Welcome to Demigods Witches and Doors, a Owl House x Riordanverse centered story born from me noting there just didn't seem to be anything of this fic type I liked on FFnet or Archive of Our Own. Its the reason I write.
...You may be wondering about that other thing I write if you follow me. I'll be honest there is progress on chapter 52 but my muse has been busy on a lot of things and stressed from eight hour work days+ so...need to get other stuff out. Plus does me no good to only do the same thing all the time. Anyway you will see three chapters of this go up at once because I wanted to write up a few complete ones before I post it, so there is something solid in case my muse wanders off.
Anyway enjoy.
Being a principal was not something people would consider an easy or relaxing job. To be in charge of the futures of not just your employees, but school children whom your actions would directly affect the directions their entire lives would go through was a great burden. Even more so when the choices were less his own to make and his reaction to what happened in the world around him.
He could not control the budget cuts and he'd wish they would stop calling him in fury about them: they'd be better off harassing the people they elected instead. He organized fundraisers to patch those holes, he couldn't stop them beyond asking the people to cut something else or fix those tax inconsistencies.
Of course tax loopholes were his brother's forte, though the current situation was making him wonder if this was also his territory instead of education.
"I'm so glad you could make time for me this morning Principal Hal. The N.C.C.A.G Association for Children with Special Needs and Potential has been interested in talking to you about one of your students for quite a while, and it is unfortunate that it took so long to have this meeting materialize." Said the representative in purple, a smile that was just a bit off in a way that made him uncomfortable.
"My schedule is very busy, and the student you want to talk to me about is among the ones who makes it that busy. I'm surprised anyone would want to talk to me about Luz Noceda."
He was being a little fictitious. He was sure that someone could see all of the antics of that girl and see someone who just needed to have her energy and passions channeled. 'Special Needs and Potential' and all, and if nothing else the girl was special needs. In truth the fact the girl had ADHD was one of the reasons she wasn't expelled, and it was certainly more of an excuse than the kind of delinquent who smoked in the bathroom and smuggled drugs into the school. However this man put him on edge.
The fact his brother, when not detailing how tax loopholes were being abused by major corporations to cause his budget cuts, had sent him a few emails about The N.C.C.A.G Association for Children with Special Needs and Potential because he had made the mistake of mentioning this to him. He had a few things to say about how it was linked to some super-conglomerate called Triumvirate Holdings and that he didn't know what the N.C.C.A.G part of it meant...
(That had gone on all dinner and he wasn't any more sure than his brother. The only thing that really stuck out to him was the full name of the Emperor Nero but someone like Luz was not that kind of special needs. It was probably just 'Nathaniel, Curtis, Conner, Anthony, George' or something)
The representative, who may or may not be tied to 'ultra corporative trillionaire establishment' as his brother would put it, nodded.
"Of course. We at The N.C.C.A.G Association for Children with Special Needs and Potential are always looking for children with untapped potential that our current educational system isn't quite able to see realized. After all can you say that you have really brought out the girl's potential to its fullest?"
"I cannot." He didn't disagree on that one. The girl, Luz, never had a problem that her ideas didn't display passion or interest. It was always the opposite.
The representative was now glancing through a folder that had been provided: thoughts and grades about Luz from her teacher.
Spanish: A-. A clear easy A class for the girl, which as she comes to class and does her work I cannot fault her for. Struggles with a minor case of dyslexia, otherwise likely higher grade.
History. C. The girl's disabilities affect her in class, but the link between fantasy stories and classical eras gives her some interest and focus boosts. Good group project student in all ways but raw group project part completion, best project presenter in class when directed.
Science. D. Girl unable to remain focused and struggles with instructions due to disabilities. Not allowed near chemicals that can explode.
English. C+. Motivation for book reports when given free choice always present in her actions, often to an extreme. Less motivated with non-fiction assignments. Dyslexia allowance applied.
