Chapter Six

'Well, overall not a bad party,' Eda thought.

Just as he'd promised, Hooty had arranged and thrown "Lulu" a celebratory party for her new job, and while it was simple it was clearly planned from the heart — or whatever Hooty might have. She wasn't sure how he'd managed to invite the Emperor's Coven members, but those two hadn't caused a fuss and Steve was actually a pretty good guy. Not to mention it had been fun to see Lilith and Hunter kind of stewing in their own awkwardness.

Eda was cleaning up after the party, keeping her grumbling to herself as Luz's echo mouse projected yet another diary entry.

"… All that's left is to seek out the Collector. And she will tell me what I need to complete my mission. But first, my companions and I must face-" The echo mouse let the entry go and shook itself from its trance to settle down into a nap.

"The Collector," King said pensively. "I've never heard that name."

"Me neither," Eda said. "What kinda jerk puts 'The' in front of their name, anyway?"

"Maybe the Owl Lady?" King asked snidely.

"But the Collector may know how to make a real portal door," Luz noted. "Or at least why mine was so unstable. I just-" She held her head and grunted with frustration. "I messed it up last time, I need to do better!"

"Luz, I've got leg hair older than you!" Eda snarked. "And this Philip guy worked on his portal for years! Cut yourself some slack, Kiddo."

"Yeah, sure," Luz replied. "I just wish I could go back in time and talk to-" Eda perked up as Luz trailed off, bracing herself for some crazy query. "Eda? Is time magic a thing?!"

"Not manipulating time, if that's what you mean," Eda said. "The closest we've got is Oracle magic and discerning the future." A thought crossed her mind. "Although …" She crossed over to the bookshelf and snagged a key from within her hair, unlocking a built-in cabinet that housed her most rare books on wild magic.

"Back during the Savage Ages and the earliest years of Belos's reign, witches experimented with something called 'aftsight.' Like foresight, but the opposite. Instead of trying to see into the wavering future and predict its course, they hoped to see historical events after they'd happened."

"So why stop?" Luz asked.

"Why else? Because his royal Jerkmask deemed it wild magic. Anyway," she flipped through the old book and came across what she needed, a complex set of diagrams and formulae, along with elaborate illustrations, as well as sticky-note amendments. "This is an account of a spell that was designed to take it a step further and actually allow one to interact with the past itself. Lilith and I used to try and recreate it; me for the challenge and her for the history. She'd say she outgrew it, but I think she had more fun than I did."

"Lilith!" Luz said, taking the book. "Thanks, Eda!"

"You're welcome," she called smugly, hoping that this may provide a little bonding for those two.

"Hi, Lilith!" Luz said, trying and failing to not startle her. "What's all this?"

"This, Luz, is the plan for my first museum exhibit," Lilith explained. "It's almost as if the Emperor wanted Flora to get under my skin," she mused, quickly standing and pushing her glasses back up her nose. "Well, she's about to learn that she's not the only bad-girl historian in town! I'm thinking-" She lifted a poster of staircase handrails, "-the architectural history of Deadwardian balusters!"

Luz … didn't know how to respond to that, at least without hurting Lilith's feelings. Lucky for her, Lilith seemed to pick it up on her own.

"This isn't going to work, is it?" she said sadly.

"Hey, don't be so down," Luz said. "I even started calling you 'cool aunt' Lilith in my journal."

"Oh, really," Lilith replied, honestly flattered. Especially after the "castle incident."

"I know you can be a bad-girl historian," Luz continued, "and I have an idea how!" She presented Eda's book to Lilith, whose eyes widened behind her glasses as she took the book.

"Eda had a copy of this? I thought they were all destroyed outside the Emperor's archives." She seemed to be thinking out-loud. "In the Savage Ages, it is believed that bogs saturated with the Titan's magic allowed a fusion of Oracle and Abomination magics to manifest avatars into the past!"

"Time magic!" Luz summarized. "You'll have a way to explore the past for yourself and gather info for an exhibit, and I might be able to learn more about Philip and his portal door."

