COWT; The raven cycle; Stand beside me

[ephitomis]

Title: Stand beside me
Fandom: The raven cycle
Notes: Written for the prompt "Spirito" for COWT9
Wordcount: 4530
Summary: Adam's life changes the day Eve finally settles in her form. Or a Daemon!AU

If someone asked Adam what was special about the night Eve transformed, Adam wouldn't be able to answer. After all nothing was different about it: just another bottle, just another angry snarl, just another punch.

And yet, one moment his father’s daemon - a mutt the color of dirt and blood - had been closing his jaw over Eve, as she usually did to quickly and painfully punish them, the next she was whimpering and stumbling back.

Adam opened an eye, the one that wasn’t throbbing so much, and saw the blood dripping from Lola’s snout. He dragged his gaze from the dog, howling in pain, to his daemon, finding her changed into a Hedgehog.

There should have been nothing special about it. After all, Eve changed shape all the time. One moment she was a mouse, quiet and inconspicuous, the next she was a spider, quiet and invisible. She was always quiet and adept at being unnoticed.

Yet here she was, standing up against Lola. And Adam knew, in that exact moment, that she would never be a mouse or a spider again.

They didn’t have much time to breathe, to take in this momentous occasion, because his father stroke him harder. Hit him again and again. Adam could hear the “How dare you, you little brat!”.

He didn’t remember how this night’s punishment started, but this was why it continued.

Adam was eight, he was unhappy, but he had Eve and he had a soul that was hard to the touch.

That had to count for something.

-

On the days when his father hits him, Eve stands on his shoulder with her needles ready to hurt, daring anyone to come close to them. Sometimes, she prickles Adam, but he doesn’t mind.

He’s used to the pain and he enjoys the feeling of having her so close, so warm, so dangerous. Adam might not be a boy used to hurt, having only experience in being hurt, but Eve is all sharp edges and deadly warnings.

People keep their distance when she’s this way, but also when she’s not. They see a hedgehog daemon and they think that Adam must dislike touch. They aren’t exactly wrong, as he’s a creature unfamiliar with gentleness and so wary of it, but they aren’t right either.

Adam and Eve are a show of contradiction, and not even Adam has a book to decipher them.

He lets them being wrong and right at the same time and tells himself it’s enough.

-

The first person to ever touch him, uncaring of Eve and her needles, is Ronan Lynch. Sometimes Adam thinks that Ronan touched him not despite Eve’s presence, but because of it.

Eve is a warning, a sign to keep away, and Ronan’s life consists of reading warnings as suggestions. Where there is something that shouldn’t be touched, something to be wary of, Ronan has to touch.

(At the time, Adam hadn’t know what made Ronan this way, if it was life or just Ronan.)

It happens a couple of month after Adam’s transfer at Aglionby and after Science, a class Ronan has attended two times in the past two and a half month.

Adam knows because he hasn’t missed a single one.

It’s been a difficult day. He’s tired, countless hours at Boyds or at the factory (and he needs to find another job, probably, shit) and he’s putting away his stuff slowly because he doesn’t want to wrinkle any of his books, yes, but also because moving hurts.

Eve is a sentinel on his shoulder, menacingly looking around them and being aware of anyone that steps too close. But she’s as tired as he is, Adam knows, their mind slugging along in tandem.

Ronan Lynch isn’t someone you can prepare for anyway.

Obviously Ronan doesn’t touch Eve (touching another person’s daemon is unthinkable, even for someone like Ronan) but she startles all the same when Lynch’s hand pushes Adam’s back. Not with much strength, admittedly. Had Adam’s back not been covered by black and punches, it could have even being considered gentle.

But Adam’s skin is a map of abuse and so he still flinches, because of the pain and because of the surprise, and Eve stands up quickly, covering his shoulder in needles. One of them prickles closely to Adam’s cheek, but it’s a anchoring presence. It’s there not to hurt him, but to help him remember that he’s as safe as he can be.

Trying to collect himself he turns towards Lynch and he sees the remnant of an emotion, something so fleeting he doesn’t get to analyze it before it’s gone. Ronan looks disinterested now, a believable act was it not for his daemon.

The raven perched on Lynch’s shoulder is looking at them, staring. She cocks her head, much like a dog would, and there’s a glint in her eyes.

Eve bristles under the attention and as much as Adam wants to soothe her, he refuses to show any more weaknesses.

“Can I help you?” Adam asks, trying to be as cordial, as normal, as possible.

He should have predicted that something as mundane as cordial would only make Ronan Lynch mad.