Greek-Latin 101. A. Girl shows remarkable ability to learn both languages despite budget cuts. Translation of 'Good Witch Azura' chapters into Ancient Greek surprisingly good.
Math. D-. No further comment.
Art. A. Girl is very good at a variety of artistic expressions, and as long as properly directed no issues to report. A gem of a girl.
Computer Science. B. Unremarkable bar a need to ensure is not reading fanfiction in class.
Gym. B. The child has energy but no physical conditioning. Participates until she hurts herself, is all I can ask for.
Music (general): B-. Girl has potential but requires extensive direction to stay on task. Has interest and talent but seemingly in narrow window of interest.
Luz Noceda. Average girl with a bad case of ADHD and a minor case of Dyslexia. Single mother, boundless creative energy, impulsive.
"Allow me to explain now just what our programs at The N.C.C.A.G Association for Children with Special Needs and Potential can do for a girl such as this as well as monetary contributions and scholarship opportunities for both yourself and Ms. Noceda to consider when sending her to our special school in New York City..."
Luz Noceda. Girl of interest to an organization that was accredited but unnerving in some way on both his and his brother's fields of expertise. A girl who needed somewhere other than his school to truly become the person she is meant to be and thrive in society in some form.
…
The end of year book reports had gone well. No one had absolutely bombed the assignment, the books covered were a wide range of topics and genres, and Luz had presented her project without anything macabre, unsettling, or dangerous. That was, of course, rather odd.
It wasn't on its surface a bad thing. When Luz was into a book she gave a very enthusiastic, really well researched, and very accurate report on it. It was a teacher's dream to have students be like that. The problems Luz had was some tendency to get lost in tangents about unimportant details about the King Arthur Mythos unrelated to the assignment, and to go overboard with props and special effects. A book report whose antagonist was a giant snake that didn't involve any actual snakes was, on the face of it, a good thing. It was also so out of character it stood out to a teacher as did any notable shifts in student behavior.
"Luz, a minute."
The girl stopped on her way out, her body frozen in mid-step as she turned back to her. It was the last class of the day, so she had nowhere to go in a hurry.
"Is something wrong Ms. Wednesday?" the fatherless girl asked.
"It's about your book report. It was...different than you usually do. No one seems to have told you to keep it tame."
The girl's foot finally made it to the ground and she pulled her hood up, covering her head completely.
"Yeah...I guess it wasn't my best work. I just...didn't put my all into it."
Her 'half-assing' a project was more enthusiasm than many's full attention, but that was a minor detail. What was bothering Luz that badly.
She gestured towards her student, to see if she'd elaborate what was bothering her.
"It's stupid." Luz tried to deflect.
"I teach teenagers because I prefer stupid problems to 'real' ones like mortgages and debt."
Luz looked like she wanted to say something, but she thought otherwise and took a deep breath.
"Okay, and I'm not lying when I said it was stupid. It's just...I'm hearing everyone talking about what they are going to do over the summer. Friends going on camping trips together, going to Disney world with each other, going to the Mythomagic tournament in D.C with one another...and it's getting to me."
Luz looked her way, like she was wondering if she was going to tell her to stop and that it was stupid and not worth talking about. She saw no such look and only understanding, so she kept at it.
"I mean it normally is fine. I don't have friends, I have stories and anime and cartoons and my mom, but she's gotten asked to take on a lot more shifts this summer so she's going to be even more busy and out of the house so I'm not going to really have anyone. I mean I'm not mad at her or anything, she helps people, she makes money, she's doing good things and helpful things and everything, but I can't help but feel lonely and I'm..."
"If you were going to say selfish, I'd say you aren't being. Selfish would be blaming your mother for something she can't realistically do anything about. It's okay that you feel that way, and it's beyond okay that you also know that it isn't your mother's fault. Plus think about it this way. You are 14, and that means you can do a lot more on your own now. If you are lonely you can just ask your mother if you can go out and do things, and more than you think. Sure it isn't a job or a car, but I'm sure you can find something to do that you'd have never thought of."