"I had actually hoped to try this rite several years ago," Lilith admitted. "To try and stop myself from cursing Eda." She frowned. "But Luz, magic like this is risky and may lead to paradoxes." She sighed. "And that's getting past the fact that it would require an incredible source of raw magic to even begin. Even when I had my magic and Branwen," she ruffled the white raven's feathers, "I couldn't power it enough for a twenty-five year journey. And as we are now," she tapped her temple next to her grey eye and then gently prodded Luz over her heart, "we would need a fuel source of tremendous magnitude."

"Fuel, you say?" Luz mused before rushing out of the kitchen. Lilith looked at Branwen in confusion, and her palisman just shrugged. Then Luz barreled back in with an ornate wooden key, the handle marked with a golden cat-eye. "Would Titan Blood cover it?"

Lilith blinked and considered that. "Yes, it would get the rite started," she admitted, "but there's another problem." Luz tilted her head, listening closely. "To journey over three-hundred years into the past, we would need an even further boost. Something to amplify the rite, rather than simply supplement it as a palisman would."

"Amplify it?" Luz asked. "What could-?" A thought occurred to her and she rushed over to the crystal ball. She dialed a number and waited as the sphere rang. After a few rings, the visage of Augustus Porter appeared inside it.

"Hey, Luz," he greeted. "What's up?"

"Gus, I need a huge favor," Luz said. "It's to help with the portal."

"I'm listening," Gus said seriously.

"Luz, are you certain of this?" Lilith asked.

"Pretty certain," she replied. "Also, if I haven't said it yet, I like the new outfit."

"Oh," Lilith said, looking down at her leather vest, teal blouse, maroon skirt, tights and ankle boots with a faint blush, "thank you."

After a ride on Branwen and a trek through the Forearm Forest, they had arrived at the fabled Looking-Glass Ruins. Lilith marveled at the structure, said to predate even the Savage Ages. And a place the Emperor's Coven had tried to locate and loot for years. In hindsight, she was glad they had failed so miserably.

As they entered the graveyard, Lilith gasped at the statues. "Oh my goodness, Luz! Are these the statues Gus and his friend rebuilt?" She removed her notebook and began vigorously writing. "This is marvelous! How close did they get to the originals, I wonder."

Luz had no chance to answer before the mist hanging along the ground of the graveyard seemed to well up, lightning flickering in its depths, and then dropped to reveal the fabled guardian of the ruins. Luz gasped, and then squealed. "Oh, it's so cute! I mean, terrifying, too, but so cute!"

The guardian faded into mist to reveal an old man with wild white hair and a matching beard, his ears drooping with age, and dressed in pale-blue robe tied with a cracked mirror brooch, dark robes underneath, and red stockings.

"Greetings, Luz the Human and Madame Lilith Clawthorne," the witch said with a stately bow. "I am Stewardt, the Keeper of the Looking-Glass Graveyard. Gus told me you would be arriving."

"Yeah, that's us," Luz said, scratching the back of her head.

"Honored salutations, noble Keeper," Lilith said with a curtsey.

"Did Gus happen to tell you about the huge favor I need to ask?" Luz picked up.

"He did, indeed. You wish to borrow a galdorstone from the graveyard," Stewardt said, tenting his fingertips. "And as Gus has proven himself a trustworthy young man and I hold his opinion in high regard, I am willing to grant your request."

"Really?" Luz gasped.

"Ah ah," Stewardt amended, wagging his finger, "on a few conditions."

"Fair enough," Luz said, brushing her hair back to appear confident. "What're the conditions?"

"Firstly, you must not tell anyone that a galdorstone was at all involved. As far as anyone else is concerned, you and your aunt pulled this off on your own strength."

"You got it!" Luz said, clenching her fist with determination.

"Secondly, as soon as you are finished with it, you both must return the galdorstone as quickly as possible."

"Agreed," Lilith said. "Such an artifact would spell disaster in the wrong hands."

"I couldn't agree more," Stewardt said gravely. "And lastly, you both must swear everlasting oaths to these conditions."

Luz looked back at Lilith, who shrugged. "Okay, what exactly happens if you break an everlasting oath?" Luz asked. "Not that I will, I just never learned that."

"You can't break it, child," Stewardt explained. "The oath compels a swearant to fulfill the terms of the bargain or die trying."

"It's not something to be sworn lightly, Luz," Lilith added.

"Really? Because Amity put us both in one at the covention."

