Archive of Our Own

During the funeral, Alfred carefully unstitched the two feather pairs on each side of the Feather Ring and laid them on their respective caskets. With the crisp blue plumage of his mother and the striking navy-and-white coloring of his father gone, the ring looked dead.

“When your adult molt comes in, Master Bruce,” Alfred put a hand on his shoulder. Bruce just sat on the enormous couch and blinked at nothing, as he’d been doing since the Incident. “When your molt comes in, we will complete your feather pair on the ring.”

Bruce looked up at the ring hanging above the fireplace. With only a single pair tied to its side—Alfred’s white fledgling feather and an adult gray one—it was frightfully bare. Bruce’s own fledgling feather was small and tiny beside it. It was empty like their house, and like Bruce’s life.

The moment he’d heard the gun crack and turned to see his parents falling out of the air—their chests bleeding red, their wings spasming in death—his life had gone with them.

Now, the world only existed in gray.

--

Bruce’s adult plumage came in black as the darkest night, in complete contrast to his parents’ vibrant wings. It was almost unheard of for a child to inherit different colors than their parents, and there were whispers about infidelity and true succession.

Alfred helped break away the pinfeather sheaths and straightened out his adult plumage with a bowl of synthetic wing oil. It was normally an entire flock's job to help preen a fledged adult. With only one pair of hands instead of three, it took hours for the wings to finally come into view.

“They’re quite large, Master Bruce,” Alfred observed as Bruce twisted in front of the mirror and beat his wings once, twice. “You'll be able to fly long distances on those wings.”

“Maybe you can fly with me,” Bruce said.

“Unfortunately, my days shooting across the skies are long over,” Alfred shook his head. His small gray wings were capable of flying him up several stories, but he hadn't the endurance to go through a long flight. “It gives me greater maneuverability and speed, but I doubt I can fly out to where you want to go.”

Bruce made a face and fluttered into the air.

Alfred was right, of course.

That coming summer, Bruce started backpacking across Europe with nothing but his pack and his wallet and his wings to guide him.

--

Talia al Ghul was beautiful and dangerous and drew Bruce to her like a moth to a flame. Her wings were a beautiful teal green. She spent their first fight flipping and twisting in the air, and when Bruce flew close enough to touch, she just fluttered her wings a bit and dove out of reach. It was exhilarating. It was… fun.

Even better when he caught her, and she splayed her wings out in flirty invitation.

“Our family’s Feather Ring has long been missing,” Talia told him one morning as they lounged in bed. Bruce had asked about the bare wall in the sitting room where every flock usually kept their ring. “Father likes to think us above that sort of small-minded tradition. In his new world, everyone will be part of his flock. Which is strangely progressive given his antiquated view on heirs.”

Bruce had quite a few dark opinions on R’as al Ghul and his kill-happy policies. But it was a brilliant morning and he was feeling soft and satiated.

Lying with Talia didn’t mean anything, not really, but Bruce was willing to take what he could get. Talia wasn’t going to leave the League of Shadows, and Bruce couldn’t stay. But here, they could enjoy each other for a bit, before returning to their lives.

--

Then there was Batman, and the hollow ring on the wall seemed far less important.

--

Bruce hadn’t realized how poorly-kept his feathers were until Dick burst into the manor like a hurricane in a bed of daisies.

The fledgling had molted half his feathers in his grief, and then spent another month or so rolling about the manor as new ones grew in. Once they were back in shape, however, he was off. He flew everywhere, pulling off complex aerial maneuvers like any eight-year-old should be able to do a quadruple somersault dive. He never used the stairs and pouted when Alfred insisted on driving him to school.

“You don’t know what kind of people you’ll meet flying in Gotham,” Alfred had said while Bruce listened from the passenger seat. Dick squinted out the car window and watched the Gotham businessmen flying in the designed air currents above the road. “It’s dangerous for a fledgling.”

“I can take care of myself,” Dick grumbled, though his wings lowered in grudging acceptance.

Dick’s wings were very fluffy. Running a hand through them was like petting a warm, silky blanket, which Bruce knew because Dick liked having his wings stroked.

“Bruce,” he took to whining when Bruce holed himself up for too long in his study. The fledgling would nudge the door open and crawl over Bruce’s dark black wings without preamble. Alfred had never been the touchy-feely type, but Dick grew up on wing-language in the circus. He preferred showing affection the old fashioned way, and did so now by looping his arms around Bruce’s neck. “Bruuucee.”

As if Bruce had no idea what Dick wanted, the boy curled a white wing over his shoulder and brushed his cheek demandingly.

“Dick,” he warned.

“I’ll preen you too,” Dick wriggled closer. Small hands grabbed fistfuls of black feathers. Bruce shivered. His wings flared open and nearly toppled the fledgling onto the floor.

“Later, Dick,” he said apologetically when Dick pouted at him. “Let me finish this up.”

“Promise!” Dick exclaimed, and nipped Bruce’s cheek affectionately. And then he fluttered back out, and Bruce had ten more precious minutes of peace.

Dick’s insistence on preening left Bruce’s wings in better shape than they’d been in years. His feathers no longer sat in hurried disarray, shining dull in the light from what the tabloids insisted was a night full of partying. They were sleek and well-groomed, and Alfred seemed thrilled to have an accomplice in forcing Bruce to sit down and preen.

“The Batman can’t have dirty looking wings!” Dick complained, flexing his wings under the yellow, moldable wing-armor Bruce had designed for him. They snapped onto the fledgling’s wings, providing both stealth and protection. “No one’s going to take you seriously.”

“That’s why I have armor,” Bruce said flatly, clipping on his own wing-armor. They were large and black and designed to mimic the shape of a bat rather than a bird. “No one can see my feathers.”

“I can see,” Dick said. Bruce just rolled his eyes and let his little Robin flit about the air, until he landed on Bruce’s shoulders and wrapped his wings over Bruce’s head.

“Robin,” Bruce chided. He still wasn’t used to being touched so often, and he wasn’t sure what to make of Dick’s gestures. They were affectionate and freely given, but still differed from how a fledgling treated a parent.

Bruce hadn't expected anything different. He'd kept his promise to Dick that first day after the funeral, when he’d found the fledgling tearing out his feathers in the back of the church. He had stopped him with a large hand.

“I don’t need a father,” the little fledgling had snarled, half-bald wings still flaring out in puffed-up warning. “I had one, and he’s dead.”

“I’m not asking for that,” Bruce had said calmly. “You’ll be my ward—a part of my flock in Gotham, and under my protection.”

It hadn’t felt real until the day Bruce had come downstairs and noticed the new addition to the Feather Ring. Beside Bruce’s feather pair was a single soft feather stitched into the ring.

Bruce didn’t know how to describe the feeling in his chest. If he was a softer, less damaged man, he might have even smiled.

--

It took an embarrassingly long time for Bruce to realize what Dick’s fluttering wings meant. So long he was completely blindsided when the teenager splayed his soft, blue-banded gray wings onto the ground.

He didn’t react well.

“I’m not a fledgling anymore, Bruce!” Dick had ended up shouting at him, though his wings were still spread low rather than puffed up and angry as they’d normally be. “I’ve been your partner for years, you don’t get to treat me like a chick now—”

“Enough,” Bruce had growled back, knocking him back with a sharp wing. Dick went sprawling across the floor. “Enough.”

“You’re always pretending you want to be alone,” Dick coughed, rolling into the fall. His wings finally arched up in defiant rage. “Chasing everyone off, scared of any kind of connection, even though a flock lives off of that. But you’re lonely, Bruce. You need people.”