The girl smiled sadly and took her hood down. That was a good sign.
"Maybe it is that simple."
"And sometimes you can find adventures in the real world. Trust me as an adult; the world isn't as boring as it might seem sometimes. It's no Azura, but it's no Seinfield either."
"What's Seinfield."
"Boring." She joked as the girl turned and left. It wasn't until the girl was gone that she clutched the underside of her left arm, the old brand stinging her. The world had adventure in it, she had said. That was true, and as there was no Mr. Noceda around the girl's energetic self...well for her own sake she hoped the adventure didn't find her.
Nothing good came from the wolves finding you, and it wasn't even them that was the problem. It was the people they told you to find afterwards. People she was happy to leave behind after her free college was done and she paid her ten years of hell and mockery.
"Father if that girl's one of us, is there anything she can find that's not the Legion? She'd be miserable there. Even more than I was." She asked the tattoo she always kept covered. A tattoo of the Caduceus and SPQR got attention in a way she no longer wanted any part of, especially the later.
...
"Mami can I have permission to go out and do stuff without asking you first this summer...no that sounds bad. Oh, Mami is it okay if I leave the house without telling you first...phrasing. Oh oh Mami if I am back before you get back at nueve de la noche I can do anything else right...oh geeze that's worse somehow."
Ms. Wednesday's suggestion was good on paper. She didn't see any problem with it, and she was sure her mom would be fine with her as long as she got home before a certain time. Her mom would want her out of the house and doing stuff...but how on earth she was going to
"Mom is it okay if I just text you when I go out somewhere this summer? I'll always be back before dark and text about what places I go to just so I can get out of the house a little."
"Oh hey that's a great one. Thanks...um..." she turned around from her ponderous haze as she walked through the school to thank whoever gave her the words that were just escaping her.
The man behind her was dressed in a janitor's outfit, though she didn't have a name or a 'name' to put to him. He had a similar skin color to her and her mother, with salt and pepper hair and looked like he ran a lot. He was around her mother's age, maybe a few years older. A phone with two snakes on the case was in his hand and at his belt were all the fixing of a janitor: sprays, keys, the works.
"Are you new? I don't recognize you. Did they hire a new janitor?"
"Oh, you can tell I'm new? Do you know the names of the janitors here?" He asked with a bit of interest.
"Er well...not really, but I do recognize them if I don't have a name to their face. My mom...well she kind of works in a job like that and I know how hard it is."
The janitor nodded in agreement.
"It's easy sometimes to miss how hard the people outside the top work to keep it all going. Of course you can miss plenty at the level you are on as you do below you, so why are you alone? Shouldn't you be out with your friends? School's out for the summer, the world's your oyster as my uncle would say. You should be enjoying it and all of the good times ahead. Well assuming the world doesn't end in two years of course."
"That's an odd number. Not sure who thinks the world blows up in 2022 but..."
"August 18th 2022 to be exact. So about two years, two months, and thirteen days, unless it is August 23rd of this year."
"Um...regardless of thosevery specific dates that I don't get the reason for, it isn't even in November, I...well I don't have any friends. I have...um...books, and shows and games and fanfiction of all of those things...I'm kind of weird."
Weird enough that she was usually fine with that, and weird enough it almost looked like his snake phone case was wiggling a bit. The snakes, not the case. Was it a movement based shimmering...whatever you called that effect?
"Plenty of weird people find friends, no one is ever as alone as they think. They just haven't walked down the right road yet to find someone who cares about them." The new janitor's phone beeped as he quickly went to check it. "My apologies, message. Could be important."
His check was over as quickly as it had begun.
"Fortunately not. Just an advertisement for Suspicion Island. A certain someone I know would rather watch that show than do something about the dying tree of his or the Oregon thing. Then he gets upset when his nephew teams up with two flower munchers to fight poxies that he didn't know until I mentioned it…"
"That show?! Who actually likes that show?" Luz had tried it and all it did was make her appreciate her mother's boring shows a bit more. At least the dead who came back to life there weren't dinosaurs!? (Well actually pterodactyls but still, what sort of crazy person would watch that?!)