"She what?!" Lilith yelped. "Wha-? I-!" She groaned and lifted her glasses to rub her eyes, then snorted and replaced them. "I do miss that girl. We really need to catch up and perhaps clear the air."

"We'll swear the oath," Luz said, holding out her hand to shake. Lilith nodded and held out her hand, as well. Stewardt nodded and traced a spell circle with each hand around theirs before clasping their hands in a vice-like grip until the magic faded.

"The oath is sealed," he intoned. Then he disappeared in a puff of mist, only to reappear behind them … with a blue orb of crystal in his hands. "Remember your terms, ladies," he advised, and handed the galdorstone to Luz. "And good luck."

"Thanks, sir," Luz said.

"We'll take all we can get," Lilith said dryly.

Now came the preparations.

"You told her where the Looking-Glass Graveyard is?!"

Mattholomule was pacing up and down the sidewalk, slowly coming to terms with Gus's revelation. Given Matt's contribution to defending the graveyard, he'd thought it fair to let him know.

"I trust Luz," he replied. "If anyone's gonna use the artifacts," the term they used for galdorstones in public, "responsibly, it's her."

"But what about Lilith?" Matt argued. "She's an ex of the EC! How do we know she can be trusted?"

"I'm choosing to trust her because Luz trusts her," Gus said simply. "Plus, do you really think that Stewardt would let them use his charges without insurance?"

Matt halted and grit his teeth. "Has anyone ever told you that you trust way too easily?" he asked through clenched teeth.

"No surprise," Gus said morosely. "But I refuse to close myself off just because of some bad memories." He smirked. "After all, look how you turned out."

"Oh! It's on, Porter!" Matt shouted, though he couldn't hide a smile. But Gus already had his staff out and was flying away with a laugh. "C'mon, Duke," Matt said, catching his staff as his palisman dutifully transformed. "Let's show him what we can do."

"Okay, that's the last of it," Luz said, brushing her arm across her forehead to slick away sweat.

After hours of scouring for a site covered in mud and rich in magic and then preparing the site by smoothing the ground and setting up a platform to work on, then pouring a potion that Lilith had prepared, they were finally ready as the sun rose.

"Wonderful," Lilith said as she checked her notes one last time. "This will be a truly unprecedented experience." She set her things aside and took a place beside Luz, passing her a bandana to cover her ears and donning a straw hat to hide her own hair as their doppelgangers would be identical to their appearance when the spell began.

"Now before we dive in, we have to remember that we are on a clock," Lilith said. "If my calculations are correct, we will have until sunset today, which should give us approximately eight hours to do what we can. Any harm that befalls our counterparts will result in psychic backlash when we return, and of course there's the bloody-fly effect-" She took hold of herself. "But, a bad-girl historian is all about taking risks, so … let's boogie down to history town."

Luz giggled as Lilith began dancing in place like a goofball. "She really is 'cool aunt' Lilith," she mused.

Lilith and Luz took their places at equidistant points within the elaborate circular diagram they had drawn in Abomination clay laced with one part of the potion their spell would use. Lilith readied a vial of the other part, tracing a bare spell circle of her own to gently coax some of the Titan's Blood from the portal key, which fell into the vial, too. Branwen swooped down to snatch the portal key and return to her perch in a tree, and Lilith approached the center of the circle where the designs converged on the galdorstone, motioning for Luz to stay put, and poured the vial's contents onto the galdorstone before rushing back to her place.

The center of the circle flared with violet-blue light that expanded like flames to encompass the entirety of the circle, lifting the witch and human from their feet to spread their limbs and wave through their hair as if suspended in water.

Branwen, closely watching from her perch, croaked as she felt the spell take hold.

The awareness of her partner and the kind human had been sent cascading into the winds of time.

Luz sat up with a scream as she finally came to, pressing her hand to her belly as she dry-heaved. She smacked her lips at an odd earthy taste in her mouth. She stood up on shaky legs and looked around to find no evidence at all of her and Lilith's spell.

Lilith gasped and sat up, too, clutching her head. "Did it not work? I triple-checked my calculations …!"

"Nope, we're here," Luz said. "I can feel it! Also, Branwen's not in that tree, so something happened."

Lilith looked at the tree her dear palisman was supposed to be in and put a hand to her lips. "Well, I can't argue there, but how do we know we're where we need to be?"

