please, it’s cold here,” she said.