A sudden burst of thunder from somewhere made her jump and drove questions about flower munchers from her mind.
"We were having thunderstorms today?"
"Nope." The janitor shook his head as if the thunder was something mundane. "Of course it's all sorts of people who watch that show: powerful men with issues, teenage girls lost in a swamp far from home, many varied demographics. Of course shows are a good way to make friends. Just imagine if you got into a show like that and met, oh I don't know, a girl who really needs a friend and a help to really blossom into her true potential, a young boy who feels like he needs an illusion of being more than himself to be seen by those around him, and a real life Hecate who needs an Azura in her life."
"If the dice are right." A voice Luz could almost just make out seemed to add at the end of that also very specific tangent.
"People who'd want me to be their friend? That would be nice, too bad that only happens in books."
She blinked after she said that.
"Dios mio I sound depressed when I say it like that."
"Life's not all that different from a book sometimes, especially these days. We live in an age of renewed heroism and monsters, of trials and adventures. A new heroic age is beginning, and more people have it in them to be heroes than one thinks. A single voice, a single choice, a single act and you have a hero, and those choices add up, and all it takes to become part of it and make a difference is taking that first step."
The janitor, very invested in this pep talk of his, moved so quickly to the door leading out of the school, presenting it to her as if it was a new car he had just unveiled.
"All it takes is taking the first step out into the wider world. Just reaching the door, feeling it in your gut, and declaring to the world at large that you are Luz Noceda, and you are ready to take the step."
A weird feeling in her gut? The janitor's eyebrow rose a fraction of a centimeter, and she felt a sudden, new feeling in her gut. It wasn't fear or fury or sadness, but she didn't have time to try to figure out what emotion it was. She just really suddenly wanted to open that door!
"Yeah you're right Mr. New Janitor! Well hopefully not about the world ending in Augusts to come or stuff like that but I should see about finding friends! Ms. Wednesday said that the world is more interesting than I think it is, and whatever this 'heroic age' is supposed to mean I want to see it! I don't know if anything cool is beyond this door but I'm going to see!"
With that and that feeling she couldn't quite describe in her gut she opened the door and took a great long step through it. Only at the last second did she notice the door was filled with a bright light like a portal and that she couldn't see what was on the other side. Or the fact that as soon as she walked through it the door closed behind her.
…
He closed the door as she went through, trusting in his gut and his dice that she'd get what she needed and be safe from everything there...as safe as she could be in any case.
"Good luck Luz Noceda! Now next stop Gautama's place, then I really need to figure out what I should fill with the winds for Perceus..."
"The Hercules Bust Heads Thermos maybe? You don't have the complete set and it is just taking up space otherwise." one of his snakes suggested.
"No George, something less collectible from a less under appreciated show. Maybe a Real Housewives of Alfheim canteen."
"He'd have to get one from Aphrodite. She loves imported reality television."
"I wouldn't know why. Hades uses shows like that in the Fields of Punishment."
"Elysium gets deleted scenes from Hercules Busts Heads."
He shook his head. He still had a bit to sort that one out, and he had multiple apocalypses to deal with in the meantime. 2020 was a horrible year.
…
Luz wasn't sure how long she stared down from a point that was most certainly not outside of her school, but it was still not processing in her mind just...just what she was looking at.
She loved fantasy and she loved it in nearly all of its forms. She loved the science fantasy of galaxies far away. She loved the modern fantasies of wizarding schools. She loved urban fantasy and high fantasy and gothic fantasy. She wasn't a particular fan of dark fantasy stories or 'fantasy romance' (technically called paranormal romance) but she wasn't really supposed to be reading or watching either of those types of stories so...
Staring down at the city below her, a city made of bones and marble and monster parts. A city where smoke and giant arms rose up from the buildings and grabbed shrieking creatures in the air before slinking down to earth, a city filled with inhuman grumblings and sounds...
