Chapter 12 - The power of glyphs
~ONE~
The one-hour walk from the Bat Queen forest the Owl House was peaceful. Hawky and Maotif rested quietly on their staff since Iniko and Luz decided to come back on foot.
Iniko was humming the same song, the one he was always humming while he was walking with someone but no one fell strong sense of the necessity of continuing their talk.
The Owl House was a rather close spot on the horizon, that meant only a ten minutes by slow walking.
The teenage boy looked at the angle of a shadow to exact time of day, and out of the corner of his eye Iniko saw Luz pulled out her phone, looking at photo of the healing glyph.
"What are you thinking so hard about? I can practically see the steam rising."
Luz glanced at Iniko. "I was just wondering how many glyphs the other me discovered for the last four years."
"I've never counted them." He started counting on his fingers, then gave up and just said, "Probably about 50, I think, including healing glyph. She even learned how to combining the two kinds of glyphs and make a more powerful blend of their powers."
"Fuse glyphs." Luz's expression changed to be more thoughtful. She never thought about mix glyphs before.
"Yes, but not all glyphs can by mix. The plant glyph and the fire glyph, for example, together form just a pile of cinders." Iniko snapped Luz out of her thoughts and she quickly made eye contact with him.
"How do you know what kind of glyphs can be used together?"
"Well...When my sister want to discovered that, she worked through old-fashioned trial and error." He replied, "It's been a long, hard and full of surprises road."
Luz sighed, putting phone in her pocket. "I'd like to learn your sister's glyphs."
"I know a few glyphs." Iniko said in a very casual tone. "I'd be happy to show you." Luz beamed with delight, suprising Iniko. "Now?"
She nodded.
"Couldn't that wait till tomorrow? I'm just a bit sick of drawing glyphs after chasing Striker and trying healing him."
"Just one or two glyphs. Please."
"No." Iniko said firmly, folding his arms.
"Pleaseeee." Luz entreated – more whined, really.
Iniko titled his head, rubbing his chin thoughtfully as Luz performed one of the best Puppy Dog Eyes, he had ever seen a female perform. "Alright. Two glyphs, but that's all."
Luz flapped her hands and let out a little squeal. "Yay!"
"Do you have any requests?"
The girl seemed to consider it and said, "Surprise me."
The corner of Iniko's lip lifting in half a smile. "Well, in that case, we'll start with... the gravity glyph."
He lift his right leg, revealing a glyph on the sole of his shoe. It was a the circle, coiling lines illustrate the wind with three intertwined circles in the middle of it.
Iniko tapped a glyph and walked over to a tree. Slowly, he started to climb up it as if he were walking on normal ground. Luz was shocked at this.
Eventually, Iniko was hanging upside down from a low branch on the tree. He then quickly, climbed down the tree and said, "Wanna try?"
"Yes!"
Iniko's face sported a smirk as he saw the excitement on Luz's face. He drew a spell circle and summoned the paint marker to her hands.
Luz quickly redraw the glyph on the sole of her own shoe and walked over to a tree. But she slipped on her first step and the back of her head had a nice quick chat with Mr. Ground.
"A little tip: you might want to activate glyph before you try walk on tree." Iniko said with a playful light in his gaze.
Luz slaps her forehead, chiding herself for forgetting about this. She popped up and tapped glyph before running off to try to climb up the tree again.
She placed her foot on the bole of the tree and then, slowly, walked up the trunk of it until she was on the highest tree branch. Looking down, she smiled at the teenage boy.
'I feel like a ninja.' Luz thought then quickly ran down her tree, but she unfortunately went a little too fast and crashed into the ground, face first. The mumbled words, "Hello gravity," could be heard from the careless Latina.
"You and ground remained close friends." said Iniko, laughing with the snort in his voice that sound identical to Eda's. "Now come on, you look stupid laying down on the ground." He smirked, extending his hand to Luz.
"You know, all friendships have benefits." Luz said as she took the hand and let Iniko pull her up.
"Now, glyph number two." The orange haired boy said, drawing on ground a rather big glyph. "It's one of my favorites."
The new glyph was a sideways crescent with double backwards 'J' on both sides, and equilateral triangle pointing downward under it.
"See if you can guess what kind of glyph it is." He tapped the glyph quickly as it gave of a pinkish-red glow, and then emerging from the ground were three large ivory tinted crystals sharpened to points on the tips no smaller than a grown man. That's crystals seemed to shimmer in a near rainbow of colors.
"That was the crystal glyph."
"You're almost right." The look on Iniko's face matches the look on Eda when she intended to steal something. "It was fuse glyph. Step aside and cover your ears."
Luz did as she was told and allowed Iniko to show what crystals can do. He picked up a small rock and threw it at crystals. They went dark, and it was literally the moment the rock touched one of crystals.
And then a powerful explosion shook the ground. The shockwave hit two teenager, they remained in place, although with their hair and clothes very dishevelled. Luz covering her ears and looking at Iniko, he has big smile on his face.
As the dust settled, they saw a big crater where crystals was before.
"Wow."