Bruce’s coverts and secondaries puffed up like a cat with its hair standing on end. He’d never lost control of his temper like this, but Dick had always pushed his buttons. He shook his head and turned away.

“Bruce,” Dick’s voice was soft and almost pleading. Bruce didn’t turn around. He knew if he did, the image of that beautiful boy with his wings half flared in worried request would end him.

“You’re fired,” he said instead, and heard Dick’s sharp intake of breath behind him. Then, with his chin raised high, he stormed forward into the depths of the Bat Cave.

--

When Dick left, he didn't unstitch his feather pair from the Wayne Feather Ring. Fledged adults often took the pair as a talisman when they searched for a new flock, and Dick's conspicuous refusal to do so said volumes.

At his angriest, Bruce wanted to reach up to the ring and rip them off himself.

He didn't. No matter how often they fought, the dark part of his heart never wanted to let the boy go.

--

Jason hadn’t come home.

Bruce paced the Bat Cave while pretending he wasn’t pacing. The duo had gotten separated mid-battle while fighting off Penguin's goons. They'd promised to rendezvous back at the cave, and Jason had indeed called over the communicator to confirm he'd gotten away.

That was an hour and a half ago.

Finally, his temper won out over his patience. He launched himself off of the Bat Cave runway and flew towards the only place Jason could possibly be.

Bludhaven was an absolute cesspool. It made the dirty streets of Gotham look pristine in comparison, and not for the first time Bruce wondered what the hell Dick had been thinking when he decided to roost here. It was like he’d flown about and picked the city most likely to give Bruce a heart attack out of worry, and no amount of arguing had dissuaded him into moving elsewhere.

“Ow!” he heard Jason yelp from Dick’s open window. Bruce landed silently on the short apartment runway and peered inside. The little Robin sat cross-legged on the floor, his wing-armor tossed aside and the back of his shirt unbuttoned. Nightwing—Dick, technically, since he was in a t-shirt and boxers and not that skintight bodysuit he’d been prancing around in lately—Nightwing sat behind him while tearing out his broken feathers. “Ow, ow, ow!”

“You asked me to straighten out your feathers, I’m straightening them out,” Dick told him unrepentantly. “What did you do, run into a tree?”

“Penguin’s goons,” Jason mumbled, lowering his wings slightly in embarrassed indignity. His wings weren't seriously injured, though clearly someone had scuffed them up quite a bit. The fledgling chirruped angrily when Dick began using his own wing oil to straighten out his feathers. “Ew, Dick! Stop that!”

“Okay, first, you’re definitely not going to be able to hide this from Batman,” Dick said, reaching behind his back and wetting his fingers on the glands beneath his scapulars. It was a practiced move, because Dick was the golden boy of wing health. Even angry and a second away from clawing Bruce’s face off, he sometimes forced Bruce into a chair and worked through his feathers while still mouthing off.

He’d use his own oil too, despite Bruce being an adult and having a pair of perfectly functioning oil glands. It was a blatant, inappropriate territorial gesture, and Bruce let him do it.

Another reason he tried not to come to Bludhaven in person. Less tortured indecision.

Dick smoothed down Jason’s feathers neatly, even when the fledgling flapped his wings and tried to beat him off. “And second, Jason, you haven’t been keeping your wings clean at all. When was the last time you preened?”

Jason stuck out his lower lip in an angry pout. “B doesn’t preen.”

“B is not the best example of wing health,” Dick rolled his eyes. He finished grooming Jason’s wing and patted his shoulder. “Sometimes you have to just hold him down and have your way with him.”

“What,” Jason threw him a mortified look, his feathers puffing up. Bruce flushed too, because what was Dick thinking even bringing that up? The young man just laughed, and kept laughing as the little Robin bristled and took off for the outside runway without even a thanks or goodbye.

He froze when he saw Bruce standing there. “B-Batman!"

“You don’t have to hide your injuries from me,” Bruce said. He caught sight of Dick observing the two of them through a window with his arms folded. “I’m sure Alfred can treat you too.”

Jason scuffed his boots on the floor. “…yeah, but not as good as D—as Nightwing.”

Bruce resisted the urge to rub the bridge of his nose. “Fly home, Robin. Nightwing and I need to talk.”

“Don’t be mad at him!” Jason burst out, his wings flaring out under the yellow wing armor. “I mean, I just came here myself…”

“It’s not about that,” Bruce said with finality.

Robin looked nervously between the two—he’d caught sight of Dick too, the clever boy—and nodded. With only a bit of hesitance, he spread his wings and flew.

Bruce waited for him to flutter out of sight before turning to Dick.

The younger man opened the screen door and let him in.

“Figured you were stalking me,” Dick said, leaning down and beginning to gather all of Jason’s white feathers from the ground. “I count two cameras in here, though I’m sure there’s more.”

“Five.”

“Six then,” Dick concluded.

Bruce raised a brow, and the younger man’s wings twitched in annoyance. “What do you want, Bruce?”

Using his civilian name reminded Bruce of an easier approach, because talking to Dick as Batman was the best way to start an argument. He reached up and carefully took off his cowl, and saw Dick’s expression and wings relax immediately. They fluttered once, twice, and then Dick went to throw the feathers away in the trash.

When he came back, Bruce was running a hand down the bare Feather Ring wall.

Dick just gave him a look. “I’m already part of a ring, Bruce. You know that.”

“You left.”

“You told me to leave,” Dick shot back. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not part of your flock anymore.”

“Technically, it does.”

“Oh shut up,” Dick said. “Is this seriously what you came here for? To bitch to me about my feather pair still sewn into the Wayne Feather Ring? Because if you try and unstitch me, I’m sneaking back in the manor and shedding feathers all over your bed. And then I’ll stitch myself back on, because I’m still a member of your flock!”

He was jabbing a finger into Bruce’s chest at this point, wings arched high and puffed up in anger. Except Dick’s wings had always been soft and beautiful. Deadly, yes, never as aggressively striking as Bruce’s. They were cute.

“Dick,” Bruce said in a calm, even voice. The younger man glowered at him from beneath long lashes. “You deserve a better flock. One with members who can care for you better than any of us can.”

“I don’t want another one,” Dick shouted. “I want yours.”

And Bruce—Bruce felt his wings flutter, just once.

Dick’s mouth dropped open, anger giving way to wide-eyed gob smacking.

“Bruce, you…” the young man reached out to grab his gauntlet, but Bruce stepped back. With one more glance back at him, Bruce did the only thing that made sense—he slipped on his cowl and flew.

A split second later he heard Dick taking off after him. He let him approach as close as possible before suddenly folding his wings tight and diving towards the air channels below. He pulled up before he could crash into some drunk-looking fliers lurking about the night, and even found himself smiling when Dick yelped somewhere behind him.

“Goddammit, B!” he said. “Where’d you learn a trick like that?”

“Around,” Bruce said, deadpan. He turned and raised a brow at the image of Dick hovering nervously before him, still dressed in only his t-shirt and boxers and looking ridiculous in the air. “You’re going to catch a cold, Dick.”

“And whose fault is that?”

Bruce smiled again—and used Dick’s distracted pause to launch himself far into the distance. The chase was on.

--

“I’m not moving back to Gotham,” Dick whispered to him in a low tone, propped up on a pillow and systematically flaring and smoothing out his feathers. As his right wing was pressed snugly under Bruce’s left, he found the sensation very distracting. “Bludhaven needs a protector, and I still need to feel more… established as a fledged adult.”