"Oh my...oh my...oh my..." She repeated as she took a step away from the edge. What...what was happening!?
She took a rapid breath, trying to calm herself. She just...somehow traveled into an actual fantasy world. Or she was dreaming. Or she died and was in the bad place. She really hoped it wasn't the last one. If she died and went to hell her mom would kill her!
(Also that would make Father Horacio right and she did not want Father Horacio to be right. Father Horacio sucked and had no sense of good entertainment).
She darted to the door she had come from, panic sparking every cell of her body. She reached for the handle.
"Alright Mr. Janitor if you did this to help me...um...please don't do that again. I'm not sure what sort of help this is so I'm just going to go home..." she tugged at the door and opened it wide, only to stare in confusion as she didn't see her school hallway or light this time. She just saw a closet filled with junk.
She slowly closed the door, gulping loudly.
"Ah ha ha ha ha. Funny. Real funny door. Now show me home!"
She opened it again to the same result.
"Home?"
Again she opened the door, and again there was no change.
"...Mami?" She quietly begged as she opened the door again, and again there was nothing. Her entire body was trembling and she was almost shaking the doorframe. She really hoped it was from her fear and not something else.
The horror was sitting in her stomach like a splash of freezing water, and her gut had a similar feeling to that of when she had opened the door the first time, just with a different emotion. She swung the door wide and saw the portal return. She grinned and was ready to step through it when she felt something come through the portal from the other side.
Cold. Freezing, bitter, terrible cold. Cold like she had never felt before. It made her entire body shiver uncontrollably, her body almost involuntarily jumping trying to warm itself up. It was like opening a freezer door, and she hadn't even taken a step into the freezer itself. She slammed the door shut, the cold air ceasing to bathe over her as she stared at nothing.
"What...what was that?! What is going on..."
She heard the fluttering of wings and turned to see a pink fairy fluttering next to her. An honest to god pink fairy, in a white dress and cute and not scary or weird or freaky at all.
"Um, hello there little fairy...you wouldn't happen to know if I'm dreaming or if this actually happening..."
The fairy's mouth suddenly opened really wide to expose teeth that looked far too large for it to actually possess.
"GIVE ME YO..."
It was going to say 'your' next but she slapped the creature down to the ground like a bug before it could finish. She promptly ran off screaming into the city, which was probably a bad idea but she was freaking out!
...
The city was even scarier up close. Yet somehow, it was also calming to walk through it, as little sense as it sounded. It at least got her to stop screaming and take in just where she had ended up.
It was like Halloween Town in real life, or Death City, or Hogsmeade in those fanfics written while on drugs. It was filled with monsters and people with pointed ears like elves and everything seemed crazy and twisted, yet it felt like it functioned and moved like reality and not a dream. So not like the fanfics made on drugs even though the town did in fact resemble something from the series if made on drugs.
No one she saw had ears like hers though, and she reflexively had put her hoodie on to mask that little fact. Fortunately for just how curious she was of everything she was seeing and hearing around her, her hoodie did not restrict her periphery vision much.
"Two for one deal! Buy two brooms and get a third one free! Good for families and raiding parties!"
"Fresh monster meat! Get your fresh monster meat! 30 Snails per pound for Reptilian Demons, 40 Snails per pound Mammal Demons..."
"Demon grooming kit! If you need to groom your demon you've come to the right place!"
She couldn't tell what she wanted to stare at more: the brooms that made her want to shout 'actual Quidditch' loudly, cute little monsters that looked adorable yet dangerous in a way that made her want to shout 'Pokemon battle!' loudly, and meat that made her want to shout 'I am hungry!' loudly. She wasn't all that hungry, but what was one supposed to shout about when around giant hunks of meat?
It was so amazing, so crazy, so….wait she still didn't know how she got here and how she'd get home.