“Just fucking move, you’re blocking the road,” the other replies, his tone biting. There is nothing cordial in Ronan Lynch who looks more animal than his daemon does.

Still, Adam raises one eyebrow and then looks at the rest of the classroom, bare apart from them. If Lynch is really interested in leaving quickly there are a million other routes to take. If he has decided to use this one isn’t because he’s in a rush.

If he thinks he can push Adam around, he doesn’t know Adam at all. (Of course he doesn’t, he can imagine Eve saying, no one knows us.)

“No,” Adam replies, still cordial, because he knows it’s the best way to make Ronan angry. He’s not scared of Lynch. There is nothing that he can do that would be worse that what Adam has to suffer every day.

It obviously brings the other boy short, probably too used to their classmate’s fear of him.

He sees Lynch hesitate one second before he scoffs and shrugs. “Fine. At least pick up your trash, this is not your trailer park.”

The cold and familiar sensation of shame curses his body until it encounters the hot feeling of Adam’s hurt pride, roaring back like a lion. Sometimes he thinks that he’s made only of this, the curl of shame and pride snarling at each other.

Everything that makes up Adam Parrish in a single, terrible, package.

The voice in his head snarls in his father’s voice that he will never be enough, that he’s nothing but what he came from. Dirt and bones and nothing. The other voice, similar to Eve’s, reminds him that he’s here at Aglionby, he made it on his own and one day he will get out of here in the same way: on his own two legs.

He gears up to answer, but Lynch just walks away abruptly, uncaring of what he has left in his wake.

When Lynch is out of the classroom, and not a second before that, Eve relaxes. She’s still shaking with fury as much as Adam is, but there is no immediate danger and she won’t waste the little energy she has.

“What an asshole,” she murmurs against his ear. She’s still so quiet, so much so that even if she’s close to his ear, Adam wouldn’t be able to hear her if he wasn’t paying attention.

But he is and he nods back. He looks down and sees one of his pens on the ground. It must have fallen down from his backpack without him noticing.

A part of him wants to leave it there, a sign that he doesn’t care about Ronan Lynch, but the truth is that he can’t afford to leave it there.

A pen is nothing for all the other Aglionby’s student, but Adam is not another Aglionby student. He’s dirt and bones and nothing.

He doesn’t move for a minute, conscious that every second he wastes this way will mean a second longer he’s late to his next class, but the battle inside him prevents him from doing what he has to do. He can’t afford to leave that pen here, so he has to pick it up.

It’s never about what he wants to do, and that is a truth that Adam should have accepted long ago.

In the end, it’s Eve that scurries away from his shoulder, climbs down his body and finally picks up the pen. Bending to pick Eve back up is easier than doing so for the pen, allows him to breathe easier. Freer.

He doesn’t thank her because she doesn’t need him to and he’s not as late as he could have been to History.

-

Befriending Richard Gansey the Third isn’t exactly in their plans. It still happens, and they still don’t know how.

Adam doesn’t know what compels him to stop and repair his Camaro (one of those made for rich families with big daemons, with the back modified to accommodate Gansey’s doe daemon, Gwen) and most of all he doesn’t know why he doesn’t walk away faster everytime Gansey and Gwen try to talk to them.

A month later, sitting with Gansey at lunch, Adam can’t really deny that they are friends.The problem with that, surprisingly, isn’t Gansey.

At the beginning Adam thought he would hate Gansey like he hates all the other people at his school (Envy, Eve sometimes whispers to him, doesn’t look good on us) but as much as Gansey possesses much of the qualities Adam detests in his classmate, he’s a beast of his own kind.

What Adam likes about him it’s not Richard Gansey the Third, with his money and his family connections and his charity, but Gansey with his quest to find Glendower, with his passion, with his faults.

The problem with being friends with Gansey is Ronan Lynch, of course.

Ever since that day in class, Lynch has been ignoring Adam. Nothing too unusual, they had never been on spoken terms, but now it seems to be personal unlike before where it was just something ingrained in Ronan’s character.

Adam can’t forget the look in Lynch’s eyes the first time he saw Adam and Gansey speaking together, something between a glower and a snarl. Even more peculiar had been Chainsaw’s eyes, fixated on Gansey’s hand on Adam’s arm.

Do you think they were jealous? Eve asked him that night, while they were hiding under the cover and finishing up their homework.

Adam didn’t reply, but the concept of Lynch being jealous of him seemed so absurd that he dismissed it immediately.

