Chapter Thirteen

Jerbo watched forlornly from a cracked doorway in the Secret Room of Shortcuts. Classes hadn't started yet, but Willow had arrived early to help the teacher set up. And, surprise, she'd brought Strong along with her. As the two followed Mrs. Kissiae's directions, they traded flirty banter and seemed to be trying out pet names for each other.

In one way, it made his stomach turn. No one likes realizing they blew their chances with an amazing person.

But … Willow seemed happy. She was smiling and giggling and blushing, and Str- Hunter, seemed to be just as much of a mess as she was. Seriously, how could the guy go from stone-cold hardnose to a pile of dorkiness like that? And if he was perfectly honest with himself, he thought they looked cute together.

A doggy whine drew his attention and Barcus was sitting next to him, a knowing look behind his taped, square spectacles. He yipped quietly. The doorways in the Room were somehow partially soundproofed, but it never hurt to be careful.

"Yeah, I get it," Jerbo said. "I still think he's suspicious or ... whatever. But, if he makes Willow that happy, I should just accept it." He smiled sadly. "She's amazing, whether as just a friend or anything else." He groaned and rubbed his eyes. "Let's get this over with."

Jerbo slipped into the greenhouse proper and shut the secret door. He moved as unobtrusively as he could until Willow noticed him. "Oh! Good morning, Jerbo," she chirped. "Is everything okay?"

"Uh, yeah," Jerbo said, nerves twisting in his gut. "Hey, Hunter, can we talk in private?"

Hunter lifted an eyebrow and looked at Willow, who shrugged. He rolled his eyes and nodded, following Jerbo to the far end of the greenhouse and away from close ears. "What do you want?" he said neutrally, crossing his arms.

Jerbo sighed and rubbed his eyes again. "I like Willow, okay?"

Hunter gave him a deadpan look. "Yeah, I kinda figured that out on my own. Newsflash, man: you're just a friend to her."

"But you're not," Jerbo said matter-of-factly. "And I've … I've decided to accept that." He held out a tentative hand. "So why don't we bury the spearhead?"

Hunter's eyes narrowed, but he glanced over at Willow first. As if sensing his gaze, she looked up from her task and waggled her fingers, and Hunter's expression softened. "Alright, fine. A truce." He took the hand and they shook. "Wanna set up an everlasting oath to make it official?" he snarked.

"Nah," Jerbo shrugged. "Too much hassle. But maybe a piece of advice for the greenhouse?" Hunter lifted an eyebrow. "If you turn your sleeves up-" Jerbo did just that before Hunter could think to stop him. Hunter panicked and jerked his arm back … but the damage was done.

Jerbo had seen his coven brand.

"You're Emperor's Coven?" Jerbo asked blankly, quietly. He blinked and puzzle pieces fell into place, his eyes widening with shock. "You're the Golden G-!" He was cut off when Hunter slammed him against the wall, his arm pressing against Jerbo's neck.

"Shut up!" Hunter hissed.

"Hunter, Jerbo, what's going on over there?!" Mrs. Kissiae demanded, moving to approach them.

Hunter let out a nervous laugh and let Jerbo go, the dual-tracker coughing and massaging his throat. "Sorry! Just, uh- You know. Guy stuff." Mrs. Kissiae looked suspicious but seemed willing to let it pass.

"I was right," Jerbo said roughly. "You're a spy."

"Not another word," Hunter growled.

"I mean, I thought from Glandus or something, but the Emp-!" He cut off with a yelp when Hunter stomped on his toes.

"Shut your mouth, Jerbo!" Hunter snarled quietly.

"Hunter, what's going on?" Willow asked as she jogged over to them.

"Just resolving some issues," he said with a forced smile, wrapping an arm around Jerbo's shoulder and digging his nails into the Troublemaker's arm. "I'll explain later. Go along with it or else," he said through clenched teeth.

As much as Jerbo wanted to out Hunter to Willow and even the whole school, the idea of the head of the Emperor's Coven putting a target on his back frightened him. He and his friends were well aware that they were toeing the line of criminality by studying multiple tracks, even in school and with Principal Bump's tentative approval.

That, and he was curious about the story. He'd spent weeks puzzling at Hunter's origins … and now he had a chance to learn the truth, once and for all.

"Uh, yeah," Jerbo chuckled nervously. "Just, uh-" Jerbo blinked and took a breath. "Willow, I gotta tell you something." He stepped forward and rubbed the back of his head. "I like you, Willow. As in more than friends-like."