“Out of my shadow,” Bruce said. The next time Dick tried flaring his wings, he pressed it down under the weight of his own black ones. The younger man pouted. “It makes sense.”

“But I meant it, you know,” Dick turned and nuzzled Bruce’s cheek. It was a familiar move and an unfamiliar one all at once, because he’d spent so many years as Robin doing the same thing. He hadn’t since their falling out, and Bruce hadn’t realized how much he missed that affection. “Even if I’m a flight away, I’m still part of your flock. Me and Alfred and Jason—you’re not alone.”

“Hm,” Bruce said. Dick ran his hand down the sensitive feathers along Bruce’s nape, and the older man shivered. Not even Talia had dared to do that. Not when things were so clearly temporary.

But this was Dick, and Dick had integrated himself onto their Feather Ring as surely as Alfred or even Bruce himself. He was theirs.

“Sleep,” he commanded, gently pushing the man back.

“Bossy,” Dick grumbled, but twisted around and snuggled against Bruce regardless. After a long moment spent looking at him, Bruce leaned over and tucked his face into the crook of Dick’s neck. He closed his eyes and breathed.

--

They still fought and growled at each other and teamed up occasionally, especially when villains crossed the city borders without a care for territorial propriety.

But they'd returned to their pre-fight state of tactile affection now that Bruce wasn't actively chasing Dick away. If Alfred or Jason noticed, neither of them brought it up.

Sometimes Dick caught Alfred smiling slightly when he thought they weren't looking. Dick and Bruce had been making fun of some of the Leaguer’s stupider plans after Clark had once again gone off on his own without consulting the JLA brain. Dick loved Clark and all, but some of these ideas were just bad.

Bruce wasn’t actually smiling, but Dick could tell that he was practically cackling on the inside. Alfred could too, of course, and nothing felt better than watching Bruce enjoy himself. It’d been so long.

--

When he came home after a long mission away, he came home to a manor shattered apart.

--

There were a lot of horrible things in the aftermath, but nothing hurt more than Dick flying home just to see Jason’s blood-red feather pair missing from the ring.

“Master Dick,” Alfred called out from the doorway. He looked haggard and old and awful, and Dick realized that the butler had probably been the one to unstitch Jason’s feather pair. Bruce wouldn't have had the strength. “You’re late.”

“Titans business,” Dick said, less of an excuse and more of a guilty admission. He should have been here. Jason was their youngest, and the rest of the flock should have protected him. Instead, they’d let him spiral down to some maniac whose double-wing amputation had driven him bat-shit crazy. “Is B…”

“He’s not handling it well,” Alfred shook his head. When he turned and gestured for Dick to follow him through the doorway, a few gray feathers shook away from his wings. “He’s downstairs.”

Not handling it well was an understatement. Dick couldn’t help but gape: he’d never seen Bruce’s wings looking so bare. They were ragged and near-naked, and dull, black feathers covered the entire floor of the Bat Cave.

“Are you trying to permanently hurt yourself?” he walked through the feathers to where the Batman was staring intently at the screen. “Bruce?”

No response, not even when Dick wrapped a gray wing around him and nipped his cheek.

If not for the systematic rise and fall of Bruce’s chest, the man could have been a statue.

Dick made a distressed chirruping noise in the back of his throat and ran a hand through the remaining feathers on Bruce’s neglected wing.

He didn’t say anything as he began straightening and re-oiling and preening the feathers like they weren’t all on the verge of falling off anyway. It was the only thing he could do.

--

Alfred put Jason's fledgling box in his room and quietly shut the door. Bruce put his Robin costume into a glass case in the Bat Cave, like the well-lit outfit wasn't a creepy sight in the dark.

Dick spent his time stalking the Joker. He watched the wingless man careen across Gotham with that goddamn grin on his face, like he hadn't just beat his little brother to death just to make a point.

There had been many times Dick had been tempted to cross over that line, but none ever came close to this.

--

Tim burst onto the scene with devoted, slightly obsessive determination. Watching the fledgling spinning about in that familiar costume, Dick vowed to care for him better. To pay better attention.

Jason and Dick had grown apart those last few years, especially after the boy deemed himself “too old” to ask for Dick’s help grooming his wings. Dick hadn’t had any idea that Robin had been looking for his mom. He couldn’t help but feel like he should have.

So when Tim's life fell apart, Dick made sure he was there to catch him before he shattered. The feeling was bittersweet: he'd never wanted Tim to experience this kind of pain at all.

“What color were Jason’s wings?” Tim asked as he watched Alfred stitch his fledgling feather onto the Feather Ring. The boy sat slumped in the armchair looking particularly small and frail. Dick wrapped a warm gray wing around him in comfort and stroked Tim’s trembling feathers when the fledgling curled up against him. “There…” Tim said in a wavering voice. “There aren't any photos, and the yellow armor hides a lot…”

“They were red,” Dick said. “Solid red so bright they were the first thing you saw when he walked into a room.”

Tim shivered. He hadn’t stopped clutching the Drake Feather Ring in his hands, not since they’d come back from the hospital and Tim had had to look at Jack Drake’s battered face. They’d allowed him to go home and collect his belongings, but he was going to stay at the Waynes until his dad woke up.

If he woke up.

“They took her pair away,” Tim whispered, running a hand down the ring. There was a light spot beside his father's pair. “It used to be right here, and they took it away.”

“It’s an old tradition,” Dick said softly. “Removing the feather pair signifies the person’s departure from the flock. Burying it with them allows them to pass into the afterlife with a token of how much their flock loved them. It’s a good luck charm.”

“Her wings are—were—yellow,” Tim said. “What if I forget, Dick?”

“You won’t, Tim, not ever,” and really, Dick’s heart bled for this fledgling. He remembered his own despair those first few weeks, the dazed way he wandered about the mansion while Alfred fussed over his molting wings. He hadn’t even had a Feather Ring to hold onto. The Graysons weren’t their own flock. They were the Circus’s.

“We should probably go to bed,” Dick said gently, and led Tim upstairs to what he couldn't help but think of as the fledgling's room. He allowed him time to change and get himself ready before poking his head in.

“’M not a baby,” Tim complained when Dick tucked him in and stroked him with a wing. Tim’s white ones flapped in response. “I can put myself to bed.”

“Whatever you say, Timmy,” Dick said. He grinned and lightly flicked his forehead. Tim wrinkled his nose and batted his hand away. “Just want to make sure my little bro’s as alright as he can be.”

Tim bit his lip.

“I will be,” he finally whispered. “Eventually. Good night, Dick.”

“Night, Tim,” Dick said, and then quietly got up and turned off the lights.

--

Tim liked flying. Most people did, though there were some like Alfred who preferred walking and others who couldn’t, wouldn’t, didn’t want to. He respected that. Still, Tim preferred to fly whenever he could.

He twisted out of the way of a sign hanging off of a building—that was a clear violation of designated air channel law, what if someone poked out their eye?—and flew down to the Gotham zeta-tube. Tucking his yellow and black wings against his back, Tim slipped inside.

“Tim!” Kon greeted him when he arrived. The boy’s vibrant black-speckled red wings flared out in joy, and Tim couldn’t help the little wing-flutter that rippled down his back. He stepped forward and nuzzled Kon’s cheek in affectionate greeting, and the boy beamed at him in response.

“So…” Kon stepped back, though the way his wings drooped meant he didn’t want to. Tim’s wings fluttered again. “What are the chances Nightwing has no honest idea that we’re planning a party for him?”