Eve, the next day, decided to climb down from Adam’s shoulder and sit upon his desk. When Gwen and Gansey stopped like usual at their desk for a chat, Eve answered Gwen’s good morning for the first time. Spiteful bastard, Adam thought with a smile.

This is how Adam finds himself in this situation, seated in front of Gansey and Ronan with his lunch in front of him. Eve is in her usual spot on his shoulder, feeling ill at ease because of Lynch and Chainsaw, and Gwen, beside Gansey, looks sad about this.

Chainsaw is perched on Lynch’s head. Every once in a while she pecks down upon her human’s head and Lynch raises something for her to eat, even though daemons don’t really need food.

Gansey is talking animatedly about a cave and he seems to be hestatic to have both of them there, even though they haven’t even acknowledged their presence.

Adam would think that being friends with Ronan has accustomed Gansey to a general level of frostiness, but after a month of friendship with Gansey, Adam knows better.

Ronan is a wall of fire and rage that seems rather intent on keeping everyone away, but he’s not that way with Gansey. He sees their comradery, the way Ronan waits for Gansey when it’s needed, and follows when it’s not.

It took him less than a month to see that there’s more of Ronan than what meets the eye. But that means jack squat when Lynch seems invested in hating Adam with everything that he has.

It doesn’t mean anything when Ronan is even more invested in hating himself.

The moment the thought crosses through his mind, Chainsaw turns and looks at him. If it wasn’t impossible Adam would have said that she heard him.

Adam almost averts his eyes - talking to someone else’s daemon is something very rude, but he’s sure that having a staring contest with someone else’s daemon is up there as well - but his pride doesn’t let him.

In the end, Chainsaw looks away to peck at Lynch’s head and Adam almost feels like he won something.

Lunch is still awkward as hell, though.

Adam doesn’t know why they decide to do it again the next day.

-

The first time Gansey invites Adam to Monmouth Manufactory, he asks him if he’s sure and tries to gesture to Lynch as stealthy as he can.

Which is, going by the other boy’s heated gaze, not stealthy at all.

Gansey shakes his head and, not even trying to lower his voice, simply states: “Ronan probably will just close himself in his room all day like he usually does.”

Ronan doesn’t defend himself or contribute anything to the discussion so Adam simply shrugs. He doesn’t have work today, and if he doesn’t accept Gansey’s invitation then his only choice is to go home (to be avoided at all costs) or find somewhere to study for the rest of the day that would allow him to spend, at maximum, 23 cents.

Adam says yes.

Still, when he’s in Gansey’s car he can’t help but push. “It’s still his home,” he repeats, “and if he doesn’t want me to be there then…”

“Ronan is…” Gansey stops and shrugs, unable to explain the mystery that is Ronan’s Lynch. “He’s complicated. But he doesn’t hate you, we would both knew it if he did. He’ll come around.”

Adam wants to reply that he still has the distinct impression that Ronan does, in fact, hate him, but Gansey knows him best.

He still doesn’t think the right tactic is to shove Adam at Ronan’s face until they stick, but he has voiced his concerns twice now, and he’s satisfied.

Eve huffs on his shoulder, something akin to frustration or maybe disapproval, before she jumps away from Adam’s sit and goes to hang out with Gwen in the back. Gansey very meticulously doesn’t look at Eve and does his best not to show how happy he is by the development.

He fails.

-

When they arrive Lynch’s car is already in the driveway, which isn’t really a surprise considering the BMW he drives and the way he drives it, but the owner is nowhere to be seen once they enter the building.

There are two locked doors that Adam can see, and he’s sure that Lynch is hiding behind one of them, just as Gansey predicted. Well, he can continue being a baby for as long as he likes. They spend an afternoon studying and talking about Glendower and nothing out of the ordinary happens. At least not until Gansey looks up and smiles. “Noah! Come here, there’s someone I want you to meet!”

Adam startles, surprised, and turns. There’s a boy there, looking at them with a placid look. There is something strange about him, he looks soft, unreal. He’s very pale, but he’s smiling at them, and he walks towards them.

“Ah, yes,” Noah says, there is a strange glint in his eyes, “Adam.”

He doesn’t know what that means, if it’s a good ah yes or a bad ah yes but he still nods and smile, hoping to leave a good impression, regardless all the terrible things Lynch must have said about him.

“Noah is our third roommate,” Gansey explains, “he comes with us at Angiolby too.”

Adam doesn’t really remember him, but it’s not that unusual, he’s mostly too focused on school or too tired from working to pay attention to what happens around him.