Willow blinked in surprise. "Oh. Um, well … actually, that explains a few things." She blushed in faint flattery and much more embarrassment. "Jerbo, you're really sweet and a good friend, but-"

"You don't see me that way?" Jerbo asked wryly, with a sad smile. "Yeah, I know. Not to mention," he gestured between her and Hunter, "you two clearly have something going on." Both of them blushed and looked away from each other, Hunter scratching his chin and Willow playing with her hair.

"How'd you know?" Willow asked.

"It's kind of obvious, honestly," Jerbo said with a faint shrug and smile. "Most of the school knows about this whole 'dance' you two have been doing for the past two weeks or so." He rubbed his eyes, noting mentally that it was getting to be a habit. "Willow, you're an amazing friend, too. And if this guy," he pointed at Hunter, "makes you as happy as you look …? How could I be unhappy about that?"

While Hunter looked unimpressed, Willow smiled gratefully. She was tangentially aware of how badly love triangles could turn out, especially in high school. The fact that he was being such a good sport was a nice change of pace. "Thank you, Jerbo."

Jerbo nodded with a smile, then turned a sharp glare at Hunter. "But if you hurt her," he growled, pointing at Hunter's nose, "I'll be right behind Luz in the line of her friends who're ready to kick you into mulch for the carnivorous plants."

Hunter seemed unfazed. "Yeah, good to know," he said, brushing his finger aside with his hand. "So are you gonna help out or what?" He turned and bumped Willow's shoulder affectionately as he resumed pre-class work.

Jerbo blinked and turned to Willow with a look that said, Really? Him?

"To be fair, I wouldn't be too happy if you'd just got done threatening me," she quipped before gesturing for Jerbo to follow. Jerbo thought about that and nodded to himself before following to lend his own hand to the preparations.

Eileen hummed to herself in the muffled way of her demon kind as she arranged potion ingredients for the project for their period: a freezing potion. She glanced to her left to find her project partner, Luz Noceda, doing the same thing.

"So have you ever made a freezing potion before?" Luz asked out of the blue.

Eileen replied in her muffled speech, a consequence of having no external mouth. Luz pursed her lips as she listened and nodded along.

"Okay, I'm getting a 'no', but you've seen your older brother make one?"

Eileen's eye crinkled and she nodded vigorously.

"So you've got an edge," Luz said with a smile as she finished laying out the ingredients that Eileen had retrieved from the storage cabinets. One of Mrs. Flint's lab procedures was that she stored potion ingredients in the cabinets to the left of the room and, on days the class were working on practical skills, would have them retrieve their own ingredients. This was to help them learn to identify and organize potion ingredients on their own and familiarize themselves with labeling.

A few minutes later, Mrs. Flint called for them to start brewing their potion. Luz and Eileen took a moment to divy up roles before nodding and getting to work. Eileen took charge of preparing their cauldron — filling it with distilled water, casting a spell for a pilot flame sustained by the circle around her wrist, and gently stirring the water clockwise to prepare for mixing. Every now and then she checked on Luz as the human portioned out and labeled the ingredients they would need, making sure she'd portioned the right ones and in the correct weights.

So far so good. It seemed Luz was a quick study even with her tendency to get distracted.

As the water began to bubble, Eileen mumbled and gestured for the first ingredient, a white powder made from the bile of a rodent from the desert of Palm Stings. Eileen checked the amount one more time and nodded before gently shaking it into the swirling water and stirring it evenly.

"So cool," Luz said quietly as frost began to climb up the sides of the cauldron before steaming off. Eileen shrugged and waited for the frost to stop steaming before adding the next ingredient.

"So, Eileen," Luz said when the cyclops was stirring the next phase, "you're in the Human Appreciation Society, right? I think I saw you there that one time."

Eileen mumbled in agreement and nodded.

"So, this may come off as kinda vain or whatever but I gotta know: What made you want to join?"

Eileen pointedly continued stirring for a few moments before she looked at Luz and shrugged, removing their stirring rod to let the potion simmer for a little while. She mumbled her explanation, and Luz picked up something like, Humans have no magic. Magic is a key part of our entire culture here, but they don't have it. I've always been curious about how they get along without it, what they use in its place.

Luz's eyes were shining. "Wow …" she sighed, completely surprised. She never would have expected such a heartfelt answer from a fellow teenager. "Well if you're interested, come sit with my group at lunch. I'd be happy to answer your questions if I can."

Eileen crinkled in her way of a smile and nodded before they both turned their attention back to their potion.

Eun hummed with delight as he flipped a final sausage patty onto a plate to sit with steamed scream beans and scarrots. Every month, he and his husband arranged for a day off together on one of Willow's school days as a kind of date day. As they both preferred, he was in charge of cooking. Eun snuffed out the oven and picked up both plates and two glasses of water, taking them into the den for Gilbert and himself.

