Part 2: Chapter 3 - Vulnerable Pulse

The weeks after Luz was gone were the hardest, Amity told herself. She was still on the outs with Boscha and the rest of the gang, and things with Willow were still.. Awkward. Amity had gotten used to the human barging into random pieces of her life without a care in the world, and without her around she felt more lonely than she had in a long time. So, she threw herself into her studies.

Which were two tracks, now. Convincing her parents hadn't been easy, even when she said that it was Oracle magic, and that mixing magic was something the Emperor's Coven was expected to be proficient at anyway. She had almost lost hope for her plan when her parents revealed that her mother had been chosen to replace Miss Clawthorne as the head coven leader, and Amity pointed out that as a Blight she would have to show she was willing to work harder than others, just so no one could accuse the family of nepotism.

That had sold her mother on the idea, at least. She had even left several old Oracle textbooks on Amity's desk that night. Her father had even patted her on the shoulder affectionately, saying that they would allow it, and were proud of her for taking the initiative.

From that night forward her workload doubled with school, and she began to have a much greater appreciation for how Luz had done at Hexside. Two tracks meant twice as much effort, and Luz had been enrolled in all of them!

She kept trying the scrying spell with the use of the Owl Lady's truesight potion, but nothing changed. It was always the same smudged woods and an out of focus girl pacing in front of what Eda had explained was a broken down house that the portal door had once connected to. These attempts, and speaking about them with the Clawthorne sisters, took up most of the time in between her new school workload, so much so that homework began to take a back seat to finding a way to see and talk to Luz.

It's two months after Luz was sent away that Amity comes home much later than usual, having been pouring through books in the library for an answer to how she could fix the scrying spell, when she enters Blight Manor to raised, angry voices. It doesn't take her more than a moment to decipher that its her siblings arguing with her parents in the study near the entryway.

Stepping carefully with her bag slung over a shoulder, Amity cringes when the door smashes open and both of her siblings come out, looking back into the room. "-already told you what coven we want to join!"

She can't remember the last time she had heard Emira yell at someone that wasn't Edric, let alone their parents. The twins continued on towards the stairs, not noticing her at all.

But her hope that she would avoid being involved in whatever had just happened at all was gone the moment two older witches stepped out into the hallway. It looked as though her father was just about to say something when his golden eyes fell on her. "Oh, Amity." His words drew the gaze of her mother as well, causing her stand up a bit straighter as he glanced in the direction the twins had gone before looking back to her.

She could tell he wanted to say something, could see the regret for whatever had been said in that room etched into his tired expression, but her mother spoke up first, in a tone that was sweet as honey. "Don't worry about your brother and sister, worry about your own studies." A sweetness that did not meet Odalia Blight's eyes. "I noticed you scored only a ninety percent on your last test in Abominations. Your future is at stake if you cannot maintain both of the tracks we have allowed you to enroll in."

Amity suppresses her instinct to comment that it was a well above passing grade, and the urge to flinch at the words. She was spending most of her day at school now, studying hard for both of her classes. A little less than perfection was still better than most of the other students, better than the twins!

And she wasn't having arguments with both of them.

It didn't seem fair that the standard for her was so much higher.

But Amity didn't say that, she didn't allow herself to sigh in frustration or stamp her foot like she wanted to. She gave a curt nod and spoke with an even, practiced tone. "Yes, mother. I'll do better."

Luz had been gone for a few months when Amity finally discovers a clue to what she has been searching for, inside the old textbooks her mother gave her. Written in the margins on a particularly well worn copy of magical theories on Oracle spells is a modified formula of the scry spell. The handwriting is perfect, curved and even, one that she recognizes instantly as her mother's.

From what she can piece together from the notes, it looked like Odalia Blight at her age had been working on a way to do something similar, using the scry spell to speak and interact with someone over a distance. And her mother had been attempting to modify the scrying spell to do so, incredibly advanced magic for a witch her age when she had owned these books. Even for Amity's age this was beyond anything they were supposed to be learning in class, the professors always stressing that fundamentals should be learned and perfected before any attempt to modify was made.

Days blurred together as she spent all of her waking hours and energy on modifying the spell. During class, during lunch, even during the time she was normally supposed to be devoting to homework. Amity barely checked her scroll anymore, and the days between talking to Willow became weeks, with texts answered only in the quiet hours where she was trying to coax her exhausted mind to sleep.

Willow didn't mind.

At least, Amity didn't notice if she did.

It's four months since she began her path to speak to Luz again that it all comes crashing down.

For days upon end now, Amity had been modifying the formulas of the scrying spell, scrawling page after page of new ways she thought could work in a journal she keeps hidden in a place even the twins wouldn't think to look for something to tease her with, underneath all of her half-finished homework.

Her test scores in both tracks had taken a hit, and luckily her mother's new position has occupied enough of her time that she hadn't seemed to notice yet. But Amity was living on borrowed time with the way she was working. It wasn't until she used the last of the truesight potion on another fruitless attempt that she breaks the spell circle out of rage upon seeing the smudged nothingness of the trees that Luz seems to walk through every day.

She tells herself it is pointless, as she marches to the Owl House that day.