It’s only because Eve shivers on his shoulder that he notices that there’s something missing. Noah doesn’t have a daemon.

Or, probably, he doesn’t have a visible daemon.

People with insect daemons usually let them hide in their clothes, or the daemon itself doesn’t want to show itself. It’s unsettling, but no one has to show their daemon.

If Noah wants to protect his soul, who is Adam who hides tragedies under his shirt, to judge.

Still, it seems that Noah notices his inquiring gaze and he smiles, something a little ethereal about it. “I don’t have a daemon,” he says, “I’ve been dead for seven years.”

For a second Adam freezes, unsure of how to react, but then Gansey laughs, without any trace of worry or concern and Adam smiles as well. “He always jokes about that, only because we have never seen Andrea.”

Noah soon joins them, sitting beside Adam on the couch. He doesn’t talk much, but when he does he’s funny and helps make Adam feel at ease. Eve and Gwen are talking between them, and even if Andrea doesn’t show herself, it’s comfortable.

Only the closed door and the ghost of Ronan Lynch that glares at them reminds Adam that not everything is perfect.

The truth is that he likes this: he likes Gansey, might even call him his best friend; he likes Noah; he likes Monmouth.

That night, while he lies on his bed free of bruises, he thinks that he would like to spend all his free days like that.

If there is one thing Adam is good at is finding ways to achieve what he wants.

“We’re going to have to talk to Lynch,” Eve says, a little bit of annoyance in her tone. She’s protective, and Lynch makes her curl even tighter around herself, her pins pointy and dangerous.

Adam simply nods, because there isn’t anything else to say.

-

The moment he decides to talk with Ronan isn't the same as when he actually manages to talk to him. It's not due to Adam, who is eager to get it out of the way, but because Ronan doesn't show up to school for the rest of the week.

He tries to ask Gansey about that, but the other simply shrugs. "I tried, but he won't get out of his room. It happens sometimes, he'll be back next week."

It's true, but Adam isn't one used to wait, at least not without doing anything.

Eve huffs beside him, while they are looking at their bike. They have at least three hour before they have to be at Boyd and Adam would normally spend that time studying, but there's an itch that he has to scratch.

"This is bad idea," Eve says, putting herself in the basket of the bike anyway. "We should wait for him to get better."

"We can't avoid it," he tells her, even if he's almost sure she has a point. Ronan is a feral beast most of the time and while Adam isn't scared of him, it's unwise to go directly at the core of the danger.

It's a long ride towards Monmouth but Adam is used to biking longer and with harsher conditions and when he arrives there, half an hour later, he sees that the parking space is devoid of a Camaro. Good, he had hoped Gansey would be held back at school for a little while longer.

So he strides towards the door and rings. When no one comes to open up for him he knocks. Then, he rings again for longer.

Oh, is this the game Lynch wants to play?

"Maybe they aren't home," Eve tries, but they both look back towards the BMW parked a few meters away.

"Maybe he's just a dick," Adam says, viciously, ready to pound on that damn door until it falls down - or until Adam needs to go to Boyd. Whichever comes first.

Before his knuckles can touch the door, however, it opens on itself and Adam blinks, surprised. He pushes it open, confused, and finds Noah hovering there and looking at him. The moment he recognizes Adam he smiles. His pale face glowing with the happy expression.

Before Noah and Gansey, Adam didn't know someone could look so happy to see him.

"Adam! What are you doing here? Gansey is out," Noah says, but he lets him enter immediately.

"I know, I'm sorry. I'm not really here for Gansey..." he stops, looking towards what he assumes is Ronan's room. Noah follows his gaze and then he smirks.

"Oh, sure. He's being a baby, however, I have to warn you,” he says, flippantly, and Adam feels Eve move a little on his shoulder .

She then murmurs in this ears “Normally he doesn't?” and Adam suppresses his laugh in a not very convincing cough.

Noah raises an eyebrow, obviously understanding what just passed between them, but his amused expression doesn’t fade away.

He motions for Adam to enters and then walks towards his own room.

Now, faced with his decision and the closed door of Ronan Lynch’s room, Adam’s certainty wavers. Should he really be doing this? Isn’t he just going poking the bear? hasn’t he learned what happens when you do that?

“You know this is a completely different situation,” Eve says, her spikes brushing against his cheek. “We’re not scared of Ronan Lynch.”

That’s very true, and a reminder of what he has survived up to this point. Ronan Lynch isn’t even high on the list of things that might scare Adam Parrish.

