Work Text:
Day 20
Captain Canary
Witch/Witch Hunter AU
xXx
She had been hunting him for three years now. Sara Lance, the sheriff's daughter. The girl who didn’t fit any mold, so she broke them all out of spite. She was hellfire in a petite body, a force to be reckoned with. A woman on a mission. Scorned and dangerous and worst of all out for blood.
His blood.
Leonard had first laid eyes on Sara in a tiny town out west, aptly names Starling. It was small for a boom town, but a boom town it was and like any boom town it was ripe for the picking.
His team wasn’t human, his out casts, his rogues. They fell from the pages of myth and legends, striking fear into those who would oppose them.
All except her.
Leonard had gotten close to her because she was the sheriff’s youngest daughter. Courting her would ensure he had inside information on Starling's law enforcement. What he hadn’t counted on was getting attached, regretting his actions in deceiving her. When they left town with their catch, he had an ache in his heart and a weight on his shoulders.
He didn’t realize she’d followed them until a few months later. They were planning a new heist, inserting themselves around town when everything went to hell. They were ambushed by the deputies and taken into custody. Sara had been on the balcony across the street, overlooking the tin jail house, when they were taken in.
“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, big brother.” Lisa told him later through the bars of their adjacent cells. The weight of Sara’s withering stare still haunted him. He was ashamed to admit the pain he felt when he saw just how much hatred she harbored for him.
“Told ya that girl would be trouble, boss.” Mick added. “She’s too wild.”
xXx
Leonard had worked out their meeting down to the last second. Her family's home was small, not much for her to take care of. So, by noon she was usually out of the house, making her way through the woods that bordered one side of the territory.
Leonard followed at a distance, observing her as she descended a shaded path into the hidden valley below. He’d staked out the area after the first time he’d watched her disappear down there. It was mostly sparse grass, with towering pine trees, thick enough to explain the lack of grass. Large boulders dotted the landscape and encircled a midsized lake.
He’d seen her carrying a pack with her that day, concluding that she planned to spend the afternoon by the lake eating lunch. What he hadn’t expected was to turn the corner on the path toward the lake and find her discarded pack and clothes on the surrounding shore.
Leonard quickly recalculated, approaching the shore where she’d dropped her pack. He expected a memorable meeting, something he could apologize about later when they ran into each other in town, leading to a witty back and forth over the incident, thus securing his place in her mind. Instead, when she noticed him, she smirked, wading a little closer, the water just barely covering her chest.
He should have walked away then, called off the job, packed up his crew and moved on to the next town, but she intrigued him and Leonard’s curiosity had always been a fault he couldn’t shake.
xXx
After the break out they’d all separated. Leonard could see Sara was only out for him and he wasn’t going to take his crew down with him. The other’s were hesitant to leave him and Mick and Lisa put up a fight, but in the end they all trusted him to do right by them, no matter what form it took.
In a group, Leonard was much safer, but now he was forced to work a bit of magic to protect himself and with a blood line like his it was guaranteed that someone even more unsavory than himself would notice him. So now, not only was he dodging the woman he’d scorned, but also his father’s enemies. Dozens of men looking for revenge or leverage on Lewis Snart for one of any number of reasons. He was almost tempted to let Sara catch up with him. Nothing she could do to him would ever compare to what Warlocks and Witches and all manner of Mythical Creatures would do to him in some fruitless attempt to get the upper hand on his father. A man who could careless about what happened to his children if it didn’t benefit him in someway.
Leonard was reduced to pick pocketing to survive whenever he ventured into a town. He avoided the big ones just in case and mainly kept to himself. If the politics in one town seemed unstable, he didn’t bother to stay, keeping on the move and out of sight.
Leonard didn’t know how Sara managed to keep up with him. Whether her fury was driving her to move faster or subconsciously he wanted her to catch up. He knew, deep down, that he wanted to see her again, that he wanted to go back and change everything; change his fate to that when he rolled into Starling it wasn’t as a thief looking for a score, but a man with a chance as love. Something he could not afford to have, no matter how many banks he robbed.
xXx
“What do you want in life?” Sara asked him one afternoon by the lake. A few weeks had passed since their first meeting and Leonard would soon have to admit he was stalling his crew.