The changes can't work, even her mother abandoned them later in the book for something called soul projection. There was nothing about that in any of her other books, and asking one of her Oracle professors had earned her nothing but a stern warning that it was dangerous magic reserved only for full-fledge witches of the Oracle coven.

It's when she's listening to Eda banter on about how all they need a stronger truesight potion or how she needs to just keep trying that Amity feels some cord of frustration deep within her snap. Maybe its the lack of sleep. Maybe it was the implication that she wasn't trying hard enough. She doesn't remember exactly what she said, only that she yelled most of it until the end. Only that she was cruel.

She remembers telling the Owl Lady that Luz was gone. That she needed to focus on her schooling.

That her future is at stake if she can't maintain both of her tracks now.

That night, a soft knock at her bedroom door just after dinner took her out of her line of self pitying thought long enough to answer it. Suppressing a gasp when she saw it was her father, Amity took a step back and clasped her hands behind her back. "Father. Do you require me for something?"

It was all so formal on her end, learned behaviors that had been drilled into her by her mother. But Alador Blight just sighed and placed a hand on the door frame, looking for a moment as if he was using it for support.

Amity softly questioned her own memories. Had her father always had bags under his eyes? Even his suit jacket was rumpled in several places, looking like it hadn't been cleaned for a few days. "Amity. I wanted to check in, after seeing your latest grade report from school."

She gulped, eyes flicking up to meet her father's gaze. Instead of the judgement she thought she'd find in his golden eyes, she only found a flash of concern before it was buried behind his tired exterior. "I-I.."

"Your mother has been trusting me to keep an eye on that, but I seem to keep losing the letters in my workshop. Abominations work, you understand how messy it is." Amity stared up at her father, not knowing exactly how to respond. Was he saying what she thought he was saying? "But with things in the Emperor's Coven coming under control again, I believe she will want to take a more active role in your schooling once more."

"Y-yes sir, I'll get my grades in line at once!" She managed to squeak out the words, wondering why they had made him flinch so.

He raised his hand toward her, reaching out before pausing and letting it fall to his side as if having thought better of whatever he was about to do. Instead he straightened and gave a slow nod. "So long as we understand one another." He turned to leave then, as awkward as his arrival had been. When he glanced back at her, she was still standing in the doorway, stunned and staring back at him. "Get some rest, Amity. You do your best work with a well rested mind."

There was a soft smile that crinkled two bright gold eyes that made her nod hurriedly before he turned away again and walked down the hallway. She didn't have to check the mirror in her room to know that for as tired as her father had looked, she was barely a step above walking corpse at this point.

Closing the door, Amity's hand lingered on the knob as she pondered what had just happened, breathing out a slow sigh of relief before turning to get ready for bed.

With the constant obsession of the scry spell forgotten in an unmarked journal in her desk, maintaining the workload of two tracks filled enough of Amity's time that she can often forget that she feels so alone. The friend-sized hole in her life slowly started to go away as she ignored it more and more.

At least, she told herself it was going away.

Her grades improve to the perfection she held before just in time for her mother to pay a bit more attention, thanks in part to her father's warning. Her mother stands up at dinner on night, congratulating and toasting her for her hard work. It would've been something that made her swell with pride even a year before, but it feels.. Wrong.

Because her mother doesn't say it to her, so much as she says it at the twins, who bristle and glare at their plates while Amity has praise she once yearned for heaped on her.

It feels hollow, but she plays the part she knows how to play, and thanks her mother.

Six months after the human was banished from the Boiling Isles, Amity is halfway to nodding off with an open book in her bed when she hears a light tapping at her window. There no note with the small palisman, just a familiar owl that hoots at her happily and drops a crystal vial in her hand. Amity takes it gingerly, not sure if she should just smash it rather than dare to hope. Instead, she stuffs it in that drawer, next to the journal she pretends doesn't exist.

But she feels so alone now, and she knows how much better it felt when the human was here.

Her resolve lasts until the next day she has off, while the twins are gone and her parents are both out on coven business.

Digging the journal out and palming the vial, Amity sat on the edge of her bed, glancing through the notes to reacquaint herself with the modified version she came up with. It was still the scrying spell, but hopefully it was a version that used more of her own magical energy and could more easily pass the interference that lay between the two worlds.

After a long hour of indecision, Amity stood up and marched to the center of her room. Uncapping the potion, she could smell just how much stronger the Owl Lady had made this batch of truesight. Where there had been no odor before, there was now a pungent earthy smell to it, filling the room as she stared at it. One, two, three.. Fourfivesix! Doubling the amount of drops she was told to consume of the potion, she shook her head at the taste and swallowed it despite her trepidation.

Steadying herself, Amity centered her stance and raised her finger to draw the spell circle. Her form was as perfect as always, the power she had once had to claw out of her now leaping up at her command. But she was tense, so tense she gripped the vial harder than she had meant to.

"Ow!" Her cry was one of instinct as there was a crack and the small container shattered, shards of crystal digging into her fingers and palm. She barely had time to register the thick crimson liquid was beginning to drip through her closed hand when her eyes were pulled to the brilliant flash of violet light as her spell completed.