"Wow? That's all you've got?" Iniko said, laying a distressed hand to his forehead, "You saw this remarkable and awesome explosion. And the only word you said were "wow". I got to say, I'm disappointed."
Luz chuckled "You really enjoy blow up stuff."
"Yeah, I think it's liberating, but it's kind of funny too. And I love this explosive crystal glyph." He said with a mischievous smile. "Go ahead, try and you'll understand why I'm like blow up the things."
Luz thought for a moment. Then she grabbed stick and drew on ground a few rather small glyphs. After she tapped them, the energy surged out of glyphs and into the ground. Emerging from the ground were a lot of small brightly glowing crystals.
And then a second later all crystals exploded when Luz rammed a stick into the nearest crystal. It wasn't like Iniko's explosion. This explosion was more like a firecrackers. Safe and fine and actually very thrilling.
"On a scale of one to 10, I'd say I'm about a four. And, as explosions specialist, I could said that was a pretty good for your first explosion."
"Thanks." Luz small smile grew into a big bright smile, "What's the next glyph?
Iniko shook his head, "I agreed to show you two glyphs, Luz, lesson's over."
"It was worth a try."
They made their way into the owl house, ignoring Hooty's attempts to tell a story about how a butterfly flew into his mouth earlier today.
Iniko go into the kitchen and get himself some drink. Luz went upstairs, to her(other Luz's) room.
The teenage girl look around the room with the stuff from the human world and other cool things from the Boiling Isles. In theory, it's her room and her stuff. And yet since her arrival here. She didn't lay a finger on almost nothing in this room. She think to touch this things would be an unwarranted invasion of her alter twin's privacy and... Anyway, even though there was a reason now... she have doubts to do it.
'I'm just want to learn glyphs from this world. There's nothing wrong with searching that room. Technically it's also my room. She is Luz, and I'm Luz too. So, I can dig through this stuffs without feeling guilty.' Luz though as she went to the desk and sifted through one of the notebooks. The handwriting was hers but slanted a bit and not as smudged as her own handed writing tended to be.
"Hmmm...If I was a glyphs, where would I be?" Luz asked herself, closing the notebook. "No, the wrong question. The right question is, where would I hide a glyphs?" She said before looked underneath the bed.
And found what she was looking for. The ring binder. It was purple with front and back sides covered in Azura stickers. She opened it and started flipping through pages. There was a lot of glyphs. But no one was signed.
"This one look cool." Luz pulled the one page out of the ring binder to take a good long look at it. The glyph was circle with a heptagon and seven triangular shapes forming an star.
She stretched forth his hand towards the paper when her stomach grumbles reminded her that she hadn't eaten in few hours. She looked at the ring binder. 'It can wait.' She thought, throwing it at bed.
Luz go downstairs to see Iniko sitting on couch, busied with her phone levitating over his hand and glowing with magic aura. The squeaking noise coming from the low step to the stairs alerts him of her presence, with teenage boy's attention immediately on her while the phone fall on his palm.
"How did you get my phone?" Luz wasn't angry, just surprise. The girl was convinced that she had her phone in her trousers pocket.
"Luz, I'm the son of the Owl Lady. I learned the best pickpocket tricks before I could walk." Iniko smirked, and he threw her a smartphone, "Now your phone is synchronized with the scrolls. I also added your friends numbers into the contact list."
"Thanks, but why didn't you ask me to give you my phone?"
"Please, where would the fun be in that?"
And the moment Luz turned the phone's screen on, she saw only a glimpse of the time/day on her phone before it begin vibrating, and when she checked it, she realized she was only now receiving a two days' worth of text messages, the bulk of which had come from her two best friends(from this universe). Along with few "Missed Call" notifications.
Finally her phone stopped vibrating and rendered a last message sent to her. It come from Amity.
It was a short message, but Luz's pupils pinpointed after she read it.
~TWO~
"So, now we have the mystery glass orb and a piece of wood with a symbol on it which helps us to... nothing." Eda summed up the situation, after Luz told them about her met with the Bat Queen.
"What does that even represent this symbol?" The witch asked, looking at the complicated half-geometric symbol.
"I want to find out something about this symbol. But we found nothing in library." Luz's eyes moved to the symbol, and she frowned. "I tried to ask the librarian, but he just looked at it and yelled 'not again!', and then threw us out of the library."
"And we are banned." King added.
"Does that symbol is taboo or something?" Eda asked her sister.
Lilith just shook her head, and she said, "There are only list of five banned symbols to which no new has been added." Then she looked strangely at this symbol, and in a very quiet voice, as though talking to herself, said, "At least, I don't know anything about it."
Luz sat between two witches. "I think it could be helpful in swap me for the other Luz."
"Only problem is books were not helpful, and nobody knows anything about this symbol." King nestled himself under Luz's arm to see the symbol again.
"Actually, there is one place where we could found some informations."
If Luz was a bunny her ears would have stood straight upon her head, "Really?"
"Yes," Lilith seemed to hesitate, then countered, "The Emperor's Private Library. But going to that place is practically suicide."
Eda scoffed. "What is dangerous in library? Books don't bite... usually."
"This isn't about the library." Lilith said patiently. "The Librarian is very dangerous person."