“Zero percent,” Tim said. He waved when he saw Cassie and Garfield coming in through the zeta-tube platform with party supplies in hand. “He’s been flopping around the manor complaining for days about his birthday coming up, how no one’s ever thrown him a real surprise party, that he wished someone would do it this year…”

Kon snorted. “You don’t think he was hoping Batman would do it?”

“Like B knows anything about planning a real party,” Tim said. He clapped his hands until everyone was looking at him, and then began his announcements. “Okay guys, let’s get started. I have a five-step plan that utilizes each of your individual strengths to most efficiently complete set-up…”

“I call the streamers!” Cassie interrupted, grabbing the black and blue streamers and flying up towards the ceiling.

Tim managed to say, “Cassie, I was hoping you could help me move the furniture, your strength—”

“Are these table decorations?” Garfield poked about the boxes. His green wings changed size depending on his mood, and they suddenly went sharp and long with realization. “Ooh, ooh, I have an idea!”

“I have a diagram of the planned decorations!” Tim pulled up his carefully constructed design on his tablet right before Garfield could take off. “Gar, you have to follow this or it won’t work.”

“Jeez, Rob, you’re such a buzzkill,” Beast Boy pouted, wings drooping. He returned reluctantly.

“I really don’t think Dick would care,” Kon told his friend. “Relax, Tim. It’ll be fine.”

Tim gave him an incredulous look, because his team clearly didn't get it. Few people understand the Batfamily flock, to be honest, but Tim would have hoped three Robins would have taught somebody something. “No, no, no, you see, Dick likes to act fine but he’s a perfectionist, Kon, we all are. I mean B’s a perfectionist and he expects perfection from us, so even if he smiles and says it’s great he’s judging us in his head.”

“Woah, is Tim having a breakdown already?” A yellow and red blur zoomed past them, sending the box of decorations went flying. Tim put his head in his hands. “Hasn’t it been, like, only five minutes?”

“Bart!” Tim said.

“Chill, Tim,” Bart stopped long enough to eat two cookies from the dessert table before taking off again. He came back into focus with the retrieved box of decorations in his hands, which he set back on the table. “It’s Nightwing, I’m sure you can give him a cupcake and he’ll die of joy.”

Tim opened his mouth to say something. Closed it.

He breathed evenly for a long moment, because what else had he expected? Clearly without the threat of imminent world destruction or death, the Titans couldn't follow even the simplest of orders.

“You’re ruffling your feathers,” Kon finally said once Bart lost interest and fluttered his hummingbird-fast wings up to assist Cassie. The half-Kryptonian ran a large hand down the strong curve of Tim’s wing, straightening the feathers as he went. He cocked his head. “Now what were you saying about a decoration diagram?”

Tim smiled at him softly, and smiled wider when Kon flushed and fluttered his wings in response. Sometimes he wanted to just grab those beautiful wings and caress them until Kon moaned; to press his own wings up so they were tucked beneath Kon's larger ones; to do more than nuzzle and nip when no one was looking.

If only Bruce wasn’t so crazily overprotective. The day after Kon had approached him with a request to court Tim, the Batman had installed Kryptonite guns on the manor roof. Kon claimed he even got shot at once, though it was still up for debate whether or not Bruce would waste a bullet like that.

Kon could’ve just gone ahead with the courtship without permission, but the fiasco with Stephanie had proved how bad of an idea that was. All Tim could do was hope and pray Dick could get through to Bruce sometime soon. Preferably before Tim keeled over from the stress of wrangling the Titans, handling the Wayne Tech division, and a severe case of sexual frustration and blue balls.

He hoped it happened really soon.

--

"What?" Dick exclaimed once he walked through the zeta-tube, a dramatic hand pressed to his chest. "A party for me?"

"Like you had no idea," Tim laughed, but went and squeezed the man tight around the waist anyway. Dick curled his wings over Tim's for just a moment before turning to beam at his friends crowded in the space.

"So," Dick clapped his hands. "Who's ready for some pie?"

As was the norm for any party centered around Dick Grayson, the celebration was a stunning success.

The only “hiccup” in the party happened when Jason appeared.

“Hiccup” since Tim had reluctantly asked him to come, because despite his attempt to clip Tim’s wings and slit his throat, he was still Dick’s little brother. And he’d been behaving himself a bit better after some time out of the pit.

“Jay?” Dick had immediately torn himself away from the crowd, gray wings flaring in question. “How—why—”

“The replacement asked me,” Jason said gruffly, putting his hands in his pockets and looking around the decorated Watchtower with his lip curled. Still, the way his red wings flicked and lowered meant he was feeling… nostalgic, most likely.

Tim wasn’t as good at reading wing-language as Dick was, but he was determined to get there one day.

“Well, there isn’t any of Alfred’s pie left,” Dick said. He glanced around. “Though if you want to come back to the manor…”

“No.”

“But Jay—”

“No,” Jason’s coverts puffed up. “I’m still angry at you guys.”

Dick frowned but didn’t argue further. Instead, he extended a hand and firmly patted Jason’s shoulder.

“I’m glad you came,” he said in a quiet voice.

Jason flushed. When Dick turned away, though, he reached out and caught his sleeve.

“Wait,” he said, “I just—I've something to give you.” He took out a cloth bundle from his pocket and shoved it into his hands. “Happy Birthday, Dickiebird.”

And then he was striding back towards the zeta-platforms, hunched forward and not making eye contact with anyone. He clearly didn’t want to be here. Tim actually sympathized. It was hard meeting anyone who knew him before his mom’s death and not after, because it brought back memories that hurt to remember.

Here, surrounded by all of Dick’s friends from the Teen Titans and the Justice League and in the Watchtower, of all places—Tim was surprised Jason had made it at all.

“Oh Jay,” Dick whispered softly, looking down at the open cloth in his hand. Tim peered over his shoulder and was surprised to see two feathers inside: one long brilliantly red primary feather with its shaft tied to a much smaller fledgling feather. A feather pair.

“I think Alfred’s going to cry,” Tim said dumbly, and Dick wrapped the feathers up with gentle affection. Jason might not be willing to come home, but a feather pair meant there was still hope.

Their lost Robin might one day return to the flock for good.

--

Their Feather Ring was starting to look a lot less empty. Even more so after Cassandra arrived and Alfred added her white-and-white pair beside Tim’s. She was their quiet, quick-witted angel and so different from what Tim was used to. She wore no armor around her wings when she fought, and she came and went as she pleased between the Bat Cave and Oracle’s base of operations.

“You should tell Bruce,” she once said one morning. She’d fluttered back home sometime overnight and had been sitting on the couch watching television like she hadn’t been gone for three days. Tim rubbed his eyes and plopped down beside her, extending his yellow wing in greeting. Cass nodded and pointed at his shirt.

Tim looked down and fought down a blush. “Kon’s shirts are comfy, okay?”

“It is… hard for you,” Cass insisted. “To be not together.”

“Apart,” Tim said. He tugged at his shirt. “But it’s fine, Cass. You know how stubborn he can be.”

“Yes, but not for what you think.” Cass’s white wings flicked and flared. They did that when she mused over something difficult. “Bruce… cares about you. A lot. He worries.”

“Overprotective, more like.”

“He worries Kon is… forcing you,” Cass overrode him. Tim blinked at her. “Did you tell Bruce your feelings?”

