Luz's mouth dropped open in astonishment. Amity, Gus, and Willow, along with Willow's datemate, the basilisk Vee, were standing in front of her in Luz's school. Just like they were any other ordinary student! It was ridiculously surreal. Especially with the way Vee had disguised xyrself as Principal Weiss. And a good thing too. Without xyr intervention, Luz would have been toast. Even with badass new powers, Luz was just human at the end of the day.
"I can't believe you're here!" Luz shouted, not caring how loud she was being. "How long have you been here? How are you here? Are you, like, on the lam or something?"
"We just got here today," Willow said. "We would have gotten here sooner, but we had to sign all these forms and it was so boring." She pantomimed throwing up.
"Why are you here?" Luz wondered. "I mean, it's awesome you're here! But what are you doing here? In my school?"
Willow stepped aside and let Gus take the floor. "We are part of the first ever Demon-Human Realm cultural exchange program!" He did a little jig of excitement. Luz was very careful not to look as if she was amused. "I get to be here in the Human Realm with my best friend!"
This was all a little difficult for Luz to take in. "How exactly did this all get done so quickly?"
"Bribery," Amity said bluntly. "Emira bribed…basically everyone with the slightest shred of authority over this thing." Well, that did explain it. If there was one things humans loved more than hating anyone different, it was money. Atomic transmutation of base metals to gold had been the end goal of alchemists for centuries, but in the Demon Realm, even the equivalent of a kindergartener could do it. That was yet another fact Luz was pretty sure she didn't want getting around.
Amity gave Luz a huge hug. Not a kiss yet, Luz noted. But that was okay. If her girlfriend was not in a kissing mood, Luz would be fine with that. Disappointed. But fine. She could sense that Amity needed the friend part of the word more than the girl part anyway. "It's so good to see you, mi valiente defensora." Willow groaned. She was probably resigning herself to eons of Amity acting like a lovesick fool. "I missed you more than you could believe."
"Oh, I can believe it, querida," Luz purred. Gus clapped his hands pointedly. Oh, right. Luz could get tunnel vision when it came to…well, just about anything, actually, but especially Amity. "Anyway, fill me in on what's been going on with you four! I need the deets!"
Amity cleared her throat. She looked embarrassed. "Um, well, you've probably heard that I went a little overboard the other day." Luz had heard nothing of the kind. Amity, figuring out this was the case by her facial expression, just winced. "I got…really sloshed? Yeah."
"Did someone spike your drink or something?" Luz wondered. The idea of Amity and being drunk simply did not compute. The twins, sure, absolutely. But Amity? Nope.
Amity looked ashamed. "No…I mean, maybe Edric spiked it a little? That does sound like something he'd do. But, no, it was probably all on me. I just…couldn't…" Luz kissed her on the cheek gently. "Thank you. Anyway, Emira found me, and she freaked out, and she decided I had to get back to the Human Realm as soon as possible, so I wouldn't drink myself to death or something ridiculous. Which I totally wouldn't do! I just had a moment of weakness, that's all, I'm not some alcoholic!"
"I believe you," Luz assured her. She wasn't actually 100% sure she did, but right now, Luz was ready to err on the side of faith in her girlfriend.
"Yeah, so King and Emira set up this program," Amity went on. King was in the Human Realm and didn't even say hello to her? Oh, her brother was going to get a talking to next time Luz saw him. "I still can't believe they pulled it off so fast, even with the bribery. My host family is your friend Caroline's parents."
Luz wasn't sure about how to feel about that. On the one hand, it was awesome that Amity and Caroline were going to be getting to know each other. The two of them didn't have much of an opportunity to interact for very often during spring break. On the other hand, Luz wasn't too comfortable with Amity living under the same roof as Agent Johnston. Not that Caroline had anything other than the typical teenage complaints against her father. But still, he was a government agent, and Luz had seen a ton of stories about government agents experimenting on alien and supernatural beings. Not to mention that according to Dustin, one of his friends was experimented on by the government!
She was probably being paranoid, she decided. The Lake administration was determined to establish a strong relationship with the Demon Realm, and experimenting on its princess's girlfriend didn't exactly send the right message, to say the least. "Just make sure you watch what you say to Agent Johnston," Luz said finally. "He's a nice person, but his superiors may not be as nice as he is, and they're probably expecting him to report back on…well, everything."
Amity nodded. She didn't look remotely nervous. "Okay. I'll be careful."
"So you're really going to be going to school with me?" Luz asked. "For how long?"