"It's no problem for us." The Owl Lady said casually.
"Edalyn, we don't possess our full strength. And even if we did, fighting him would be an terrible idea." Lilith argued.
"Who said anything about a fighting?" A smile, with the hint of a tease, appeared on the younger witch. "We could just sneak into a building and search the books. Opening doors and locks isn't a problem for me."
"This library don't have any locks. No one who had no authority to goes into the Emperor's Private Library and comes out alive."
"Librarian has seen to that."
"What about hide from him in one part of library?" Luz suggested.
"He was subjected to dangerous experiment, the result of which acquired rather extraordinary powers and have very heightened senses. We'd have to become invisible for long time, don't made any sound and covered up our scent. So, he couldn't find out that we come to that's library."
"That might be a bit difficult." Eda unwillingly admitted.
"Maybe not. I'll be right back." Luz ran upstairs, leaving two witches and a demon in living room.
The sounds of thumping feet and crashing filled the house.
"What is she planning?" Lilith asked, looking at stairs.
Eda simply shrugged.
Luz came back three minutes later, carrying few pieces of paper and four colored markers. She sat on the floor, and started painted glyphs on the sheets of paper.
"Luz, what are you doing?" Eda asked, looking at very weird glyph drawing by the teenager. It looked a little like a light glyph.
"One second..." Luz finished drawing and put a little sticky tape on piece of paper. She came up and taped it to Eda's chest.
And tapped it once. Then twice.
No less than a second later, the glyph began to glow before the paper began to melted and Eda felt a curious sensation; cold trickles seemed to be running around her body from the point the glyph was.
"This interesting effect ." said Lilith, staring at her sister.
Eda looked down at her body, or rather, what had been her body, for it didn't look anything like her anymore. It was not invisible; it had simply taken on the exact color and texture of the room behind her. The Owl Lady seemed to have become a witch chameleon."
She looked up at Luz, who stared at Eda with big smile.
"That's a trick I discovered when I experimented with a glyphs." The girl said, putting other piece of paper on Eda to could turn the witch back to normal. "This is the fusion of light glyph and illusions glyph. I call it the chameleonlight."
"I see the the practical uses of this glyph." Eda said, thinking about a few places where she could to break in with this glyph.
"And this?" King asked, pointing at two pieces of paper in Luz hand.
Luz smiled. "For my next presentation I need you and Hooty."
"I heard my name!" Hooty said, swinging himself open to face them.
"Hooty, could you do something for me?" asked Luz, taped one glyph to King's skull and then scooting closer to door.
"Hoot! What specifically?"
"Tell me how was your morning." Luz replied as she slapped a mystery glyph on the home demon's forehead.
"Finally, someone wants listen to my story!" Hooty said before begin talk about his day.
"That voice. That awful voice!" King said in annoyance, but Hooty didn't seem to matter to him.
"Quiet, please." Luz quipped and activated the glyph on King's skull. And there was silence in the room. Hooty's mouth still working fastly, but entirely silent.
The Latina allowed herself a small smile of contentment as she gazed at the surprised witches.
"Did you just made him inaudible?" Lilith asked, still looking at Hooty. The pale woman never even thought it would be possible to make that infernal owl tube on the door went completely quiet.
"For everyone, except for King." Luz said, pointing to the little demon. King was staring at Hooty with this really vexed look on his face. "This fuse glyph captures any sounds you make and sends them other people who had that glyph on their bodies."
"How did you manage to create something like this?" Lilith asked, now sounding a frankly intrigued.
"It was a result of trial and error."
"Luz, do something with this glyph!" King ordered – more whined, really. "I can still hear that awful voice!"
She carefully peel off the glyph, King breathed the sigh of relief but then Hooty's voice become audible to everybody.
"And then the mailman left his whole bag on our porch and walked very fast toward forest." Hooty finished his story. "You guys think he'll come to my tea party tomorrow?" He asked, unaware that only King listened to him (against his will).
"Maybe." Luz told him nicely. "He have to deliver the undelivered mail."
Hooty stretched a bit ,silent and motionless, just starring at Eda, Luz, Lilith and King. "Do you want to hear about my yesterday?"
"Nope." Eda said with her hand in her hip.
"Not now." Luz said, shocking her head.
"No!" King and Lilith said at the same time.
"Rude. Hoot! Hoot!" The living door ornament pouted at them and retracted back to his door.
After the door closed, Eda looked at the teenager, "Let me guess, you also have a glyph that can mask the scent of our bodies."
"Nope but I've found something from the Human Realm that can do this." Luz said with an enigmatic smile.
"Then it's settled, we will breaks into the Emperor's library." said Eda matter-of-factly, as though they were going to the market for grocery shopping.
"It's not an unreasonable decision." Lilith stated a little flatly.
Eda waved her hand, the smile only widening on her lips. "Me and Luz vote go to library. And you gotta respect the democratic process, Lily."
Now, the older Clawthorne looked more annoyed, "Aren't we supposed to wait to doing anything till tomorrow?"
"It looks like the plans have changed."
Yay. My first chapter in 2021. Remember to leave reviews ;)