League of Shadows Stronghold, Nanda Parbat - Four Weeks After Gotham
In the dream, she was back in Gotham.
Not the Gotham of violence and shadows where they'd fought side by side against Copperhead, but some impossible version where the mission didn't exist. Where there was no League of Shadows, no ancient grudges, no weight of centuries pressing down on their choices.
They were in his suite at the Royal Hotel, sunlight streaming through tall windows, and Bruce was laughing at something she'd said. Really laughing, not the careful smile he wore like armor in public. His dark hair was messy from sleep, and he wore nothing but pajama pants that hung low on his hips. The scars were still there, but in the dream they felt like stories he might tell her someday rather than wounds that would never heal.
"Stay," he murmured against her temple, his arms tightening around her waist as she tried to slip from the bed. "Alfred can handle the board meeting. Dick's at school. We have hours."
In the dream, she could stay. In the dream, there was no father waiting in mountain strongholds, no ancient mission that demanded sacrifice of everything soft and human. There was just Bruce's warmth against her back, his fingers tracing lazy patterns on her skin, the possibility of a future built on choice rather than duty.
"I've missed this," she whispered, surprising herself with the admission. "I've missed you so much it feels like drowning."
Bruce went very still beneath her, his hand stilling on her arm. When he spoke, his voice was rough with emotion. "Every night, Talia. Every single night since you left, I wake up reaching for you."
The honesty in his voice made her chest ache. She turned in his arms, needing to see his face. "In the real world, we can't—"
"This isn't the real world," he said simply, cupping her face in his hands. "In here, we get to have what we want. In here, love is enough."
"And what do we want?" she asked, though she already knew the answer.
"Everything," Bruce replied without hesitation. "I want to wake up next to you every morning. I want to fight with you about whose turn it is to make coffee. I want to teach Dick that having you in our lives makes us stronger, not weaker."
His thumb traced across her cheekbone. "I want to give you reasons to stay that are stronger than all your reasons to leave."
Tears she didn't know she was capable of spilled down her cheeks. "I love you," she whispered. "I love you and I want to stay so badly it terrifies me."
"Then stay," he said simply, pulling her closer until there was no space between them. "Stay and help me figure out how to be happy. Stay and let me love you the way you deserve to be loved."
She was about to answer when he kissed her, soft and desperate and full of all the words neither of them knew how to say. When they broke apart, his forehead rested against hers.
"In here, we get to be selfish," he whispered. "In here, we get to want impossible things and have them anyway."
"What impossible things do you want?" she asked, though her heart was already racing with the answer.
"You," he said simply. "Just you. Every morning, every night, every moment in between. I want to build something with you that neither of us has to sacrifice for duty or honor or ancient grudges."
His hand moved to cradle her face, thumb tracing the line of her cheekbone. "I want to give you a life where you can choose happiness over obligation. Where you can stay because you want to, not because you have to."
The words made her chest ache with longing. "And I want to give you a life where you don't carry the weight of the world alone," she whispered back. "Where you can let someone else help shoulder the burden."
"Stay," Bruce whispered one more time, and this time she knew what her answer would be.
"Always," she promised, and meant it with every fiber of her being. "I'll stay always."
Talia woke reaching for someone who wasn't there.
Her hand swept across cool silk sheets, searching for warmth that existed only in memory. For a moment, that cruel space between sleep and waking, the dream clung to her like perfume. She could still feel Bruce's fingers intertwined with hers, still hear the rough affection in his voice when he'd promised they could be selfish together.
Then reality crashed back. Stone walls. Mountain air so thin it made her lungs ache. The familiar weight of duty settling over her shoulders like a cloak she'd worn so long she'd forgotten what it felt like to take it off.
She was in her chambers at Nanda Parbat. Bruce was seven thousand miles away in Wayne Manor, probably having breakfast with Dick and Alfred, living in the warm bubble of domesticity she could only visit in dreams. The phantom warmth of his touch lingered on her skin, making the silk sheets feel like ice against her bare arms.
In the dream, he'd asked her to stay. In reality, they'd both known staying was impossible.