Tim opened his mouth. He closed it. It seemed stupid in retrospect, but Tim hadn’t talked to Bruce about Kon’s failed courting. Bruce was the best detective in the world; surely he could see from their wing flutters that there was mutual interest there. Couldn’t he?

“Tell him,” Cass said. She reached out and patted Tim’s shoulder. “I am sure he will listen.”

“You’re a godsend, Cass,” Tim said, sitting up. When he tried to leave, however, Cass pulled him back down. “What is it?”

“Not now,” she shook her head. “Wait an hour. Busy.”

“I interrupt him when he’s busy all the time,” Tim frowned. “He’s always busy.”

Cass’s brows furrowed in frustration. After chewing over her words, she tried a new angle, “Dick slept here last night.”

“Dick what? Oh,” Tim flushed. “How do you even—no, never mind. I’ll tell him in an hour. Or two. Just… not now.”

“Not now,” Cass agreed, and they shared a small smile. It was nice being able to gossip about Dick to someone who actually understood how crazy things got in their flock. The only person who had qualified before Cass was Jason, who wasn’t exactly someone Tim could hang out with and bitch to. Cass was nice. And Bruce clearly liked a full house, even if he would never say it aloud.

--

And then there was Damian.

--

After everything that had happened, Bruce knew better than to expect some peace and quiet. Crime never slept, after all, not for a single night in his decades-long career flitting about Gotham as the Dark Knight.

Watching Dick and Damian interact reminded him of a fledgling Dick hanging off of his own wings, pleading for a grooming. He literally couldn’t function without touch; he craved it.

Bruce’s reluctance had come in part from unfamiliarity and personality. Two things that Damian had, unfortunately, inherited from him.

It seemed like history was doomed to repeat itself, though the situation was far more amusing with Dick nearing thirty and Damian being all of twelve.

“I don’t need assistance,” his son snapped irritably. He hunched over, curling his wings tight against his body. “I haven’t needed help preening since I was an infant, and I do not appreciate your patronization, Grayson.”

“Okay, so I know that’s a lie,” Dick sidled up close enough to envelope Damian in a wing-hug. Damian hissed like a cat and smacked Dick in the face with a hard flap. Dick retaliated by grabbing the offending appendage—and at least four feathers just tore right out.

Bruce felt his eyebrows arch. Oh. Oh.

Damian’s eyes bulged. “Grayson, what did you do?”

Dick, not helping his case at all, just dropped the feathers onto the floor and burst out laughing.

Bruce intervened before heads began to roll.

“Damian,” he approached the two, and this seemed to knock some sense back into the Dick. He must have noticed how close Damian was to crying, because he sat up and soothed his large hands over the boy’s shoulders.

“Dami, Dami, it’s fine—” Dick’s voice was gentle. “Your adult plumage is just coming in, that’s all. Why’d you think I was trying to preen you?”

“Because you’re like a dog after a bone,” Damian mumbled. He folded a wing over his shoulder and looked at the bald patches. He scratched absently at it and yelped when two more feathers fell out.

“It’ll take at least a week,” Bruce said matter-of-factly. “I’ll call school and let them know you’re taking a molt-break. Dick and Tim can help on patrol.”

“What?” Damian clearly began to realize what an entire week of molting meant. “Father, even without my wings, I’m far from an invalid!”

Of course Damian would complain. What Robin didn’t want to work? “It’s not just the wings, Damian. A full molt takes an enormous amount of energy. You will be too lethargic to perform competently.”

“Also, you’ll start itching really bad,” Dick added when Damian began scratching at his opposite wing. It made sense: feathers almost always fell symmetrically. “Imagine this… but ten times worse.”

“That may be what it was like in your case, Grayson,” Damian said haughtily, and his expression only flickered a little when his next scratch sent three feathers spiraling onto the ground. “But a bit of itchiness isn’t enough to stop an al Ghul.”

Dick turned and gave Bruce a look. Bruce shook his head. He’d been the same way as a child, to be honest, and he’d learned the only way a stubborn Wayne heir could: by experiencing the hell himself.

Unfortunately, Damian seemed destined to follow in his footsteps here as well.

--

By dinner, the itching had clearly grown unbearable. Dick hadn’t pressured Damian into a preening session since their talk, but he’d been following him about all day. Damian’s wings kept flicking and twitching uncomfortably, puffing up in discomfort and settling down when a puff twisted a loosening feather the wrong way. The soft downy feathers on the back of his neck constantly stood up on end.

“Oh no,” Tim came home for a quick dinner dinner before inevitably flying off to whatever safe-eyrie he’d holed up in. “Don’t tell me the demon spawn’s molting.”

“Honestly, Tim,” Dick said when Damian’s left wing gave such a violent twitch it nearly upended his glass of water. Dick caught it in time and put it back on the table. “You weren’t any better when your plumage came in.”

Understatement.

Tim had been insufferable. Dick loved his little brother, but that week had taken all of Tim’s worst habits and amplified them by ten. He and Bruce had had to barricade Tim into his room after the fourth time he’d attempted to sneak out and work, and Tim spent the next few days banging out angry texts to the Titans and ignoring the puddle of white feathers by his feet.

The worst was definitely Tim’s reaction to the itching: like Damian, he’d refused any and all help with the preening. Unlike Damian, his solution was to tear out his feathers.

Alfred had been horrified when he saw what Tim had done to his own wings, but Tim was unrepentant.

“They were about to fall out anyway,” Tim said matter-of-factly while the butler looked over the angry pink pucker marks all over the insides of his wings. “It’s fine.”

“It is not fine,” Alfred had scolded him. “Do you know how much extra your body will have to work in response to this trauma?”

True enough, the molt took an extra two days to finish. Tim’s final brilliant yellow and black coloring was beautiful, but by that point everyone was just ready for it to be over.

Tim was clearly thinking the same thing, because he flushed and looked down at his plate. “But Damian’s already bad enough without the molt,” he muttered, poking at his meatloaf. “He’s going to burn the house down.”

“I can hear you,” Damian snarled. He tried to scratch the feathers near the center of his back and whined in frustration when his arms couldn’t reach. He got out of his chair and twisted and turned, until Dick had had enough and extended his own gray wing out towards the fledgling. He forcefully dragged Damian close and ran his hand through Damian’s loose feathers. He made sure his touch was gentle: he wasn’t tearing any feathers out, simply jostling the already loose ones away.

Damian huffed and muttered and made all his usual, I’m-not-a-kid complaints, but he relaxed under Dick’s touch.

“So,” Dick said conversationally once Damian had stopped thrumming like an angry, vibrating dragon. “How about that preening?”

“I’ve set up the downstairs bathroom for a steam bath,” Alfred said from the doorway, and Damian pouted in a way that Dick knew he’d won.

"Yeah, so I'm probably going to stay away the rest of the week," Tim muttered after he finished putting his dishes in the sink. Which was Tim-speak for "going to be flying with Kon and taking advantage of everyone's distraction," but Dick could allow the teenager his fun.

Bruce glowered, but clearly they had more important things to worry about now.

--

Steam baths during a molt were the best.

Dick had once gotten too reckless as Robin, and had had a large portion of his feathers ripped out in a scuffle with Killer Croc. The pain had been excruciating. The embarrassment was even worse, since without his wings he’d had to curl up in Bruce’s arms and let his guardian fly them both home.

But the worst had been when the feathers started growing back in. It itched. It itched worse than the partial molts he’d had before, probably because his feathers were torn out before their time. His skin wasn’t supple enough, and the pinfeathers coming through were sharp and hard and uncomfortable. Dick had moped around the Bat Cave until Bruce finally stopped working and picked him up.