Luz looked over in the direction of Bonesborough and gasped at how much smaller and younger the city looked. "I know where we can find out," she said.

About an hour later, they encountered a woman on the main road and asked her what the era was, receiving a prompt "'Tis the Deadwardian era, good witches," which confirmed that their spell had been powerful enough to do the trick. As they approached the city, Lilith reminded Luz that this time was a part of the Savage Ages and therefore possibly dangerous.

As it turned out, she was … somewhat right.

As they walked carefully down the streets, several witches and demons greeted them with far more friendliness that Luz would have expected from their own time. Witches and demons could be seen using various disciplines of magic without restriction — such as a witch repairing a wounded demon's cart and then healing his arm without missing a beat or a little girl summoning an Abomination just to hug it and give it a flower crown.

"This looks more awesome than dangerous," Luz said, and as if by some cosmic cue, something happened to prove her wrong. A demon tried to use what looked like Healing magic on a man-eating plant, only for the plant to hiss and snap him up in its jaws.

Later, an explosion ripped through one of the buildings and a witch in a burlap cloak raced by with a bag of snails and pursued by two heavyweight constables, as Lilith called them, that could barely keep up with his pace, let alone a slew of spells from a half-dozen types of magic.

"Geez, what's with this place?" Luz complained. "It seemed great at first, but-"

"Belos may be a heartless dictator," Lilith observed, "but his regime did enforce order upon society. And while Edalyn certainly has a point that it restricts our freedoms … it also provides a framework to build society upon." She scoffed. "Then again, having been a part of that 'framework,' it's certainly far from perfect." She gasped and stepped beside Luz to point something out. "And Belos's coven system wasn't pulled from nowhere. There, Luz, is the house of the Plant guild."

"They had guilds?" Luz asked, her fantasy-loving heart swelling with joy.

"Yes, and they were a sign of specialization, rather than restriction. To be part of a guild was to be acknowledged as a specialist in a particular branch of magic, though still free to study others."

"So why did Belos crack down on wild magic, again?" Luz asked.

"Well, besides the whole 'order' thing," she said with air quotes, "supposedly the Titan disliked the chaos and destruction that powerful witches with no regard for others would cause." She hooked her thumb backward. "Like those ruffians from before."

Luz thought about that for a second before refocusing on her mission. She could figure out her stance on safe, suffocating order versus destructive, freeing chaos later.

For now, she started asking around for Philip Whittebane, the human. Most people seemed to not know him, though a few gave her vague directions or rumors of his experiments and expeditions that few came back from besides the human himself. Some went on to say that he was a walking curse.

After an hour of searching, Luz was wondering if she should give up before a gravelly voice shouted, "Hey, Human! We got a bone to pick with you!"

Luz turned a corner to find two hulking demons, each with a single massive fang colored red or blue, looming over a familiar silhouette. A lanky human with a long tail of chestnut hair and a matching beard, with piercing icy blue eyes, dressed in a stately navy-blue coat and other old-fashioned clothes. A familiar journal was clutched in his hands.

"Gentlemen, I'm sure we can settle this quite peacefully," the human said, and Luz gasped at the familiar voice. This was him! This was Philip Wittebane!

"Peacefully?!" the red-fanged demon snapped. "Nothin's gonna be peaceful 'til you tell us what we need to know!"

"I've told you everything I can," Philip said, clearly tense. "I am sorry for your loss, truly." There was pain in his voice, before his gaze hardened. "But he knew the dangers before we set out."

"Oh yeah?!" Red Fang asked, stepping forward with a fire spell in-hand. "What about-?!"

Ice spikes surged forward from before, forcing the demon brother back. Luz stepped forward, her heart set. "Back off, gentlemen. Before you get beat by a little girl."

A coin purse landed at the brothers' feet and Green Fang scooped it up, opening it to reveal snail coins.

"That is all I have," Philip said, striding forward to stand beside Luz. "It's not the full amount, but I assure you I will pay the rest after I accomplish my mission."

Before anyone could think, Red Fang snarled and pushed Philip backward, papers flying from his journal. "You still owe us-!"

"That's enough, Red," Green Fang said, holding his brother's shoulder. He looked at Luz with narrowed eyes. "Ask your friend what happened to our brother, Blue Fang, and his palisman." With that, Green Fang dragged his brother by the arm with their money in his pocket.