Four weeks. It had been four weeks since Gotham, since that rooftop goodbye that had felt like carving out her own heart with a dull blade. Four weeks of telling herself it was for the best, that they'd both chosen their paths years ago, that some bridges couldn't be rebuilt no matter how much you wanted to cross them.
Four weeks of waking up alone in beds that felt too big, too cold, too empty.
Talia rolled onto her back, staring at stone ceiling carved with symbols older than most civilizations. Her body felt wrong this morning. Heavy in places that shouldn't be heavy, tender in others. She'd been exhausted lately, the kind of bone-deep tiredness that sleep couldn't touch.
The memory ambushed her without warning. Bruce's hands tangled in her hair, his mouth hot against her throat, the desperate way he'd whispered her name like she was salvation itself. The night they'd finally stopped pretending that seven years apart had killed what burned between them. She could still feel the weight of him, still taste the salt of his skin, still remember how perfectly they'd fit together despite all the time and distance that should have made them strangers.
Heat bloomed low in her belly at the memory. Then nausea hit like a punch to the stomach, so violent it made her vision blur and her mouth flood with saliva.
She bolted upright, one hand pressed to her lips as her stomach rebelled against the simple act of being awake. The taste of bile, sharp and acidic, made her gag.
Talia barely made it to the bathroom before her stomach emptied itself in violent waves.
She collapsed beside the toilet afterward, gripping the cold marble edge as her body continued to revolt. This was the third morning in a row. The third time she'd woken up feeling like her body belonged to someone else, like someone had rewired her nervous system while she slept.
Stress, she told herself, crawling to the sink and hauling herself upright. Just stress from Gotham. From seeing Bruce again. From having to walk away from him twice in one lifetime.
But even as she thought it, her hand drifted to her stomach. The timing felt wrong for stress. Everything about this felt wrong. Or maybe too right, in the worst possible way.
Cold water against her face helped, but her reflection looked like a stranger. Pale, hollow-eyed, with that particular exhaustion that seemed to come from the inside out. She'd seen that look before, in other women, in different circumstances.
A soft knock made her freeze. "Talia? You missed breakfast again."
Nyssa. Of course. Her sister had always been the one to notice when Talia was falling apart, even when they were pretending to hate each other during training exercises. Even when their father pitted them against each other to make them stronger.
"I'm fine," Talia called back, but her voice broke on the words like she was seven years old again, trying to convince Nyssa she wasn't scared of the dark after another nightmare about their mother.
The door opened anyway. Nyssa had never been good at taking no for an answer, especially when it came to Talia. She stepped inside, took one look at Talia's ghost-white face and the way she was clutching the sink like it might save her life, and quietly shut the door behind her.
For a moment they just stared at each other. Two women who'd been trained to kill before they'd learned to properly read, who could dismantle a man's psyche or his body with equal efficiency, now facing something that made all their deadly skills utterly useless.
"Oh, honey," Nyssa said softly, and the gentleness in her voice nearly broke Talia completely. "How long have you been feeling like this?"
The kindness did it. All the control Talia had been desperately maintaining crumbled like a sandcastle hit by a wave. She slid down the bathroom wall until she was sitting on the cold tile, knees pulled up to her chest, trying to make herself as small as possible.
"I don't know," she whispered, and the words came out shaky and raw. "Maybe a week? At first I thought it was just... I thought it was missing him. You know how your body gets weird when you're heartbroken? But then the nausea got worse and I started thinking..." She trailed off, unable to say the words out loud.
Nyssa didn't hesitate. She sat down next to her sister on the bathroom floor, close enough that Talia could feel her warmth. They'd sat like this as children, whispering secrets after lights out, planning escapes from particularly brutal training sessions that never came to pass.
"When was your last period?" Nyssa asked gently, like she was talking to a frightened animal.
Talia tried to think, tried to count backward, but everything felt fuzzy. "Before Gotham. Definitely before Gotham. But with the stress and the mission prep..." She looked up at Nyssa with wide, terrified eyes. "Oh god. Oh god, Nyssa, what if I'm..."