He’d carried the fledgling into a large bathroom already cloudy with warm steam. A bathtub had been filled to the brim with piping hot water. Rather than dumping him into the water, however, Bruce plopped him onto the stool beside it.

“The warm steam helps soften your skin,” he’d said. Dick fluttered his wings when Bruce rolled his sleeves up and took a seat behind him. “It eases the emergence of the pin feathers. Massaging the skin with oil also helps. You’re too young to produce your own oil, so we’ll have to use a synthetic one.”

Dick had sat obediently when Bruce began working the synthetic oil into the injured area. The relief was instantaneous. Everywhere he touched seemed to spell away the fiery itch. He fluttered his wings again. Sighed when Bruce worked at a particularly hard nub on his right wing where a pinfeather had gotten stuck beneath the skin. It stung when it finally pushed through, but it felt so much better too.

Bruce thoroughly worked through his feathers until Dick had turned into a warm, fluttery mess. When he was finally done, he nudged the fledgling towards the water. It was a comfortable temperature now after all this time. Dick shed the rest of his clothes and sank into the tub.

“Bruce,” he called out when his guardian washed his hands and went to the door.

“You can take as long as you want,” Bruce said.

“No, not that,” Dick reached out over the side of the tub and made grabby hands. “I wanna preen you too.”

Bruce hadn’t had any major injuries, but Dick and Alfred and everyone who knew Bruce knew how little he took care of his own wings. They’d be a disheveled, dull mess if Alfred or Dick didn’t periodically hold him down and comb through his feathers.

Bruce had frowned but actually acquiesced. He sat beside the tub with his enormous wings spread, letting Dick card wet fingers through his feathers. It felt good adjusting Bruce’s misaligned feathers, gently helping a few old ones break loose, and swiping oil from the glands at the base of each wing to cover the feathers until they shone. Everyone at the circus had helped care for each other’s feathers, and Dick was used to preening as a means of affection.

When he finished, Dick leaned forward and nipped at the back of Bruce’s neck. Bruce tensed, the translucent black feathers there flaring up just a little—but didn’t shake him off. Dick wound wet, lithe arms around his shoulders.

“You should open up more,” he said, rubbing his cheek against Bruce’s. “We’re a flock, we look after one another.”

“We do,” Bruce had agreed in a soft voice. He adjusted his wings so they arched high in the air. His right wing settled across Dick’s naked body in the tub, mindless of the water, and the fledgling laughed at the familiar darkness enveloping him.

--

By the third day, most of Damian’s feathers had fallen out. Alfred had placed them all into a fledgling box, just as he had every other time his boys had molted. As for Damian, he spent his time lying on the living room couch like a ragdoll and occasionally making noises like he was dying.

“Dami,” Grayson called out, popping his head into the room to check on the fledgling. Damian didn’t turn in response to his name. “Damian, you hungry?”

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Are you just saying that because you don’t want to get up?” Grayson frowned at him. Damian drew his naked wings closer to his body. It felt wrong without any of his feathers to warm him, but it was still better than nothing. Grayson didn’t take the hint and continued, “I’ll get you whatever you want to eat. Just let me know.”

“No,” Damian said. His face was almost entirely covered now. “I’m fine, Grayson. Go away.”

“Your body needs protein,” Grayson scolded him. “Alfred told me you haven’t eaten in hours.”

“Traitor,” Damian hissed.

Grayson sat beside him and ran his feathers across Damian’s side. Damian made an angry chirruping noise and twisted away, but Grayson was as doggedly determined as ever. He brushed the fledgling with firm, silky-soft strokes before wrapping a wing firmly around him until he was a glaring Dami-burrito.

It was a comforting gesture, and one usually used between a parent and their child. Father wouldn’t dare try something like this, and Mother’s go-to affection was to a run a single hand over the elbow-joint of his wing.

He’d never been swaddled before.

“I’m not an infant,” Damian snarled, trying to extend his wings and twist out of Grayson’s grip. The man just rolled his eyes.

“Eat,” he said.

Damian growled and abruptly sat up. He batted away Grayson’s soft feathers and glared at him. “Fine. Fine, if it’ll get you to stop pestering me.”

“I’ll let Alfie know,” Grayson beamed, and nuzzled the side of Damian’s cheek in affection. The boy pouted. The League had always viewed themselves above the instinctual rituals humankind was bound to. Grayson was one of the most prolific wing-language users Damian knew, second only to Cassandra Cain. He wasn’t used to any of this.

Grayson came back with a full tray of food, which Damian inhaled at once. He then drank an entire pitcher of water and flopped back down onto the couch intent on sulking again. He didn’t expect Grayson to lie down with him.

“Grayson,” he hissed, but the man was unrepentant.

Still, he did feel much safer underneath those gray and blue wings. Damian drew his own wings tightly over his body and dozed under the fluffy weight of Grayson’s feathers.

He’ll chase off him later, but now—well. He can be charitable. He’ll indulge Grayson’s skinship needs and then kick him off the couch when he least expected it.

It'll be hilarious.

--

Colin visited on the fourth day.

“Woah,” his friend's eyes went wide when he saw Damian twitching on the floor. Damian had tried to settle on his bed, which was both large and comfortable, but his instincts hadn’t liked being high up. Something about having no feathers meaning he can’t fly, except Damian seriously doubted a three feet drop was going to kill him.

“Colin,” Damian growled, deceptively calm. He twisted again within the pile of blankets and pillows he’d piled in a rough nest on the floor. “As you can clearly see, I am in no shape to teach you fighting techniques today. Go home.”

“You’re molting already?” Colin approached. What was with all of Damian’s friends ignoring him? He needed new friends. “You’re younger than me!”

“Early bird,” Damian flapped his wings and glared at the pinfeathers lining them like particularly uncomfortable barbs. They were pale and ugly and hard as nails. “It’s horrible.”

Colin twitched curiously and just—tugged on a pinfeather. Damian yelped and batted him away.

“Don’t do that,” he said, curling his wing over to see if the pinfeather had been damaged. “They’re still growing.”

“Oh,” Colin said apologetically. “Is that why you’re spazzing out? Does it itch? What color do you think your wings are going to be?”

Damian didn’t respond. He just rubbed his wings irritably on a pillow, which didn’t help at all.

“Can I do anything to help?” Colin finally said, right when Father knocked on the door and walked in.

“Colin,” Father acknowledged. Colin went slack-jawed in idol worship at the great Batman, which Damian would’ve normally puffed up at but now found annoying. Father had the blessed bottle of synthetic oil in his hands. “Damian’s going through his adult molt. He can begin teaching you again next week. Do you need Alfred to drive you back to the orphanage?”

“I want to help,” Colin found his voice again. He pointed at the bottle. “Are you going to oil up his pinfeathers?”

Father frowned. “Colin… you understand that helping molts is family only.”

Colin’s wings drooped in chastised disappointment.

“It’s fine,” Damian spoke up. He growled and twisted onto his back. The floor was as useless as the pillows were in abating his itching, but he was compelled to try anyway. “You’re busy, Father. Colin can help me.”

Father looked at him with narrow, considering eyes. “You’re sure.”

“Quite,” Damian said.

Father looked at a suddenly excited Colin, and then down at his miserable, itching son. He gestured for the redhead to follow him to Damian’s side.

“Apply the oil gently around each pinfeather,” Father explained. He uncapped the bottle and squeezed the oil onto his fingers. “Be careful—too much pressure and the feather will break and bleed. The goal is to keep the sheaths as soft as possible. Applications are usually every hour or so. I will check back when he needs reapplying.”