He inspires deeply and then takes courage in his own hand and walks to the door, knocking loudly two times. He waits a minute before knocking again, more firmly.

Still no response.

“Is he really ignoring us?” Adam wonders out loud, not really a question towards Eve, but he’s not surprised when she responds, more annoyed than even Adam is.

“I’m going to prickle that bird,” Eve mutters and Adam then starts knocking continuously for two minutes. He’s almost thinking of giving up and just kick the door open, when finally it slams open. Ronan Lynch, big earphones dangling from his neck, squares him up.

It’s obvious that he didn’t expect Adam and he stills, before a switch flips. “What the fuck, Parrish? What’s your damage?”

Adam raises his eyebrow and looks at him. Chainsaw is perched on his shoulder and she’s looking at them with a curious expression. Eve bristles at her.

“I think,” Adam says, ignoring Ronan’s brusque tone, “that we need to talk.”

Ronan immediately seems skeptical he seems to almost gear up for a fight. It seems, Adam realizes, that this might not be the best way to interact with Ronan.

Gansey enjoys talking, and if Adam wanted to make peace with him, he would try to converse with him, but Ronan Lynch was an entire different beast.

So Adam decides to switch tactics. “I need a ride.”

The other seems confused for a second, looking around the house. “What the fuck have you smoked?”

Adam shrugs, while Eve moves a little forward, almost to challenge Chainsaw to come down from her perch. It’s almost funny to see how much their daemons are acting different from them: Ronan is most certainly the most aggressive of them, but Chainsaw is standing calmly on his shoulder, unbothered. Eve, on the other hand, is showing all the aggression that Adam can’t. Won’t.

Ronan seems to hesitate for a second before he exits his own room and pushes past Adam. Well, he says push, but Ronan avoids him like he has the plague and walks around him quickly and making sure not to touch him in any way.

It’s almost comical.

“Well?” Ronan asks him, turning towards him, “we going, Parrish?”

“This is really stupid,” Eve murmurs and Adam can’t exactly disagree.

Still, he walks towards Lynch and doesn’t show any of the hesitation he’s feeling. “Lead the way.”

-

They’ve been driving for five minutes when Lynch finally turns towards him and asks him: “So, where are we going?”

It’s a very fair question, if he’s honest. One he doesn’t have the answer to. But this ride was never about getting somewhere, so he just turns towards Lynch and raises an eyebrow as a challenge. “Is this how fast you usually drive?”

Ronan blinks, and then turns towards the road. “What the fuck, Parrish?” But at the same time he finishes saying Adam’s surname, he pushes on the accelerator and Adam starts to feel the pressure of the car.

He takes Eve in his hands, pushes her against his chest. She’s relaxed under his touch, even if her little spikes against the bruise in his abdomen hurts a little. Chainsaw, on the other hand, seems to be completely in her own habitat.

She’s perched on the headboard, looking outside, and her feathers preen when Lynch accelerates.

“Is this fast enough?” Lynch wonders with what seems to be genuine glee.

“I don’t know, do you still feel the need to be a dick?” Adam honestly wonders, and Ronan laughs. He doesn’t even seem to be that offended.

“Always, Parrish, but I have to say I prefer your way of making friends to Gansey’s,” the other says, he seems more relaxed than Adam has ever seen him.

Still, he smiles at the mention of Gansey and shrugs. “I thought maybe if you were acting less of a dick we might have actually talked,” he starts, before he pets Eve, “but the truth is that we’re both dicks and that’s okay.”

Ronan doesn’t stop looking at the road, but he sees Chainsaw turns towards him. Her stare is starting to become almost familiar to Adam, but what is less familiar is Eve struggling in his hold.

He looks down at her, surprised, and he sees she’s pointing to the headboard where Chainsaw is.

As much as he trust Lynch’s driving, or at least the incredible safe roads of Henrietta, he’s still hesitant to leave her without any kind of protection, but she’s insistent.

In the end he puts her where she wants, but keeps his hands on he headboard, ready to catch her.

She huffs at him and then walks over to Chainsaw and stares at him for a moment.

He knows it’s considered rude to stare while two daemon interact, but if he’s honest with himself, Adam is curious to see how Eve and Chainsaw could ever get along.

In the end, Chainsaw caws and then tries to peck Eve, who, in turns prickles her, but no one of the two are actually trying to harm the other and so Adam relaxes.

It goes as well as it can be expected.

“So we’re okay?” Adam wonders.

Ronan shrugs. “Sure, if we want to be fifteen year olds about it, we’re okay, Parrish.”