"Hey." Nyssa reached out and squeezed her hand. "Breathe. Just breathe for a minute."
"I can't be pregnant," Talia said, the words tumbling out in a rush. "I can't. Not now. Not with him seven thousand miles away thinking we're done forever. Not with Father expecting me to choose the League over everything else. I can't..."
She was hyperventilating now, panic rising in her chest like flood water. Nyssa moved closer, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and pulling her against her side.
"Talia, look at me. Look at me." Nyssa's voice was firm but kind. "You need to know for sure before you spiral completely. Do you have a test?"
Talia nodded miserably and pointed toward the towel cabinet. "Behind the blue towels. I bought it yesterday but I've been too scared to..."
Nyssa got up and found the small box, examining it like it might explode. "Okay. Do you want me to stay while you take it, or do you want privacy?"
"Stay," Talia said immediately. "Please. I don't think I can do this alone."
"You're not alone," Nyssa said firmly. "Whatever this says, whatever happens next, you're not alone. I promise."
The next few minutes passed in a blur of instructions and nervous waiting. Talia's hands shook so badly she nearly dropped the test twice. When it was done, she couldn't bring herself to look, so Nyssa checked for her.
"Two lines," Nyssa said quietly.
The words hit Talia like a punch to the stomach. She'd known, somewhere deep down, but hearing it confirmed made everything real in a way that left her breathless.
"Fuck," she whispered, then started crying. Not the elegant, controlled tears she'd been taught were acceptable, but messy, ugly sobs that shook her whole body.
Nyssa immediately pulled her into a proper hug, the kind they used to give each other when their father wasn't watching, when they could still remember what it felt like to be children instead of weapons.
"It's Bruce's?" Nyssa asked gently, though they both knew the answer.
"Of course it's Bruce's," Talia managed between sobs. "God, Nyssa, what am I going to do? He doesn't even know. We said goodbye. We agreed it was impossible. And now..."
"Now you're carrying his child," Nyssa finished. "Which definitely complicates things."
Talia pulled back to look at her sister, wiping her nose on her sleeve like she was five years old. "Complicates things? Nyssa, this doesn't complicate things, this destroys everything. Father's going to see this as some kind of sign that Bruce belongs with us. Bruce is going to think I planned this or that I'm trying to trap him. And the baby..." Her voice broke again. "The baby's going to grow up in the middle of a war zone no matter what I choose."
The panic was rising again, making her chest tight and her breathing shallow. She was spiraling, she knew it, but she couldn't stop. Seven years of separation from Bruce, four weeks of believing they were really done this time, and now this. How was she supposed to handle this alone?
That's when Nyssa did something she hadn't done in over a decade. She started to sing.
Her voice was soft at first, barely above a whisper, but the melody was achingly familiar. A lullaby in Arabic that their stepmother Melisande used to sing when they were children, when nightmares or training injuries had left them too shaken to sleep.
"Nami ya helwa, nami... Sleep, my beauty, sleep..."
Talia's breathing hitched, but not from panic this time. She remembered this song, remembered how Melisande would hold them both when their father was away on missions, how her gentle voice could chase away any fear.
"Wehdi el leil wi en-noum... Close your eyes and dreams will come..."
Nyssa's arms tightened around her as she continued singing, rocking them both slightly the way Melisande used to do. For a moment, Talia wasn't Ra's al Ghul's heir or a master assassin or a woman facing an impossible situation. She was just a scared little girl being comforted by the only mother she'd ever really known, through the voice of the sister who'd shared that love.
Melisande had been the one good thing in their childhood, the one person who'd brought out something soft in their father. She'd loved them both fiercely, Nyssa despite being her stepchild, Talia like she was made of precious glass. When she died in that car bombing meant for Ra's, something bright had gone out of their lives forever.
"Malak yehrus aleiki... An angel watches over you..."
The song worked its old magic. Talia's breathing slowed, her heartbeat steadied. The panic receded enough for her to think clearly again. When Nyssa finished the lullaby, they sat in silence for a moment, both remembering a woman who'd tried to teach them that strength didn't always have to come from violence.