"The rest of your school year!" Willow responded. "Bump was overjoyed to get some more human students after the great example you set, so he let us go without any problems." It was still surreal to have a principal that actually thought Luz was an excellent student. Principal Hal, the principal of her middle school, had thought she was the devil incarnate. And that was on a good day. "I'm so excited! I get to spend time in the Human Realm with my best friend. You have so many cool plants here…I want to learn all about them!"
Willow gave her a huge smile. "And…I have a surprise for you. We get to be roomies!" Luz's mouth dropped open. "Yeah! Mrs. Noceda is letting me stay in your house!" YES! Oh, man, it would be like having a sleepover with her friend every single night!
"THIS IS THE BEST NEWS EVER!" Luz screamed, and let out a shriek of joy, shamelessly flapping her arms in excitement. "What about you two? Who are your host families?"
"Your friend Avery's dad is taking me in," Gus said. A good choice, in Luz's opinion. If there was one person who was patient enough to answer all of Gus's questions, it was definitely Steve. Luz couldn't help but notice, though, that Gus looked somewhat dazed. Presumably, the awe of living in the Human Realm was getting to him. "I just…how do you live amidst such magnificence and wonder? Cars! Computers! Sandwiches! The Human Realm has it all!"
Luz giggled. "I guess we're just used to it, Gus. Avery's really neat. You'll like them. And their dad is pretty cool too. He did me a lot of solids in the alternate universe." They all looked bewildered, presumably by her slang. Vee, on the other hand, was likely bewildered by the mention of an alternate universe in the first place. "Uh, I mean, he's really helped me out. He believed in magic before it was cool."
Vee crossed xyr arms. "We're really not going to talk about what that guy almost did to you? What, that's just normal around here?"
Amity's eyes narrowed dangerously. "What guy? What is xe talking about, Luz?"
Luz just gave a nervous laugh. Vee rolled xyr eyes. "I'm talking about that kid who tried to stab you, Luz!"
Luz put up her hands placatingly. The last thing she wanted was for the cultural exchange program to come to a crashing halt because Amity had committed murder. "Uh, yeah, so Erik and a couple of his flunkies tried to beat me up. They really don't like me…and they definitely don't like you, Amity. But it's fine now! He's not going to try anything else, because he knows you'll beat him to a pulp if he does! He's too scared of you to do anything else, I promise."
Willow frowned. "This seems like something you should report to the guards. You have guards around here, right?"
"I…don't wanna make a fuss, Willow," Luz said, trying to keep her voice light and casual. "I mean, that takes time and I might have to testify, and I just…I need to stay out of the spotlight. It's hard enough as it is."
Amity conjured a small knife of compressed abomination goop and started filing her nails with it pointedly. "If he lays a finger on you, I'll kill him." Was it wrong that Luz just found Amity incredibly sexy when she started threatening people's lives in defense of Luz? Well, if it was wrong, Luz didn't want to be right.
"Anyway, I'll just be going," Vee mumbled.
Luz turned to face xyr. She knew exactly what Vee was feeling right now. The basilisk was feeling like a third wheel in the friend group that Luz had assembled. Xe was just Willow's datemate. They didn't have all the many shared experiences Luz had with the rest of her friends. Well, Luz wasn't going to leave xyr behind. She'd do whatever it took to ensure that Vee regarded her as a true friend. They'd be spending a lot of time together in the next few months after all. "Hey, no, you don't have to leave. I know we don't know each other well, but I want us to be friends. You're not just Willow's datemate. You're part of the family."
Vee gave her a slight smile. Xe really appreciated Luz's speech, Luz could tell, even if xe didn't necessarily believe it. "Okay. I'm just…a little nervous. It's a whole new world…and a whole lot of people hate us. I mean, what if they try to kill us?"
"That won't happen," Luz said immediately. "I won't let it. Okay, friends. It's time I showed you one of the Human Realm's most magnificent inventions ever: ice cream!"
Willow tilted her head. "Don't you mean ice scream?"
"Nope!"
It had been a lot more difficult than Willow had anticipated convincing her fathers to let her participate in the cultural exchange. They'd been very protective of her as of recent. She'd gotten stabbed during the final battle against Belos and had nearly bled out, so she'd tolerated a certain amount of protectiveness from them. But ever since Vee had become her datemate, the protectiveness had reached a whole new level. Unfortunately, a large part of both of them saw Vee as a monster and a threat. Basilisks had once been an apex predator of the Boiling Isles in the days before the Camelopardine Empire, and children grew up hearing horror stories about them.
To their credit, her dads really had been trying to give Vee a chance. It went against everything they'd been taught to do. They insisted they were fine with Willow having a relationship with a basilisk, and they may even have consciously believed it, but they were subconsciously channeling their anxieties into a generalized overprotectiveness.
