Chapter Text
Blood did bother her. Mary had no idea how much it did until a drop of the scarlet liquid ran down the tip of her finger and onto the still growing grass.
The single drop reminded her of the Duckworth’s. Their faces frozen forever pieced in her mind, when she ruthlessly killed every one of them.
The blood reminded her of the dripping words of her friend on the wall that she had painted, the wounds she inflicted, the beating she received, the dark underground rooms that she had stayed in, David Cain’s body ripped to pieces, soaked in blood. The man with the owl shaped goggles.
Blood.
Swallowing hard, Mary tucked her hands into her pockets, staring at the rose bush in the garden. She was starting to become accustomed to her ‘new life’ as her father Richard Grayson put it. He tried hard to get close to her, but she still found it so hard to get close to people.
She still avoided Bruce, occasionally hid from Alfred and would flinch when Richard would raise his hands or jump in excitement. Damian seemed to be her only saviour, but sometimes even she felt distanced from him.
Time, time, time. That’s what they all said. It takes time. Time to adjust, time to be comfortable, time to trust. Trusting people was difficult.
The thought of an assassin jumping though her window and slashing her throat was still a very prominent fear. The occasional thought of the Bat’s throwing her out or locking her away was a growing one.
Glancing up at the large manor in front of her, its garden grounds still being redone after the attack the manor still be fixed.
Mary felt an odd sense of calm around it, despite it being a place of chaos. It was broken, battered but still breathing. It had been given its own ‘new life’. Its new beginning.
Turning around, Mary looked out, she could easily run out of the manor, disappear and never be heard of again. She could easily fall back, hide in the shadows once more. A small part of her, screamed at her to do so. To run, to hide.
But she wouldn’t bring herself to listen to it.
Shutting her eyes Mary looked up at the sky remembering something that Natas had once told her. “La yumkinuk aleawdat wataghyir albidayat , walakun yumkinuk 'an tabda min 'ayn 'ant wataghyir alnahayati.” she whispered to herself.
A loud chirp rang though the silent garden. Mary looked up. A bluejay.
She smiled.
Standing there, in the chill winter air, looking on at the battered manor, was a girl. A small girl around the age of nine, who had seen horrors far beyond her current understanding, who was broken and battered but still breathing, who had been given her new life.
And her name, was Mary Aurora Grayson.
Translations: “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.”- Arabic Proverb.