Thus her eyes were drawn away from the people juggling flaming eyeballs and the person who was walking a dog with three heads ( ¡Ay, que lindo!) to a much more boring alleyway with a door she could try it on.
"All right Luz, you managed to open a door to someplace really cold and when you didn't know what you were doing and egged on by a janitor you ended up here. So if you try again maybe you can get somewhere else. Now…..home!"
She opened the door, and it just moved like a regular door. She slowly closed it.
She taped her shoes together; muttering there was no place like home to herself and then opened it again. Again just a door.
"Probably glad I didn't end up in a tornado doing that, or Kansas. Come on Luz you can do it. Mami is going to start freaking out if you don't get home soon, and she'll be so mad…."
She felt that odd feeling in her gut again and she opened the door slowly, seeing something different than the same opened door this time.
"Home?" She asked no one in particular in a whisper as she opened the door more. She smelled the smoke before the heat and flames rushed out at once.
"!AH CALIENTE!"
…
As far as she could tell the fire didn't spread that far outside of the alley and there were firefighters here. Still she ran and….and….what was she supposed to say!?
She didn't know what kept happening, or how she kept doing that, or how she'd even begin to explain it. She panicked and probably just committed a crime and…and….
She slumped against a window of a shop, sighing to herself. There….there had to be something she could do. Some way to get home.
Flutter flutter
She felt her ears perk up at the sound of something flying in the air. It was buzzing in place, like a hummingbird over a flower.
"Please don't be another fairy." She begged before shooting up, ready to swat anything with teeth. However what she saw instead was amazing. Shoes. Shoes with wings.
They were converse shoes: red with pure white soles. Much more importantly they had a pair of black bat wings in the middle of them and they were flying around the bird cage they were in like they were alive. Flying shoes.
She watched them with longing. It was like when she saw the Azura books for the first time, they drew her to them in a way she couldn't explain, but it was a yearning in the depths of her soul. The Azura books had been the first books she had really loved, books that let her power through her mild dyslexia to fully engross herself in them. It wasn't quite the same yearning, she doubted she'd want to cosplay as the shoes or write fanfiction about them (she had standards), but there was a part of her that just had to have them.
There was a price tag next to them: 95 Snails. She felt her hopes crash.
Shoes that cost 95 anything would be something she and her mom couldn't afford. There were people who could spend that much on shoes, and they weren't one of them. Her mom was able to save money for college and retirement and stuff, but not if they were buying shoes that cost that much. Plus 'Snails'.
She had some money on her, but she had no idea what the conversion rate was, and she doubted somewhat if there was anywhere she could somehow. Was this as close as she'd ever get to shoes like that that spoke to her very soul!?
"Yeah those are some nice shoes kid. Personally I think that the price is a bit of a mark up but hey that's the economy for you. I'd suggest you get the shoes the fun way personally."
She jumped at the sudden voice, a voice of an older woman with a smooth sass to it. The woman was tall and pale skinned, with billowing long gray hair. She had yellow eyes and wore a red dress. A single gold fang jetted out of her mouth and a green bandanna with polka dots hid her ears. In one hand was a staff with a wooden owl on the end while the other arm had two armbands on the mid-arm. The first was glowing and almost looked like it had a spinning ring of glowing symbols on it that almost looked like hieroglyphic and had discolored skin around it that almost looked like a burn and the second glowed a light blue and was right at the edge of where the burned skin was and, and it might just be her imagination, but it looked like the edge of where the two skin colors were at was constantly shifting like if skin was constantly being burned and healed continuously.
"I wasn't! I'd never!" She reflexively defended herself. Her mom didn't raise a thief and she'd never steal anything! Sure she could see, if she really thought about it, how to steal those shoes, or the woman's yellow ring, but she'd never do it! Never! That was bad! Really really bad!
The woman laughed to herself.
"Oh you were raised with a moral compass huh? Ha! Glad to see that it sometimes works, but if you really want to be a goodie two-shoes about it I can give you a bit of a leg up. You just need to do something for me, human."