Without thinking, Luz started gathering papers alongside Philip. She leafed through a few and caught a map of Eclipse Lake, which meant he'd already gotten the Titan's Blood. She noticed a pair of faces in profile doodled in the margin before the papers were snatched from her hands.

"That's private, I'm afraid," he said gruffly. Then he sighed and rubbed his forehead. "Thank you, child, for your help. Good day."

"Hold up," Luz said. "You're Philip Wittebane, right? The human?"

"Come to gawk?" he asked. "I may not have a bile sac, but I do have dignity."

"Actually, I've heard of your exploits and I was hoping we could help each other out," Luz said. "Me and my Aunt, uh, Dirtrude." Philip raised an eyebrow. "We need to find the Collector, too."

Philip blinked and tilted his head. His gaze flicked upward with a thoughtful look in his eyes. Then he looked back at her and nodded.

"So, Ms. Luzura, you and your Aunt Dirtrude live on another Titan?"

"Yep. We're hoping the Collector can help us find a way home," Luz replied. Part of her didn't like lying, but the integrity of the past was at stake, so she decided to rely on half-truths and pretend it was simply fanfiction of her life.

Philip led them into a cave and began digging into his satchel. "Oh, right. Uh, did anyone bring a torch?"

With hardly a thought, Luz took out a light glyph and activated it … and Philip's eyes widened in awed shock. "Another one?" he asked. "I had no idea there was a fourth pictoglyph."

"You use glyphs?" Luz asked in surprise. He'd never mentioned them in his journal entries.

"How else could I have survived as long as I have?" he replied. "Plant growth, ice, fire. It took years to find them all. Almost as if something were trying to keep them from me; or perhaps, was waiting until I was ready to find them." His eyes shone with interest as he took a light glyph Luz handed him and copied it into his journal. "Even found one in a snowflake," he added idly.

"No way! Me too!" Luz said happily.

"An incipient warrior and a present scholar. Truly impressive."

As they walked, Luz kept up quite chatter with Lilith about actually teaching something to Philip, while she remained politely silent. When they reached an open cavern, Luz went ahead to explore while Philip examined his notes.

"You know, your niece is remarkably gifted," he said to Lilith. "I wonder how much of that comes from her aunt?"

"Oh, well," Lilith said with a blush, "I might have encouraged it."

Philip chuckled and picked up a stick. "Well, let me assure you both that I have some tricks of my own." He ushered the ladies aside and began to draw a series of circles that soon became a complex network of glyphs and circles far beyond anything Luz or Lilith had considered.

"What is this?" Luz asked.

"A shortcut," Philip said. "To the lair of the Collector."

He tapped the matrix and a pillar of light emerged, concealing their sight until it retreated to reveal an open valley. Philip took a few steps and gestured with his arm at a huge, gaping ravine in the center of the valley.

"Welcome, ladies, to the heart of the Titan."

"This is where the Collector lives?" Luz asked.

"According to every legend that speaks of it, the Collector is said to lie at the bottom of this ravine," Philip explained. "I've tried several items to descend, but there's … something down there. The first time I barely made a teleportation matrix in time to escape, and my companions were … not so fortunate."

"So we just repel down, right?" Luz asked. "I mean, Aunt Dirtrude doesn't have her staff, but if we use vines from plant glyphs we can slowly make our way down."

"I agree," Philip said, using his stick to draw a plant glyph in the dirt at the edge of the cliffside. "Shall we?"

With all three of them having skill with glyphs — Philip was even more surprised to see "Dirtrude's" unforeseen skills — they managed their own ways down into the abyss. As they did, Lilith voiced some concerns to Luz.

"Luz, something about this doesn't feel right," she whispered. "This will eventually become the site of Belos's castle. And there's no doubt he would have known about the Collector."

"Maybe we're meant to be here," Luz suggested. "We're meant to keep the Collector out of Belos's hands."

"Perhaps," Lilith admitted. "But I wonder if that is such a good idea, either. There's something about that man — his confidence, his compliments, the way he says just what will make you feel comfortable following his lead — that makes me uneasy. It's … distressingly familiar."