Upon entering, Eun's peaceful smile faltered at the sight of Gilbert holding open a photo album dedicated to their daughter … with his eyes downcast and shining.

"Gil?" Eun prodded gently, setting their plates onto the coffee table.

"Just thinking," Gilbert replied, flipping a page. Eun sat beside him and looked over to find a picture of Willow's awkward hair phase, the tresses choppy and uneven. He chuckled at the memory, even if it had driven him crazy at the time.

"About what?" Eun asked, stirring his scream beans before taking a bite.

"Willow could have been hurt or worse last night," Gilbert said, his voice tense. Willow had been upfront about the incident with Lady Feronia before they'd all gone to sleep, and Gilbert had almost felt his lifespan shortening as fear and concern for his little girl had weighed him down.

"Gil, it was an audition," Eun said gently, though he couldn't keep the frown from his lips. He'd actually met Lady Feronia more than once — what felt like a lifetime ago — and she always seemed so kind. The idea that she would hold a teenager hostage to pick a fight with another, even not seriously, was strange to consider.

"I know that," Gilbert said, flipping another page to Willow holding her first motile plant — one that could move under its own power. She had several bandages, but she was smiling widely, a gap visible in her teeth from her last baby fang. "It still worries me, though," he said.

Eun frowned. He knew better than anyone that his Gilbert was a worrier, one who considered possibilities and dangers more than most. Whereas Eun himself tended to try and let Willow grow on her own, Gilbert always tried to look after her. It was a strange balance they struck, but they tended to have it down. But this seemed … different from that.

"Gil, what's this really about?" Eun asked. He lowered his head a bit to look over his glasses, a raised eyebrow completing a look that he'd long since learned would pull the truth from his husband.

Gilbert took one glance at that Look and sighed, flipping backward to the earliest pictures in the book. Ones with Eun, an infant Willow … and Willow's dearly departed mother, Dahlia. "Willow's growing into a fine young woman," Gilbert said, eyes watering now, "and I can see why any boy would be attracted to her." A single tear fell. "Do I really have the right to be upset with her?" He squeezed his eyes shut and closed the album.

"I'm not her father."

"So what?" Eun asked, his tone just as gentle but utterly unyielding. He took the album and flipped it to a random page, one that showed them playing at the park with their daughter. "Who is in this picture with her?" he asked.

"You and I," Gilbert said morosely.

Eun flipped backward rather than forward to an early birthday party. "And here?"

"You and I," Gilbert answered again, his tone a little more firm. Eun turned the pages one more time, to a picture of Gilbert and Eun each on the side of a healers' bed, one occupied by a lovely, slim, redheaded woman with piercing green eyes over a tired smile, holding a newborn Willow wrapped in swaddling clothes.

"And this one?" Eun asked.

"All of us," Gilbert said, his voice cracking with emotion.

Eun nodded firmly, his eyes wet, and gently closed the album. "You may not be her father by blood, Gil," Eun said. "But you have been there for every fever, every scraped knee, and every heartache for her entire life." He looked at his husband with unflinching determination. "You may not be her father," he said, "but you are her Dad."

Gilbert was openly weeping now, and lowered his head to Eun's shoulder. "Thank you, Eun," he whispered.

"Always," Eun said, leaning his head to settle on Gilbert's.

After school had let out and Jerbo said goodbye to his friends, he moved in what he considered a stealthy way to the woods outside the Hexside campus. He made it a few layers into the treeline and waited with his staff in hand, head darting around at every cracked twig and crackling leaf with a spell ready to summon an Abomination from the rich soil of the forest. His palisman, a hedgehog named Steve, remained resolute and prepared for anything, his calm soothing Jerbo's nerves just a little.

A snapping branch made him turn his head sharply, but nothing happened. He sighed and turned back to face the direction of the school — and Hunter was right in front of him. Jerbo shrieked and fell backward, his staff flaring with light and his Abomination rising to attack. A mechanized staff, one familiar as the personal weapon of the Golden Guard, appeared in Hunter's hand and he blasted the construct to wet dirt.

"Could you be any more obvious?" Hunter asked contemptuously. "Seriously, anyone who bothered to look twice would know you were up to something."

Jerbo had no chance to answer before he felt something pull at the hood of his cowl and jerk him upward. Lil Rascal let him go when he was on his feet and flitted to settle on Hunter's shoulder as he retracted his staff and put it away.