"You're calling me human like you aren't one." She nervously said as the woman laughed before she moved her bandanna, exposing a giant pointed ear. The woman grinned before re-covering said ear.
"Not a bad disguise kid, no one is going to tell that you're not from around these parts just looking at you. But I happen to know a thing or two about humans more than the average witch around these parts. I sell human stuff you see, and I need some stock right now. Supplies have all dried up for a while now, and I find a human who wants money to get something she wants the boring way. I think we can solve each other's problems quite easily."
"You….you aren't going to sell me are you?" Luz asked nervously as the woman laughed.
"Ha! No, I want to sell your stuff. I pay you something for it, I sell it for more to some sucker, and bang! We both win! You get your shoes and I get to keep food on my table so my roommate doesn't eat my security system or vice versa."
Luz wasn't sure that it was actually going to work. Stuff she had was worth 95 Snails, whatever that was, plus any possible tax? She held her bag up to the pointy-eared woman, who smirked as she plunged her hand into the bag.
"Wow kid you stuffed a ton into this thing. I'm impressed."
She scratched behind her head and chuckled nervously.
"Oh well I'm an amazing packer. Mami can't understand how I do it, but I can store a ton of stuff without breaking my back or the bag and can always find it. I honestly kind of forget what I have in there."
The woman grinned as she pulled something up, but just looked stunned as she pulled up the head of her otter costume. The older woman looked at her in surprise, then the costume, then her again.
"I'm amazing at folding clothes."
The woman didn't look convinced as she jabbed the costume back to where she had put it before pulling up a trio of pens . She clicked a few of them in surprise for a moment before shrugging.
"You want a snail each?"
"Sure."
That set the tune of what happened next. For the next few minutes the woman would rummage through her stuff and either give a price or push it back down out of sight. What the woman wanted from her was just so random Luz wasn't sure if there was even a pattern involved, but the random stuff was stuff she wasn't attached to so she had no problem selling it. The only thing she rejected was her asking to buy her leggings and sell them as 'human shedded skin'.
She liked those leggings.
The woman pulled out a rubix cube from her bag next.
"You humans still solve these things in competitions to establish dominance right?"
"In some circles, yes." She answered as the woman chuckled.
"Well that's the ticket. 50 snails for the cube good for you?"
"Good?! Good!? That's great!"
The woman grinned as she made the transaction, a massive grin on her face.
"I'm sure I can sell this 'human dominance cube' in a minute. That should be 95 snails plus tax right kid?"
"Maybe?"
"It is. Anyway kid when you're done buying those overpriced fad shoes why don't you find me. I have some questions I'd like to ask you."
"Sure!" Luz shouted as she ran into the shoe store, all her newly acquired snails in hand.
…
Eda Clawthorn, Owl Lady and seller of human stuff laughed to herself an hour later as she counted all of the snails she had managed to make.
Best trade she ever got up to. That 'human dominance cube' alone paid off that entire deal with the human and all of the other stuff had either gotten sold or filled her stock for the next little while.
Girl really had a lot of stuff on her, and for the life of her she couldn't understand how the bag fit it all. She had met and gotten annoyingly familiar with what human witches, or 'Magicians' (or Shesh) could do a while ago, and it was almost like what they did with the Duat, but it wasn't. For one thing it didn't burn her skin to poke like those things did, and it was still in this plane of reality. She didn't seem like she was from the House of Life either.
If the human was she'd surely have been from Desjardins with that 500 he owed her, or the girl would have known what she was doing. That girl was more lost than Hooty.
How did she get here? She was the one with the portal and hers had been blown up by the House of Life months ago. Took her a month after they apologized to figure out a way home, and the only good thing that had come out of that stay was knowledge and the anti-curse armband they made for her after she nearly ate Desjardins that she had to numb with another enchanted ban or their magic would turn her arm into crunchy toast.
Better than a feral monster sure, but even numb it hurt like Hooty's singing. And if it ever broke….