Luz swallowed and nodded before continuing their plunge. As they did, Luz noticed residue being left on the vines they were descending with, like mud. She checked her hands to find faint scores in them. Right, they weren't real — these bodies were constructs similar to Abominations that their minds were inhabiting. Did the breakdown mean they would be forced back to their present soon?

Eventually, they made it to the bottom and Philip gathered them together. "Now, what we are looking for is reportedly some kind of artifact. But be wary of the guardian." With that, he struck out on his own.

The floor of the ravine, as it turned out, was littered with holes. Discarded shovels sat near many of them, and the sickening odor of rotting meat hit the women. Corpses were scattered throughout, many of them next to the holes they had apparently died while digging.

"Here!" Philip shouted. Luz and Lilith came running to find him digging away, but Luz had been unnerved by all of those corpses.

"Philip, how many times have you tried to find this?" she asked.

"Oh, hard to say," he said between grunts, his digging uninterrupted. "A dozen or so, perhaps?"

"And you escaped every time?" Lilith asked.

"I did," he confirmed, a note of pride in his voice. "Almost like something were keeping me alive. For a grand purpose, perhaps?"

Luz's belly twisted at the words, memories of her "quest" from Adeghast so long ago rising up. When she'd been so desperate to believe she had a "predetermined path of greatness" that she ignored the world around her. And Eda and King almost paid the price alongside her.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a deep, rhythmic thudding that was steadily drawing closer, a sound familiar to any and all nerds. "Its eyes are sensitive to movement," Luz whispered, referencing for the sake of her sudden instinctive fear. Philip kept digging as Luz and Lilith turned to find a massive creature looming over them. It roared and charged.

In perfect unison, "aunt" and "niece" clapped ice glyphs to the ground. Luz's iced over the ground to make the creature slip and slide while Lilith's erected a wall of ice for it to smash into. "Philip, we have to go!" Luz shouted.

"Stall it!" he shouted back. "I've almost got it!"

"Philip!" Luz shouted, her voice pleading. "It's not worth it!"

She dodged the beast's tail and triggered two fire glyphs. "Spicy toss!"

As the beast was distracted, Lilith palmed a cluster of ice glyphs and swung her arm to form huge spikes that shattered against its hide, so similar to her move back at King's home island. The beast roared and stumbled, its flailing tail lashing out as Philip looked back to hit him in the face with a cry of pain.

"Don't kill it!" Lilith shouted. "It's a stone sleeper. Perhaps the last of its kind!"

"So we bind it!" Luz called. Lilith nodded and they surrounded it with plant glyphs they'd prepared. They clapped them in unison and sent tendrils of vines cascading over the stone sleeper and tightening to hold it down. "That should hold it for now," Luz said. "Hurry up, Philip! We-!"

An ice spike sprouted between the beast's eyes and it fell with a wailing cry.

"There, problem solved," Philip said casually, a disk of something like glass or crystal held under his arm. He dug into his satchel with his free hand and removed a handkerchief to press against his nose. "It really is so difficult to find good help. Now I can properly examine this creature."

"You-!" Lilith sputtered. "You killed it."

"Indeed," Philip said calmly. "You're welcome."

"It was the last of its kind!" Lilith shouted. "A living archaeological marvel!"

"And now it's a dead archaeological marvel," Phillip replied. "And so much easier to examine this way."

Lilith bared her teeth, her hair practically bristling as she took an aggressive step forward. "You can't just-!"

"Lilith, hold on," Luz pleaded, taking her shoulder. "Okay, tell us how that disk thing is gonna help you build a portal to the human realm."

Philip looked at her with wide eyes before chuckling. "Oh no, this isn't for that. I need it for another project."

"No?" Luz asked. "What do you mean 'no'?"

"I mean, you've certainly earned your audience with the Collector," he said, holding up the disk. "If you wish to ask her about a portal, that's fine. But I will be taking this with me, so I suggest you ask quickly."

This time, Lilith had to hold Luz back. "You didn't need help with the stone sleeper at all, did you?" she demanded. "You just needed someone to distract it while you got that thing and ran off."

"I will admit I was pleasantly surprised by your survival," Philip shrugged. "I wasn't lying when I said you had talent. Now, do you want your advice or not?"