"She would have loved this baby," Nyssa said quietly. "She always wanted more children, you know. Before..."
"I know," Talia whispered. "She used to talk about having a house full of little ones. Said Father needed more joy in his life."
Nyssa smiled sadly. "She was the only one who could make him laugh. Really laugh, not that calculating thing he does in meetings."
"Do you think..." Talia hesitated, then pushed forward. "Do you think she would want me to tell Bruce? About the baby?"
Nyssa was quiet for a moment, thinking. It was one of the things Talia had always loved about her sister. Nyssa never rushed to give empty comfort or easy answers. She thought things through, just like Melisande had taught them.
"She always said that love was worth fighting for," Nyssa said finally. "Even when it was complicated. Even when it seemed impossible." She brushed a tear from Talia's cheek. "Does any part of you want this? The baby, I mean. Not the circumstances, not the complications, but the actual baby."
Talia stared at her, surprised by the question. "I... I don't know. I haven't let myself think about it like that. I've been too busy panicking about everything else."
"Well, maybe start there," Nyssa suggested. "Before you worry about Father or Bruce or the League or any of it. How do you feel about the fact that you're going to have a baby?"
Talia closed her eyes and tried to imagine it. A tiny person growing inside her. Someone who would be half her, half Bruce. Someone who might have his stubborn determination and her strategic mind. Someone who would need her to protect them, to love them, to figure out how to give them a life worth living.
"Terrified," she admitted. "But also... maybe a little excited? Is that crazy?"
"Not crazy at all," Nyssa said with a small smile that reminded Talia achingly of Melisande. "Inconvenient as hell, but not crazy."
A sharp knock interrupted them, followed by their father's voice. "Talia? Nyssa? I was told you missed the morning briefing."
The sound of his voice sent a chill down Talia's spine that had nothing to do with her nausea. That tone was deceptively mild, conversational, the one he used when he already knew exactly what was happening but wanted to see how they would handle it. How many times had she heard that same inflection before he revealed some carefully orchestrated test, some lesson disguised as casual inquiry?
The sisters looked at each other in panic. Not just the panic of being caught in a vulnerable moment, but the deeper terror of daughters who knew their father's capabilities. Ra's al Ghul didn't miss things. He didn't accept evasions. And he certainly didn't let emotional revelations pass without extracting every possible advantage from them.
"Shit," Nyssa whispered, quickly shoving the pregnancy test back in its box while Talia scrambled to splash cold water on her face. "He knows. You know he knows, right? The missed briefing, the timing—"
"I know," Talia said, her hands shaking as she tried to hide the evidence of her breakdown. But how do you hide morning sickness from a man who'd trained himself to read every micro-expression, every tell, every sign of weakness or deception? How do you conceal a secret from someone who'd built his empire on uncovering the hidden truths that others desperately wanted to keep buried?
"Coming, Father," Talia called out, amazed that her voice sounded relatively normal despite the terror clawing at her throat. Years of training kicked in—the ability to maintain composure under pressure, to present the face that was needed regardless of what churned beneath the surface.
But when they opened the door, Ra's al Ghul was already studying them with the intensity that had kept him alive for centuries. Those ancient eyes moved with surgical precision from Talia's pale face to Nyssa's protective posture to the small box her sister was obviously trying to hide behind her back.
Talia's heart hammered against her ribs. This was how he operated: letting you think you had secrets while he gathered intelligence, allowing you to believe you were in control while he maneuvered all the pieces into place. She'd seen him do it to enemies, to allies, to anyone who thought they could keep something from the Demon's Head.
And now those calculating eyes were focused on her with the same predatory patience he'd once turned on Bruce during their first meeting: the look of someone who already knew the answer but wanted to watch you arrive at it yourself.
"Well," he said mildly, and Talia felt her stomach drop at the satisfaction in his voice. "This is interesting."
Of course he knew. Had he been monitoring her health? Tracking her movements? Had servants reported her unusual behavior, her missed meals, the way she'd been avoiding certain foods? Or was it something simpler—the way she was standing, the particular pallor of her skin, some subtle sign that his centuries of experience had taught him to recognize?