“Of course,” Colin nodded. “I’ll do my best, Mr. Wayne.”

Father nodded and took his leave.

Damian shivered when Colin’s small, deft hands began to spread blessed relief through his wings. He fluttered his wings a bit, especially when those fingers carded through the sensitive feathers near the small of his back.

“Don’t adults usually use their oil to care for you?” Colin babbled as he worked through his scapulars. “I mean, it’s supposed to be… family bonding or something. Why use a synthetic oil?”

“Because it’s more convenient,” Damian fluttered his wings again. Colin’s hands felt so good. “Less smells, less mess. And this way Father—or Pennyworth—or Grayson can all take turns…” he broke off with an involuntary noise.

Colin stopped stroking and looked down at Damian’s suddenly tomato-red face. “Damian?”

“It’s fine,” Damian managed. “Keep going.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, Wilkes, stop your incessant questions.”

“So do I count as family too?” Colin continued, baldly ignoring him. “Since you’re letting me do this.”

“Hm.”

“I’m glad.”

“Hm…”

“You think your wings will be black like your dad’s?” Colin worked through the large primary pinfeathers. When he finished, he gently nudged Damian’s shoulder and gestured for him to turn over.

Damian, feeling boneless and drunk on good feelings, obliged.

Except this way he could clearly see Colin’s face as the boy loomed over him. His own white wings arched up high, each end flaring up towards the light. Colin didn’t seem to realize he was doing it, and Damian flushed red at the implication.

To test his theory, he fluttered his wings deliberately. Colin’s wings arched higher.

Definitely presenting.

“It’s not itching anymore?” Colin said, oblivious to the revelations happening beneath him. He casually placed a hand on Damian’s bare chest as he reached over to oil up some of his coverts on the far edge of his wing. “When do you think they’ll unfurl?”

“They need to come in all the way first,” Damian said, distracted. “They’ll probably unfurl in a few days.”

“What color are your mom’s wings?”

Damian hesitated a split second at the thought of Talia al Ghul, and then said, “Green.”

“Green and black,” Colin smoothed a hand down the inside of his wing. Damian twitched and narrowed his eyes. That seemed deliberate. “They’ll be beautiful.”

“Colin,” Damian said, giving his friend a look.

The redhead blinked down at him for a considering second, and then flushed deep red when he realized he’d basically draped himself over his friend. He snatched his hands back. “Oh. Oh! Sorry, Damian, I mean…”

“It’s fine,” Damian said. He sat up and stretched his much-soothed wings before settling them in a resting position behind him. “When you go through your adult molt, I’ll take care of you too.”

“R-Really?” Colin’s wings fluttered in excitement. He crawled closer to Damian and pressed their cheeks together. “I’d like that.”

Damian smiled.

--

Dick went to check on Damian and found two fledglings curled up in that makeshift nest instead of one. Colin Wilkes had wrapped his white wings over Damian’s waist, his face pressed into the back of Damian’s neck as they both slept.

It was tooth-rottenly adorable.

Even more so when Colin shifted closer and rubbed his face against the short pinfeathers lining the back of Damian’s neck.

“Their puppy love is so cute,” he whispered to Bruce when he wandered into the study later. “It’s almost like Damian’s human.”

“He’s twelve,” Bruce said flatly.

Dick raised a brow. “Is this your way of being protective? Because Damian can handle himself. It’s good he has friends his age.”

“Friends are fine. Anything more, and I expect a proper request to court.”

“What is this, the 1950s? You know how that worked out with Tim,” Dick rolled his eyes and checked the clock. “They’ve got fifteen minutes before the next round. I promised Babs I’d fly over and help look over some things at the Clocktower, so can you handle Damian?”

“Go,” Bruce said. He didn’t even look up from his laptop.

Dick sidled up to him and gently slid his gray wing up and under Bruce’s black one. Bruce twitched. He twitched again when Dick fluttered his wings, and then finally turned away from his laptop when Dick folded them low to the ground. Almost instinctively, Bruce's wing covered the splayed gray feathers.

“Damian will be fine,” Dick said. He perched on Bruce’s armrest. “And Colin’s a good boy.”

“Hm.”

“Relax, B,” Dick playfully nipped his cheek. Bruce didn’t look amused. “This is an important life event for your little chick. He’s growing up.”

“He is, isn’t he?” Bruce said in a soft voice. Dick cocked his head.

“We all grew up,” he said, voice turning serious. “But it doesn’t mean we leave.”

“Hm,” Bruce said again, which could mean a thousand things. Dick took the dismissal for what it was and disentangled his wing from Bruce’s. With a running start, he rolled out of the large window facing the manor gardens and spread his wings.

--

“The little brat’s molting?” Jason threw his head back and cackled. Dick kicked him off the roof. The younger man spread his blood-red wings and glided down to the landing below, all the while throwing Dick the finger. “Tell me he’s managed to kill little Timmy, that’ll just make my day.”

“Tim’s beat a tactical retreat to a safe-eyrie this week,” Dick said dryly, flying down himself. “And I didn’t tell you to make fun of him. I wanted to invite you to his molting celebration on next Sunday.”

“Sorry, busy.”

“Jason,” Dick said.

“Seriously, you’re going to invite me to some family gathering filled with—oh, let’s see. Bruce, who I don’t get along with. Tim, who I don’t get along with. Damian, who I don’t get along with…”

“Cass will be there,” Dick said, “and Alfred, and Steph, and Babs and me.”

“Hey, take yourself off the nice list,” Jason pointed at him.

“We get along!” Dick insisted.

“Oh Dickiebird,” Jason took off his hood and shook out his dark hair. “So naïve. So pure.”

Dick snorted.

“He’s probably going crazy, isn’t he? Has his feathers started unfurling yet?” Jason said. He tucked his hood under an arm and reached for a cigarette. “Let me guess, they’re black like Bruce’s.”

“They’re definitely dark,” Dick conceded, walking closer to the second Robin. “Some of the tips have flaked off and the tuft underneath’s blackish. You know, if you come to the molting celebration you’ll see the new plumage. That’s kind of the point.”

“Or I can see it when I knock off his armor next time we fight. It'll be fun having a naked Robin flitting around Gotham again,” Jason said.

“Hm,” Dick said—and then swiped Jason’s barely-lit cigarette right from his lips and threw it off towards the street.

“Oi!” Jason growled, feathers puffing up in anger.

“Smoking’s bad for you, Jaybird,” he said. Jason’s feathers settled unhappily after it became apparent that Dick wasn’t going to splay his wings in apology. Of course not.

He only did that for Bruce.

“Fuck off, Mom,” Jason muttered. “Don’t call me out for such a stupid reason again.”

He snapped his hood back on and vaulted over the side of the roof. A tense second later, Dick spotted those graceful, hawk-like wings soaring through mostly empty skies.

He’d done his best to convince Jason to come; it was up to the younger man if he wanted to take the first step or not.

--

Damian scratched at a pinfeather on his inner wing. The shell had grown more and more brittle, and it took only a few tugs for it to break off completely. The dark green feather inside slowly unfurled, and Damian ran impatient hands through it so it straightened. He didn’t want to look like a bedraggled rat.

He’d been at for hours, and he was still working on the pinfeathers closest to his face. They were definitely ready, given that they'd stopped hurting when he bent them a certain way, and the pinfeathers closest to the outer edge of his wings had already half-flaked off. But breaking off each sheath and straightening each feather? Took a long ass time.