“That’s certainly a loaded question, isn’t it?” he replied.
“No, it’s not.” she said it so assuredly, he believed it instantly. “It’s simple. What do you want out of life?”
“Well, I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.” he told her. “What do you want?”
“Room service.” Sara replied, stretching lazily and laying back on the picnic blanket.
Sara hummed. “I want to leave this town and travel the world and never settle down and live on room service and the excitement of not knowing what’s next.” she told him and damn him if he didn’t understand exactly what she meant.
Damn him if he didn’t want to give that to her.
xXx
It all came to a head six months later. Leonard was exhausted, he’d been riding all night trying to escape a gang his father had double crossed and ended up hiding out in an abandoned mining town. He needed a place to sleep for a few hours, to rest his horse. He knew better than to sleep deeply, but after days on the move he can’t help it.
Leonard woke up a few hours later, and realized he couldn’t move. His hands were bound to an iron bar stuck in the wall beside him and all of his packs are across the room. The small shack he held up in earlier is lit only by a small fire in the wood burning stove at the center of the room.
He assumed his father’s enemies had caught up with him, but then he realized that all of this was too well planned for the impulsive men chasing him.
“Why have you waited so long?” he called out into the darkness.
“I was watching you. The way you watched me.” Sara answered. He followed her voice across the room.
“Sara,” he began, not sure which of the numerous speeches he’d rehearsed he was going to use.
“Don’t,” she cut him off, stepping into the light. “Nothing you say will change my mind about what I have to do.”
“And what do you have to do?” he asked.
“Kill you.”
xXx
“He’s a crook, babygirl.” Quentin said, pulling his rifle off the rack. “He’s just using you to keep tabs on me and my deputies.” he continued oblivious to Sara’s struggle to keep the tears at bay. “My deputies are dealing with something at the Queen ranch. I’m going out to find their camp. I want you to stay here.”
“No way, I’m going with you.” Sara insisted. “You can’t go out there by yourself.”
“Sara,” her father sighed. “Can you honestly tell me that you can go out there and be objective about him?”
Sara hesitated and it was all the answer he needed.
“Stay put sweetheart. I’ll take care of this.”
xXx
“That was the last time I saw him alive.” she explained. “He didn’t come home that night, so the next morning I went out looking for him.” she paused. “I found him by the lake, our lake.” she looked at him with such hatred it burned right through him. “When I got back to town to get help they said the post office had been robbed, nobody knew who did it, but I did.”
“And yet I haven’t found any wanted posters.” Leonard replied.
“Well, I couldn’t let the Marshalls get in my way.” she told him.
“So you weren’t the one who tipped off the Sheriff a few months back?”
She shook her head. “No, that surprised me too.” she stepped closer, crouching down beside him. “I need you free to get what I want, because no court can give you what you deserve.”
“Sara, we did rob the post office, I won’t deny that, but I didn’t kill your father, nor did anyone in my crew.” he defended himself. “Murder is messy and draws attention to us. If we had been confronted by your father we would have run, especially if he had come after us alone.”
“Is that so?” Sara sounded skeptical, her anger growing. He watched as she reached for something at her back. “So this isn’t you family crest burned into the hilt of the knife I pulled out of my father’s back?”
xXx
There was an outcropping of rock hidden on the far side of the lake. They’d found themselves there that afternoon. It had been three weeks to the day that they’d first met and Leonard knew things were going to fall apart soon if he didn’t make his move.
Be he didn’t make his move that day, instead, he made a mistake. Lying there together, her head on his shoulder, the sweat on their skin cooling in the gentle autumn breeze, he knew it.
“What is this?” Sara’s voice was soft, satisfied, her fingers lightly tracing the pattern tattooed over his heart.
“My family crest.” he replied, sadly.
“Is that a bad thing?” she asked.
Leonard chuckled. “Depends on who you ask.” he told her, rolling on top of her.
She wanted to ask him about the other marks, the scars, but he was doing all sorts of distracting things with his tongue and the thought left her.
xXx
“Sara,’ Leonard began, his tone grave. “You need to put that down.”
“And why is that?”