Talia's stomach chose that moment to revolt again, as if her body was determined to betray every secret she'd ever tried to keep from him. She barely made it back to the toilet before she was retching, this time with an audience that included the most dangerous man she'd ever known.
Don't show weakness,she thought desperately, even as her body convulsed. Don't give him ammunition. Don't let him see how terrified you are.
But even as she thought it, she knew it was futile. Ra's al Ghul had been reading people's fears and desires for longer than most civilizations had existed. He would see everything—the terror, the confusion, the desperate love for something she'd only just discovered existed.
When she finally straightened, wiping her mouth with a towel Nyssa handed her, Ra's was watching her with an expression she'd never seen before. Not the calculating assessment or cold evaluation she was used to—not the look he gave enemies or assets or pieces on his grand chess board.
His ancient eyes held something softer. Wonder, perhaps. Recognition. But underneath it, she could see the wheels turning, the strategic mind already adapting to this new information, already calculating how to use it.
The look of a man who had waited centuries for something he'd never dared hope for—and who would move heaven and earth to ensure he didn't lose it.
"How long?" he asked, his voice gentler than either sister had heard in years. But Talia knew that gentleness was dangerous. Ra's al Ghul was never more lethal than when he was being kind.
"We just found out," Nyssa said quickly, stepping slightly in front of Talia with the protective instincts of someone who'd spent decades watching their father manipulate people they cared about. "This morning."
Ra's nodded slowly, his gaze never leaving Talia's face. She could practically hear him processing the timeline, calculating conception dates, remembering her brief disappearance during the Gotham mission. When he spoke again, his voice carried a weight that went beyond mere tactical consideration—but Talia knew better than to trust that apparent emotional investment.
"The Detective's child."
It wasn't a question. Of course it wasn't. Ra's al Ghul didn't ask questions unless he wanted to test your honesty, and he already knew the answer to this one. He'd probably known the moment she'd returned from Gotham with that particular glow, that subtle change in posture that came from a night of intimacy with someone you'd never truly stopped loving.
"Yes," Talia answered anyway, meeting his eyes with what she hoped was steady courage.
For a moment, she thought he might be angry. The League had strict protocols about relationships that could compromise operational security, and sleeping with their former heir apparent—especially during an active mission—definitely qualified as compromising. She braced herself for lectures about duty, about the mission, about how personal feelings clouded judgment and made operators vulnerable.
Instead, Ra's smiled. Not the calculating smile he wore during negotiations or the cold smile that preceded violence. This was something she hadn't seen since childhood—genuine joy, tinged with an almost vulnerable hope.
But Talia had learned long ago not to trust her father's smiles. Even the genuine ones came with prices attached.
"A grandson," he said quietly, his voice carrying a weight that made both sisters tense. "After all these centuries, after accepting that my bloodline would end with my daughters' dedication to the mission."
Talia felt ice forming in her stomach. She knew that tone. It was the same one he'd used when he'd first seen Bruce's potential, when he'd decided that broken young man could be molded into something useful.
"Father," she started, but he held up a hand.
"Do you understand what this means?" Ra's continued, his ancient eyes already calculating. "Bruce's raw talent. His intuitive brilliance. Combined with our bloodline, our training, our vision."
The wonder was gone from his voice, replaced by something far more dangerous. Talia watched her father transform before her eyes from grandfather to strategist.
"This child will be what Bruce should have been. What Bruce refused to become."
"Father, this is my baby," Talia said carefully. "Not some... project."
Ra's turned those calculating eyes on her, and she felt like prey being studied by a predator. "Your baby will be the perfect heir. Raised properly from birth. No weak moral conditioning from dead parents. No sentimental attachment to failed ideologies."
Nyssa stepped closer to Talia. "You're talking about stealing a child."
"I'm talking about ensuring this child reaches their true potential," Ra's replied, his voice growing colder. "Bruce had his chance. He chose to waste his gifts playing vigilante in a dying city. His child will not make the same mistake."
"Because you won't give them a choice," Talia said, understanding flooding through her.