“Damian,” Father crossed his arms from the doorway. Damian jumped. “You were supposed to call us when they were ready.”

“I don’t require your assistance,” Damian insisted, despite being clearly untrue. “I can sort out my own feathers—”

“You’ll dry them out if you don’t oil them soon,” Father said. “Unless you want your new feathers to fall out in a week, you will let us help.”

Which was how Damian found himself surrounded by Father and Grayson and Pennyworth, six extra grabby hands pawing at his wings at once. Damian squirmed and hissed, though that didn’t stop the adults from systematically discarding bits of feather sheaths onto the floor. In the span of half an hour, his wings were starting to look like wings again. Dark green, near black, and as strong and sharp as Father’s own feathered wings.

Damian yelped when Grayson pressed something sensitive under each wing joint.

“You’re not producing your own oil yet,” he observed. He uncapped the synthetic oil instead. “Not ideal, but this will do. Unless you want me to use mine?”

“No,” Damian snapped. He flicked Grayson with the wing he’d been working on and smirked when the man sneezed.

“Master Damian, Master Dick,” Pennyworth said imperiously, and both of them settled down. Pennyworth’s hands were the gentlest and most experienced: he’d assisted in all his boys’ adult molts, after all, so the unsheathing process was old hat. His solid gray wings were tucked neatly against his back as usual, though his raised alulas meant he was amused, not actually angry. “You should be grateful, Master Damian, that we live in modern times and not those of old. Using our own oils would mark you as our family, establishing familial bond…”

“But it stank,” Father said flatly.

“…there certainly was an odor,” Pennyworth conceded tactfully.

“Best part of DNA testing,” Father told Damian. “No more oil stink.”

“Except in orgies,” Grayson sing-songed, and chuckled when the other three glared at him. “What? It’s true!”

“I am twelve,” Damian growled, pawing through the unsheathed feathers of his inner right wing. It felt good to sink his fingers into something soft. “And how close are we to done?”

“Another half hour,” Pennyworth said.

Damian let out an irritated hiss.

In the end, it was Father who broke the sheaths on the back of Damian’s neck. This task was usually given to a mate or a blood relation, though barring both of those a close friend would do. Damian shivered at the large fingers carefully working through his nape.

“They get greener as it goes up to your hair,” Grayson told him as he watched over Father’s shoulder. Damian got to see for himself in the mirror after everything was finished. A single bright green band ran across the very bottom of his wings on both sides; his tertials were almost completely green. Green also speckled across his coverts.

Damian stared at his reflection while Pennyworth began the long, arduous process of cleaning the room up.

“It’s a different green than Mother’s,” he told Grayson while he flared each wing out. He flexed them, fluffed up each feather, and marveled at how much stronger they felt. Fledgling feathers were soft and almost downy, with just enough strength to fly but not much else. It felt like he could soar on these.

Grayson wings flicked slightly in amusement.

“Talia’s are a bit more teal,” he conceded. He gently brushed off some remaining sheath-bits off of the back of Damian’s coverts. “But yours are very beautiful too, Damian.”

“They’re not solid.”

“Solid is boring,” Grayson deliberately spread his wings. The blue banding stood out in the warm light. “Black and green seems like a dangerous combo."

“You mean lethal,” Damian arched his wings and puffed them up. Grayson smiled and drew him close for a wing-hug, and Damian huffed and fought and sulked when he wouldn’t let him go.

“Dick, stop bullying him,” Father chastised him upon his approach.

Grayson sighed but released Damian, who scuttled towards Father with his wings raised in clear warning.

Which was why he was completely unprepared when he found himself wrapped up in huge night-black feathers.

“Father!” he shrieked, and squawked when the man just drew him closer. He squirmed when Father ran a fond hand through his hair and down to the middle of his back.

“Am I not allowed to show affection?” Father raised a brow, finally easing up his wing-hug enough for Damian to actually get some light. “You’re my son, you know.”

“I do,” Damian’s ire vanished immediately at the warmth flooding him from the reminder. He stood up straight. Grayson smiled indulgently. “I am your son.”

“Here it comes,” Grayson muttered to Pennyworth.

“Father, I know what I want for my molting celebration,” Damian said with a smirk.

Father sighed.

--

The celebration went off without a hitch. Relatively speaking.

Everyone was loud and grabby and running over one another while fighting for Alfred’s punch and pie. Jason had arrived midway through and had actually helped by taking Cass and Steph out for some vigilante fun; Bruce had made all the right speeches and then sat in the corner and brooded at everyone, though he was clearly enjoying himself; and Dick managed to get a proper wing-hug out of Dami.

“Enough, Grayson!” Damian protested, but extended his brilliantly black-and-green wings so they wrapped around Dick. And then he wriggled away and fluttered off to find Colin, who’d spent the first hour gawking at Damian’s adult plumage and the next half hour poking around the manor.

Dick caught sight of the two boys talking beneath a darkened hallway. Damian leaned forward and said something, and Colin grinned and wrapped his hand around the back of Damian’s neck.

Bruce twitched from the corner.

“Bruce,” Dick chided, gliding right over. “You promised.”

“I did not.”

“You promised all of Damian’s friends could freely enjoy his celebration.”

“Yes,” Bruce said, dark wings flicking unhappily. They folded behind him when Dick sat down. “The Bat Cow, Titus, and Alfred the Cat are thoroughly enjoying all sorts of attention. But Colin?”

“Isn’t doing anything Dami doesn’t want,” Dick said.

Bruce growled but didn’t fight it when Dick wrapped a wing around him. He leaned into Dick’s touch and let him nose at his neck.

“Who wrecked my room?” Tim’s voice came out from upstairs, and Dick winced. Bruce huffed when the younger man settled back with a sigh.

“I’ll handle this,” Dick said. “Just… don’t kill Colin, please?”

“I won’t kill him,” Bruce said.

“Don’t maim him,” Dick clarified. Before he took off for the upper landing, he leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to Bruce’s cheek. And then he beat his wings once, twice, and he was soaring up to make sure Tim didn't strangle Damian for messing with his stuff again.

Bruce tapped his drinking glass with a sigh and watched Dick’s graceful form as he rose.

He fluttered his wings.

--

(Now that all the boys’ adult feathers have come in, the Feather Ring seemed far more vibrant.

Alfred’s own faded gray adult feather tied neatly with a white feather from his youth. A white fledgling feather paired with an elegant black one as dark as night. A soft gray and blue banded feather entangled with an even softer downy white feather. A scuffed-up white covert with tattered ends dwarfed completely by a long, solid red primary. A raw-looking white feather with a bloody tip, and an equal-sized canary-yellow one tied beside it like a mirror. Mistress Cassandra’s pair was white and white. She hadn't had any of her fledgling feathers left, and Alfred had used one of her snow-white coverts instead.

The newest pair was Master Damian’s. A clearly well groomed fledgling feather was tied neatly with a dark-green and light-green banded secondary. Master Damian had shed it accidentally during a scuffle, and Alfred had quietly picked it up once it fell onto the Batcave floor.

Alfred placed the ring back onto the wall and looked up at it with a soft smile. It warmed his heart to see the Feather Ring looking so lively. There was a somber time when that ring only borne Alfred’s and Bruce’s feather pairs. Beautiful but lonely, and it hadn’t taken a genius to realize how much Bruce wanted a proper flock.

Glancing at the colorful ring of feathers, Alfred supposed Master Bruce had made his wish come true on his own.)