"Merciful Titan," Jerbo said blankly, "it really is true. You're the Golden Guard."

Hunter's lips twisted, as if he'd bitten into a rotten piece of fruit. "Yes. It's true."

Jerbo swallowed thickly, planting his staff in the dirt and letting Steve come down from his perch to settle on his shoulder as well. "So, uh … how'd this happen?"

Hunter was silent as he debated how much to tell. He considered himself something of an honorable guy, and he'd told Jerbo he would explain it to him. But how much was safe for him? He may have been annoying for as long as they'd known each other but Hunter didn't want to see him dead. But more than that, how much did Hunter want someone else to know?

Actually, a lot. Could the reason he'd offered to explain in the heat of the moment be that he honestly wanted to tell someone? Luz knew some, but Hunter had carried the crushing weight of secrets for years, ever since his uncle had taken him in. And maybe, just maybe, he deeply wanted to relieve just a little of that burden. Eh … maybe.

"It started with an incident in Bonesborough," Hunter began, and from there he told what he felt was safe and necessary. He omitted his relationship to Emperor Belos, Lady Feronia's involvement, and anything else he deemed superfluous. It basically boiled down to him infiltrating Hexside to discover the source of wild magic, which led him to Willow … and from there it all just happened.

"You're telling me Willow knows wild magic?" Jerbo asked. He blinked and seemed to turn that over in his head.

"That's seriously all you got from that?" Hunter asked incredulously, his arms folded. Lil Rascal twittered and Hunter looked at him with wider eyes. "So what if he only cares about Willow? C'mon, I just told him a great story!" Rascal tweeted again and shuffled his feathers. Hunter sighed and rubbed his eyes. "Yeah, fine, I'd be focused on the Willow-centric parts, too."

Jerbo laughed weakly, his nerves giving way. "So you're really not from another school trying to poach our best in the Plant track?"

"What?" Hunter asked flatly. "No, dude. I just-" He bit his lip as if physically cutting the words off. "I want to protect her."

"Call me crazy," Jerbo said, "but I think Willow can protect herself."

"Not from them," Hunter said, his tone dripping with venom.

"Don't you mean 'us'?" Jerbo asked, a hand on one hip. "Last I checked, the Golden Guard was the freaking leader of the Emperor's Coven."

"No, I mean them," Hunter said, his voice low and dangerous. "I won't let Willow get hurt by this." His hands clenched into fists, his posture tense and ready to fight. "Not if I can help it."

Jerbo looked at this guy, Hunter not-Strong, the unmasked Golden Guard, for a long moment with narrowed eyes. Then he relaxed as he came to a conclusion. "I believe you." Steve returned to his interlock and Jerbo took up his staff. "And if you need help with that, well … we Troublemakers know how to get things done."

Hunter seemed to relax a bit, though he appeared skeptical. "I'll keep that in mind," he said, then turned to leave.

"What do I tell my friends?" Jerbo asked. "I mean, does anyone else know?"

Hunter stopped and was silent. He remained like that for so long that Jerbo started to get uncomfortable. "Luz knows most of it," Hunter admitted. "And Principal Bump knows who I am and why I'm here." He turned his head to look at Jerbo from the corner of his eye, his face in profile against the light. "Don't tell your friends unless they absolutely need to know. You're prodding a fire bee nest yourself just knowing."

Jerbo paled a bit, but nodded. Then he mounted his staff and flew off toward Bonesborough without looking back. As he flew, he thought over everything he had learned. Willow had learned wild magic from somewhere, the freaking Golden Guard was a student at their school, Luz knew about him, and somehow Willow and Hunter had developed a genuine romantic bond through it all.

"Jeez, it's like some star-crossed lovers' novel," Jerbo sighed. He only hoped for everyone's sake that it turned out better than those books tended to end.

And here's lucky chapter thirteen! Hope it was fun to read!

*Jerbo's palisman was inspired by trying to combine mud and plants, thus a hedgehog. His name comes from the film "Over the Hedge" where the animals name the hedge "Steve," a humorous nod to Steve Carrel who voices the character to suggests it. I know it's not a Disney film, but it made me chuckle. And Steve is a chill soul to counter Jerbo's nervous nature.

*Mrs. Flint, the potions teacher, was named after Long John Silver's parrot, Captain Flint, from the classic novel "Treasure Island". She just seems parroty to me.

*For Eun and Gilbert, it was good-different writing a long-established couple. I wanted to have them come across as healthily intimate without the insane hormones of teenagers. They're comfortable with each other and love each other deeply, but don't have kiss every chance they get, y'know?

More to come! And leave a review if you can; they make me so happy!