Luz ground her teeth. "Idiota arrogante," she growled, and Philip raised an eyebrow. She stepped forward and reached for the disk … and her hand started to crack and flake away.

"Oh no," Lilith said in horror. "Not now!" Both of them began to wither away. "Luz, brace yourself!" The cracks spread and consumed them until they crumbled into dust.

"Well, I certainly did not expect that," Philip said. "Ah well, nothing I can do now." He picked up his stick and rapidly traced another glyph matrix. Before he triggered it, he looked at the stone sleeper's corpse. "I'll be back for you later." And with that, he disappeared in a pillar of light.

Hunter toweled the sweat from his hair after his morning workout, swordplay, and staff training. Just because he was no longer the Golden Guard didn't mean he could let his edge dull; quite the opposite, he had to be sharp to protect everyone he had now.

Lil Rascal was resting on his shoulder for their morning fly when he perked up and whistled. He fluttered off, calling for Hunter to follow. "What? Rascal!" Hunter sprinted to catch up, making his way around the Owl House and stumbling to a halt at the sight of an elderly man sitting on the cliffside. Lil Rascal was twittering away to a yellow cardinal palisman with a scar over its beak, the yellow bird replying only every so often in a deeper chirp, almost a croak.

"Hello," the older man said, not turning. "You must be Hunter. Lilith has mentioned you."

"Nice to meet you, sir," Hunter said, taking note of that wild mane of grey. "I'm guessing you're Mr. Clawthorne?"

The older man chuckled, the sound warm and comforting. "You can call me Dell, Hunter," he replied. "How are you liking the Owl House?"

"It's fine," Hunter said. "Better than the Emperor's Coven … Though, that's really not a hard contest, I guess." He felt his stomach turn at finally admitting that.

Dell hummed and held out his hand, his palisman immediately fluttering to rest in his hand as Lil Rascal flew to settle on Hunter's shoulder. Rascal twittered and nuzzled Hunter's neck, his feathers tickling the witchling and making him laugh as he stroked the palisman's crest.

"He's been through a lot," Dell noted, his eyes sharp. "Rascal, was it?"

'That's me! Nice to see you again, Dell.'

"You know him?" Hunter asked, to both of them.

"He was with the Bat Queen for many years, son," Dell said. "We would talk every now and then when I came to visit."

"You visit the Bat Queen?" Hunter asked.

"Yes, ever since my-" He cut himself off and sighed, then stiffly turned to face Hunter … And Hunter gasped at the thick scar that lined the side of his face, including covering an entire eye that he kept closed. And yet, his warm smile didn't waver. "Since an incident with Eda's curse."

"She did this?!" Hunter asked.

"No," Dell said firmly. "The Owl Beast lashed out. I recognize a frightened animal when I see one, and that was a frightened animal." He sighed and grunted, closing one hand that was trembling. "Anyway, it was a long time ago." He chuckled and seemed to lose himself in thought before speaking again. "Hunter … I would like to make you an offer."

"An offer?" Hunter repeated.

"Before this," he gestured at his scars, "I was a palisman carver by trade. It was a Clawthorne family tradition. I've been working with the Bat Queen for several years to restore the palistrom forests so that the trade may carry on, and I had hoped Eda would carry on the tradition." He rifled through his coat and removed a sheathed carving knife. "But if you ever wish to learn, too … just let me know."

Hunter blinked and looked down at the knife in Dell's scarred hand, taking it out of simple reflex. "Why me?" he asked.

"I'm not sure," Dell admitted. "Instinct, perhaps? I get the feeling you would do well in carving our dear friends." He lifted his shoulder to indicate his palisman. "This is Butters, by the way."

Hunter laughed and looked away. "I'll think about it," he decided.

"That's all I ask," Dell said, handing him the knife. Then he snorted and added, "Well, and for a bit of privacy. I think Edalyn's ready to come out now."

"Yes sir," he said. Lil Rascal grew into his staff, and Hunter teleported to the top of the tower. He leaned over the bulwark just in time to see Eda barrel out of the house. He watched as father and daughter spoke to each other, then Eda stood and began to walk away, but Dell took her hand and gave her something before walking away himself, leaving Eda with a smile and tears in her eyes.

Hunter thumbed the knife Dell had given him with a thoughtful look.