"Oh hey it's youAHHHHH!"
She was broken out of her thoughts as the human flew down on her new winged shoes initially with skill and familiarity, but she didn't seem to know how to land properly so she crashed down in front of her somewhat-patchy stocked stand face first.
"You okay human? You dead?"
"I'm alive." The girl almost seemed to sing, her shoe wings fluttering. In an impressive burst of agility the girl almost bounced back onto her feet, shaking her face clear of dirt and smiling.
"That. Was . Awesome! I need to learn to stop better but I was flying! These are the best shoes ever!"
She shook her head at the teenage glee before looking at the teen.
"You know, human, I never got your name. Mine's Eda the Owl Lady, the greatest and most powerful witch in the Boiling Isles."
"My name is Luz, Luz Noceda." The girl replied. With a snap of her fingers her stand packed up into a security-proof disguise as she pulled out the slip of paper.
"Well glad to meet you Luz. Your stuff tripled my profits for the day and I do want to know just how a human ended up here with a clear unawareness of how she even did it. Let's talk about it over lunch shall we?"
She had a coupon for a two for one sandwich deal and the place didn't sell food to demons so it was either this or she'd have to give the next guard trying to grab her a sandwich. And that would be silly.
Author notes for clarity reasons.
The events of the Riordanverse in story are currently just a few weeks ahead of the events of A Sea of Monsters. Percy is still in school with Tyson, doesn't know Tyson is a Cyclops, etc etc. Among other Riordanverse notes Sam isn't a Valkyrie yet, Magnus still lives with his mother, the Kane kids are split between their father and maternal grandparents, so on and so on.
The events of the Rick Riordan Presents books, bar the futuristic Dragon Pearl, are also in play. The events of the Mesopotamian 'City of the Plague God' occurred between the events of the first two Percy Jackson books, with the one exception that Percy ended up involved. As a result Percy starts the events of the second book a bit less rusty and more than a little concerned about the fact that both Ishtar and Aphrodite exist (and is still figuring out how that works). Percy also has Gilgamesh as a professional reference.
The events of Amphibia and Gravity Falls are also going on at the moment, with Gravity Falls maybe being a week or two out from the first episode. As to why...I got bored and no one can say I can't but it had something to do with seeing a clip of Suspicion Island and thinking 'Zeus would watch that show'. Plus its in the background as something to pull if I make more chapters and need more than 19 S1 episodes.
Luz's powers here are a Demigod ability based on a canon ability demonstrated once expanded by conjecture from a Percy J x Dresden Files fic called Deep As The Sea. I don't know anything about the Dresdenverse but the basic idea for Luz is that her primary ability allows her to cross boundaries, though she at the moment has no mastery of it. Her three portals in story were to The Boiling Isles, Niflheim, and Muspelheim.
As an extension on the powers of merchants I have also dubbed her with the power of Anne Boonchuy levels of packing skills! Spacebattles Forum talk suggests she probably got the otter suit in Boiling Isles and didn't already have it with her, but I think this is funnier. Note this is not saying Anne is a demigod. The other two however...
Anyway two questions. One, should I continue to have Luz occasionally speak Spanish or is too painful and obvious I am not bilingual by any stretch of the imagination?
Second is if you all would be curious about me attempting to open or close each chapter going forward with a in-universe info segment. Basically in another project that was set to occupy my muse I had taken to including in-universe info segments and I can see how it would work in this project, however unlike the other project (which would have a segment from both parts of the crossover it would mostly be focused on the more developed (and thus able to be developed paradoxically in my opinion) Riordanverse end. You guys interested in say, Setne's personal notes on the different 'categories' of Gods, a discussion of the variety of powers a demigod can or cannot be born with by Dionysus, or a discussion on multiple heritages and how that relates to Annabeth and Frank by the House of Life? Let me know and I'll write something up for the next two chapters.
(There are probably not going to be any for the non-Riordan parts)
Anyway see you tomorrow.