This was.. Different than it should have been, even with modifications, like something had supercharged her spell.

It ripped her out of her own senses, shooting her across the blank space between worlds until she found herself slamming down into what she hoped was the Human Realm. The walls were an ugly tan color that was cut off by brown carpet, and there was a bustling sound that caught her off guard.

No longer were things smudged and out of focus, everything looked and sounded as real as if she was standing there, and Amity would have gasped if she was currently attached to her lungs.

"Now, Mr. Boyle, I've heard some conflicting things from other students about what happened."

The voice brought her whipping about. Or at least, her perception through the spell. She wasn't quite sure what she was looking at, at first. Within the small room, there was two chairs and a large desk. Behind it was a man, who Amity assumed had just spoken, who was staring at a boy to her right through large glasses.

In the chair opposite the boy was the target of her spell, and her brief hope was immediately dashed as she saw that Luz remained out of focus in a way the world and the other humans were not. Groaning inaudibly, she wanted to throw her hands up in frustration until she heard the boy speak.

"I don't know what you've heard, but she attacked me! She's a freak!" Amity whirled on the boy angrily, realizing he was talking about Luz, and it was then she got a good look at him. He was holding a white cloth against his nose, with dark circles already forming under his eyes and dried blood splattered across his cheeks. When he moved the bundled cloth away, she could see that his lip was split in several places, too. "Look what she did to me!"

The older man, a teacher or professor if she had to guess, only sighed and hung his head for a moment. He pinched the bridge of his nose after lifting up his glasses and took a long moment before he spoke again. "Please wait outside, Mr. Boyle."

Amity watched the boy stand up, shoot her human friend an ugly look, and turn to leave. She had half a mind to follow him and see if there was a way to push the limits of scrying mid-spell when she heard a soft sniffle and turned back to regard Luz.

The girl was still out of focus, fuzzy and smudged in the most annoying of ways, the effect extending somewhat to the chair she was occupying. But something was different, and Amity could make out a few more details than she had ever been able to before.

Luz's hair had grown quite a bit, for instance. More importantly, she had a cloth to her face as well, and Amity could see specks of blood all down what had been a gray hoodie. Even without clear details, it was obvious that the boy had not gotten the worst of whatever fight they had been in. Even after months, it made Amity's heart ache to see her like this.

"Now, Ms. Noceda. Would you like to tell me exactly what happened?"

The teacher's voice was soft, coaxing even, and Amity held breath she did not currently have as she looked to the girl she was sure was trying not to cry. Instead of the sob she expected, Luz's voice came through like she was listening through a door, barely able to catch the words. "You heard him, I attacked him."

"That's not what I heard from other students. Apparently he's been very loudly asking if you'd like to be stood up for a third time, even in classes."

Silence.

Amity's brain whirred as her awareness shifted between the man and the out-of-focus girl. Luz had mentioned not fitting in, but if this was what she thought.. It was worse than what she and Boscha had done to Willow.

The teacher leaned over his desk a bit, speaking softer. "I can't help you if I don't know what's going on."

Luz's head raised then, and for a moment Amity could have sworn she could see those dark brown eyes clearly. But then her awareness pulled away, the words that were said next were soft mumbles like she had heard them underwater.

No, no, no!

The Human Realm bled away, but she was not pulled back to her body quite as fast as she had been delivered from it. Instead, she saw a starless void envelop everything, and a spike of fear shot through her heart.

The darkness around her was too large to comprehend.

At the same time it constricted around her, burying her in nothingness.

She feared she had lost that tether back to her body, that she would be lost here forever.

But then Amity felt something touch that thread, and pull on it. All at once she was rushing back to the Boiling Isles.

She returned to her body with enough force that she felt the air leave her lungs and dropped to her knees, panting as she stared at her open closet.

Sparks of violet magic drifted off into nothingness as Amity looked down at where a sudden pulse of pain was emanating from. The witch cursed softly, opening her hand slowly to see the blood leaking out of where crystal had been pushed into her flesh, the broken vial mostly dropping to the wooden floor to sit among droplets of red.

The power she had felt, it remained for a moment, but Amity could only feel it in the dripping blood. And she could see it bleeding away from her open cuts, as if it had been a source of her magical energy. As if it had been what punched through the veil between worlds.

It only lasted moments, but she could feel something in her blood singing to her in between beats of her heart, in between pulses. Power. More magic than she had ever felt before.

The pain became secondary to that interesting thought, as Amity stared at her bleeding hand.

Maybe she could find a way to see Luz clearly, with this discovery.

With this, she could find a way to bring her back.

Author's Note: Interesting stuff, isn't it? Hopefully this update time is much more acceptable than the last! I know it probably doesn't need to be said but with Season 2 coming this fic will be entirely non-canon. I wrote out the outline for how it was gonna go before I even posted the first chapter, and had the characters pretty nailed down for the story I wanted to tell. I may adjust some things as we learn more(the Belos' Spy's name, for instance!), but any resemblance to canon is purely accidental, as I won't be able to watch the episodes 'til some time after they air. So I guess we'll see which parts I got right and which parts are incredibly wrong, which should be fun! -Fox