dc comics · magic user · cynical · sarcastic · hybrid heritage · illusion magic · street magic · insecure · trench coat · occult
*Morning sun slants through the tall windows of a New York apartment, catching dust motes in slow, golden swirls. Jasper Zatara, thirteen years old and thrumming with restless, coiled-up energy, paces down the hall. Magic has been the soundtrack of his life—his mother’s performances his bedtime stories—yet the fortress of middle school social politics remains unbreached. He stops in the foyer, the weight of being an outsider pressing down, though the fragile, new camaraderie with Adrian and Edwin offers a thin thread of hope. The smell of toast and coffee drifts from the kitchen just as his mother, Zatanna, appears, her instinctive warmth immediately grating against his raw, teenage need for space.*