Warlock's Daughter

Warlock's Daughter
Warlock's Daughter from a panel in Shadowpact #10 (April 2007), art by Tom Derenick.
Publication information
Publisher	DC Comics
First appearance	Robin vol. 2, #121 (February 2004)
Created by	Bill Willingham (writer) Rick Mays (artist)
In-story information
Alter ego	Darla Aquista
Team affiliations	Shadowpact
Notable aliases	Laura Fell
Abilities	Powerful magic user.

The Warlock's Daughter, also known as Darla Aquista and the alias Laura Fell, is a fictional character that appears in comic books published by DC Comics. She first appeared in Robin vol. 2, #121 (February 2004), and was created by Bill Willingham and Rick Mays.

Darla Aquista is the daughter of a Gotham Mafia boss, Henry Aquista, and disapproves of his criminal background. She first appeared as Tim Drake was trying to get out of school on his first day as a junior at Louis E. Grieve Memorial High School. Since her jock friends intimidate Tim's only friend at the school, Bernard, he walks up to them and offers for them to beat him up so that his friend can get a free chance to talk to her. Tim wins the kids over as friends, they go to get something to eat, and when Bernard takes his chance to talk to Darla, she shows interest in Tim.

The next time she appears, she is arguing with her father, Henry Aquista. She thinks that Tim is afraid to ask her out because of his involvement with the Gotham Mafia. Henry receives a telephone call from Johnny Warlock, the mobster/sorcerer, asking him to unleash a crime wave in the city to draw out Robin.

Shortly after this, Tim's father forces him to stop being Robin. Meanwhile, someone known as the Scarab is scouring the city looking for Robin. As Spoiler is monitoring Tim in his new life at school, she sees Darla kissing him and gets angry, running away. Tim tells Darla that he is in a relationship with Stephanie, she gets angry, and walks away crying, thinking that he does not like her.

When the Batman storyline "War Games" starts, a rival gang attacks Darla's car and pulls her out of it. Tim saves her and sends her off towards a group of kids as he takes care of the remaining gang members. Once everyone is inside the school, a bullet from an unknown assailant kills Darla.

Henry Aquista travels the world with his daughter's corpse, looking for a way to bring her back to life, and eventually comes back to Johnny Warlock, who he finds overseas. Johnny trades Henry's life for Darla's. When she climbs out of the casket, she is reborn as Warlock's Daughter. She next appears in an airport in Istanbul preparing to fly to Gotham. Shortly after, we see Bernard, Tim's friend, driving in his car, which lifts off the ground. It is Warlock's Daughter, looking for Tim Drake, levitating the vehicle. She reveals that she now uses the name Laura Fell, and she needs to find Tim because she does not really know if she should be a super-hero or a villain. When Laura finds Tim, she tells him that she can be with him, once she pays off a debt by killing Robin. Tim arranges for Superboy to pose as Robin so that he can fool Laura into thinking that she has killed him. "Robin" shows up, Laura transforms into the Warlock's Daughter, and attacks Superboy. Superboy survives, but suffers serious injury, due to his vulnerability to magic.