'Even if you don't learn to carve us,' Lil Rascal piped up, 'maybe you could try woodcarving?'

"That sounds like a good idea,' Hunter smiled.

Lilith awoke to the sound of Branwen's croaks, her vision blurry. She grunted and adjusted her glasses as a pounding headache receded. Then the memories returned. "Luz?" she called weakly. Her call was met with sniffling. Lilith sat up and looked to find Luz curled into a ball, tears streaming down her face.

Lilith's heart ached at the sight of her sister's surrogate daughter weeping. The wonderful, kind girl who had forgiven her for inexcusable actions and even called her a "cool" aunt. Lilith stood and sat next to Luz to stroke her hair. "Oh, Luz. You'll be alright. I promise."

"We can't do the rite again," Luz whispered brokenly. "I missed my chance. And Philip, he … he's a jerk."

"Well," Lilith said, "if a jerk like him can make a portal, I'm certain you can, too."

Luz sniffled and chuckled before sitting up. "Thanks, Lilith." Then she hugged her, and Lilith felt her own eyes fill with tears as she hugged back.

"Ah, that monstrous creature," Philip muttered darkly as his broken nose throbbed. He'd made his way back to the cave he'd been living in outside of Bonesborough littered with his research materials. There really was so much to learn about this place — he'd need lifetimes to understand it all.

He grunted as his affliction suddenly reared its unwelcome head, a parting gift from a horrid witch. His arm swelled as the glyph matrices he'd carved into his flesh to contain it triggered and slowly began to fail. Pain burned under his skin as the muscles and bones shifted wildly and he pulled a palisman from his satchel, carved in the likeness of a toad that he'd retrieved from the fallen Blue Fang. It's not like that admittedly courageous demon would need it anymore.

He snapped it open and breathed in the pure magic that arose, the power fueling his containment glyphs and stabilizing his condition for now. He looked up at a depiction of the Titan, and its words in his head rang again.

PEACE MUST BE FOUND.

"The curse doesn't matter," he muttered. "I just need to know how to bring peace to the Isles. The chaos of wild magic must be brought to heel and crushed beneath it." He removed the disk he had finally retrieved and brushed his hand over it, the crystal glowing with white light and releasing the phantasm of a tall, cloaked figure, her face shrouded in a cowl emblazoned with a crescent moon. "And you're going to help me, Collector."

"Why hello, there," the Collector greeted.

Chapter six is here! Another episode adaptation in my alternate universe. Here we see ever more deviations from canon, and I really hope you all liked it!

*Though I thought it was a clever concept, I refuse to rehash the time pools! So I put a lot of thought into an alternate time travel method that involves mixing magic - something that the show seemed to trail off on. I loved coming up with this!

*The term "aft" sight comes from the directions used on ships and boats. "Fore" is forward and "aft" is backward. I thought that was kind of clever, myself.

*To me, one of the biggest missteps of canon from a character standpoint was that they completely dropped the subplot of Lilith teaching Amity as a reflection of Luz and Eda. I thought i'd work in a reference to it here.

*As far as Lilith using magic goes, I work on the premise that Eda and LIlith are WEAKENED rather than POWERLESS. "Separate Tides" distinctly showed them using magic (Eda levitating a bottle of apple blood and Lilith using ice magic), just largely impotent.

*I personally have some issues with the later-series implication that Belos and his coven system were the direct cause of EVERY flaw in Boiling Isles society. It's a rampant misconception even with real=world history that native cultures were some idyllic paradise that took selfish explorers to corrupt. Yes, they introduced horrible consequences, but EVERY culture has flaws! *Hence, the order versus chaos concept I ran with. I think it fits well with the lore of "Agony of a Witch" - Belos just emphasized the bad and ignored the good. Jerk.

*Luz's Spanish phrase means "arrogant idiot," which Philip is.

*I like how my intro to Dell came out! He will be seen again soon enough ...!

*I hope everyone likes my alternative take on Philip. He's truly fascinated by the world of the Boiling Isles ... he just doesn't care about individuals as much as his research. And his consideration for nature and resources is typical of his time.

*The closing line of the episode is straight from "Amphibia." If you've seen it ... you know what I mean ...

As always, I hope this was a fun read! Leave a review if you liked it! And may your own projects be fun to read and to write!