“Because it’s cursed. Have you been carrying it this whole time?”
“So you killed my father with a cursed blade?” she exclaimed outraged.
“No, Sara, damn it, put it down it’s clouding your mind!” he screamed and it startled her just enough for her to drop it. “I didn’t kill your father Sara, but I might as well have.”
“What does that mean? What is going on?”
Leonard sighed. “I don't’ supposed I could convince you to untie me before I explain?” a look was the only answer he needed. “Worth a shot.” he shifted around a bit, trying to get comfortable. “That knife belongs to my father, the head of our clan.”
“Clan?”
Leonard nodded. “I’m descended from a long line of witches, directly descended for the bloodlines of Salem. Our blood is royal in magical terms, though there isn’t much left of our family. My father turned to theft, further driving our family under. He took my sister and I with him and when I was old enough, I took Lisa and escaped. He didn’t like that, claimed we abandoned him, cut him off, so now, whenever we’re in the same area, he tries to mess with us, mess with me and my plans.”
Sara shook her head. “But why would he kill my father. It did nothing to stop you, to hurt you.”
“Believe me,” he replied bitterly. “It did plenty. He succeeded quite well this time.”
“How so?”
She watched him shift to get comfortable and sighed. “Hold still.” she instructed pulling a small knife from her boot and cutting him free.
Leonard rubbed at his wrists to relieve that ache.
“What do you mean, he succeeded?”
Leonard hesitated, stalling as long as he could. And when he couldn’t stall any longer; “First rule of any con, don’t get attached to the mark. You were the mark.”
“I don’t understand.” But Leonard could see that she did.
“I had what we needed for the heist within a week and a half.” he continued.
“But you were there for a month.”
“I actually considered abandoning my crew, giving it all up. Taking you away from there. We’d live on room service, see the world, just the two of us.”
“But you didn’t.” Sara replied.
“I’m just a thief, Sara.” he told her bitterly. “You deserve better.”
“So, your father saw us, saw how you felt and killed my father to frame you, to make me hate you?”
Leonard nodded and neither of them said anymore for awhile. Leonard eventually got up, kicking the knife across the room as he walked to his pack. He dug out some food and his water skin and they ate a meager meal.
“I’ve been carrying this anger for months. How could I let it go so easily?” Sara asked sometime later.
“The knife. My father used it to kill my grandfather and while he lay dying he uttered a dark spell. It draw the worst of you to the surface, makes it hard to think clearly. For you, it drove your revenge. My father actually has a special sheath for it, to keep it from affecting him.”
“I still feel angry.” she added.
“And i doubt that will go away anytime soon.”
“I’m alone now.” she sounded so small, so scared. “My parents are dead, I don’t know where Laurel is, not since she ran away with the Merlyn's’ son. I’m alone.”
Leonard moved closer, his side pressing against hers. “You’re never alone, Sara.” he reached over and took her hand, entwining their fingers. Sara buried her face in his shoulder, letting the tears fall uninhibited.
xXx
When Leonard woke the next morning, the space beside him was empty, cold. Sara had clearly been gone awhile. Her pack was gone and so was his father’s knife. He didn’t need to read the note she’d left to know where she’d gone.
He packed quickly, riding off after her and praying to whatever deity would listen that he would get to her first.
xXx
“I can’t let him get away with this.” Sara told him. They’d been in this position many times before, side by side, limb tangled up, heart beats just returning to normal.
“And what would you do?” he asked. “Go after him the way you came after me?” he sighed. “You can’t stop him Sara, he’s too strong, too depraved.”
“So what would you suggest I do, let him go, let him get away with what he did?”
“I’ll never let him get away with this Sara.” he told her. “But wouldn’t your revenge be sweeter if he saw you happy despite everything he did to destroy that?”
“You said it yourself, Len, he’d never going to leave you alone; leave us alone.”
“No, he won’t and think it’s time I finally did something about that. The first step, however, is showing him he has no power over us.”
Sara didn’t respond right away, her fingers absently tracing the tattoo on his chest before jumping to the scars.
“You may be right.” she finally agreed.
Satisfied , Leonard settled down, eventually lulled to sleep by the light touch of her fingers .