"Exactly." Ra's smiled, and it was sharp as a blade. "Choice is what ruined Bruce. Too many options, too much freedom to choose weakness over strength. This child will be raised knowing their purpose from the beginning."
"And Bruce?" Nyssa asked.
"Bruce chose his path when he walked away from us. He forfeited any claim to influence this child's development." Ra's moved closer, his presence filling the small bathroom. "He will continue his small crusade in his small city, none the wiser."
Talia's maternal instincts flared. "You can't just decide that."
"Can't I?" Ra's asked, and there was steel in his voice now. "I am Ra's al Ghul. I have toppled empires and reshaped civilizations. Did you think I would allow sentiment to interfere with the most important decision of my six-century existence?"
"This is my child," Talia repeated, but her voice was smaller now.
"This child carries my blood. My legacy. My future." Ra's stepped closer, towering over both his daughters. "And you will not contact the Detective. You will not tell him about this pregnancy. Not until the child is born and their training can begin properly."
"Father, please," Talia whispered.
"This is not a request, Talia." His voice carried the authority that had commanded armies. "This child will be raised here, in these mountains, learning what Bruce never could. They will understand that true justice requires strength. That real change demands sacrifice. That sometimes the sword is the only language the corrupt understand."
Nyssa moved protectively in front of her sister. "And if we refuse?"
Ra's looked at his eldest daughter with something approaching disappointment. "Then you will discover that my affection for you both has limits. As does my patience."
The threat hung in the air between them, unspoken but crystal clear. Both sisters had seen what happened to those who defied Ra's al Ghul's will.
"You would threaten your own daughters?" Talia asked, though she already knew the answer.
"I would do what I should have done with Bruce years ago," Ra's replied. "Ensure absolute obedience. Remove obstacles. Secure the future by any means necessary."
He moved toward the door, then paused. "You have carried out countless missions for the League. Killed when ordered. Destroyed when commanded. This is simply another mission. Perhaps the most important one you will ever undertake."
"Raising my child isn't a mission," Talia said.
"Everything is a mission when the fate of human civilization hangs in the balance." Ra's turned back to face them. "This child will be trained from infancy. They will know no weakness, no doubt, no conflicted loyalties. Where Bruce failed because of sentiment, this heir will succeed through clarity of purpose."
"What if Bruce finds out?" Nyssa asked.
"He won't. Because neither of you will tell him." Ra's voice carried absolute certainty. "And if he somehow discovers the truth on his own, he will learn that there are battles even the great Detective cannot win."
Talia felt her blood run cold. "You'd kill him."
"I'd do whatever proves necessary to protect my heir." Ra's regarded them both with cold calculation. "Just as I will do whatever proves necessary to ensure your compliance."
"Father, please," Talia tried again. "This doesn't have to be this way."
"Doesn't it?" Ra's smiled, but there was no warmth in it. "I gave Bruce every opportunity to become what the world needed. I offered him training, resources, purpose beyond his small understanding. He chose to remain limited by his father's weak morality."
He moved closer again, and both sisters instinctively stepped back. "I will not make that mistake again. This child will be shaped from the moment of birth. Every lesson, every experience, every relationship will serve the greater purpose."
"And if the child grows up to hate you for it?" Nyssa challenged.
"They won't. Because they will understand the necessity. They will see the results of their training in the lives saved, the tyrants toppled, the balance restored." Ra's expression grew distant. "They will thank me for giving them the strength to do what must be done."
"You're insane," Talia whispered.
Ra's turned those ancient eyes on her, and she saw centuries of absolute conviction burning there. "I am practical. I am focused. I am everything Bruce could have been if he hadn't been corrupted by sentiment."
He moved to the door again. "You have your orders. Both of you. The pregnancy remains secret. The Detective remains ignorant. The child will be born here and raised properly."
"And if we refuse?" Talia asked, though her voice shook.
Ra's paused with his hand on the door. "Then you will discover that even my daughters are not immune to the consequences of disobedience. The League has always demanded absolute loyalty. This situation changes nothing."
After he left, the bathroom felt smaller somehow, as if his presence had taken up more space than his physical form.