For Willow's part, she just saw her datemate as a person. A really nifty person, who was sweet and thoughtful and compassionate, despite the fact that xe'd gone through stuff that made Willow shudder to even think about. Not to mention ridiculously cute no matter what form xe was in. She could understand why her dads were so paranoid though, especially given that one of Vee's contemporaries had attacked Hexside.
But although the Messrs. Park were stubborn, and had passed that stubbornness down into their daughter, they were not unreasonable individuals either. Willow had been able to wear them down. She had to promise to spend at least one weekend a month in the Demon Realm and speak to them every night by scroll, however. Willow was more than happy to accede to their demands.
Willow's first impression of the Human Realm had been how quiet it was. Screams of fear and pain were just normal background noise in the Demon Realm, especially in the night. When she'd stepped out of the portal into what looked to be some sort of warehouse, agents from Luz's government made her sign all sorts of liability forms. The agents seemed particularly annoyed that Willow was meticulously reading through all the forms extremely carefully. Evidently, reading the fine print on contracts wasn't a survival skill on Earth the way it was in the Boiling Isles. The others read the documents just as thoroughly. Eventually, Willow decided that there was nothing particularly objectionable in there and signed them.
Lilith had escorted them through the portal, but after she established that it wasn't an ambush, she returned to the Demon Realm. Instead, it was a grim, unsmiling man who introduced himself as Agent Johnston of the FBI, who was apparently going to be hosting Amity, who brought them outside, and it was raining.
Willow let out an instinctive shriek, her body automatically trained to be expecting the rain to boiling. But instead, the water was a pleasant, cool temperature. It was ridiculously surreal. It was like putting your hand in a flame and not getting burned. It shouldn't have been possible, and yet it was. She knew, from Luz and Amity's stories, that rain was cool in the Human Realm, but she hadn't really believed it until she'd seen it for herself.
Agent Johnston dropped them all off at the school so they could surprise Luz. Willow was not happy to learn that there was a kid at Luz's school who wanted her dead. The Human Realm was supposed to be safe. She had assured her fathers that it was safe, and she didn't like the idea that she had even inadvertently lied. Even Boscha hadn't gone around trying to kill people, even at her worst moments. And Luz had just…shrugged that off? That was seriously weird.
But then again, even Willow knew these were extraordinary times the Human Realm were going through. Humans had long believed themselves to be alone in the multiverse, and suddenly realizing that they were not alone was causing them to freak out. People suspected of being witches (but who were just ordinary humans who were victims of hatemongers) were being burned at the stake by vigilantes, according to Agent Johnston. Was it truly all that surprising that a jerk who had been beaten up by Luz's girlfriend wanted her dead? Sadly not.
Well, if that guy tried anything else, he would meet the business end of a Paralyzing Daisy. If it had worked as a murder weapon for her parallel universe counterpart, it would work for Willow.
In the meantime, Willow was savoring spending time with her best friend in her home realm. It was interesting how much Hexside resembled Luz's high school, and how much it did not. It had lockers, but they were not sentient and didn't try to eat you. The bells, again, were mechanical devices and rang at a much quieter volume. (Which was honestly a huge relief; Willow's ears were even more sensitive than average). But at the end of the day, the fundamental elements were the same. There were cliques, homework, classrooms, and physical education classes. All in all, Willow didn't think it'd take too much time for her to adjust.
After chattering with Luz for a long time, the five of them finally went to meet their host families in the parking lot of the school. They'd already met Camila (as Mrs. Noceda insisted Willow call her), Mr. Harrington, and Agent Johnston. But when Luz saw the fourth host family, the one that would be looking after Vee, she went rigid and her eyes widened in fear. Willow couldn't see what about them was so scary. They looked like a perfectly normal, kind family. A father, a mother, and their pretty blond teenager daughter. The MacKinnon family, Willow remembered Vee telling her. Jack, Naomi, and Clara respectively. What was causing Luz so much distress?
"You can't be in the same house with her!" Luz shouted, pointing at Clara. "She's pure evil!"
Willow peered at Clara. She certainly didn't look pure evil, though that, of course, proved nothing. Surely Eda wouldn't have chosen a host family that wasn't thoroughly vetted, right? No, wait, surely Eda would have employed people who wouldn't have chosen a host family that wasn't thoroughly vetted. There, that was better.
"Luz, I know there was a lot of bad blood between us," Clara began.
"You…you…" Luz appeared so angry that she was at a loss for words, an exceedingly rare occurrence to say the least. "You bitch!"
Camila let out a disapproving gasp. "Luz! Language!"
"No, mami, she deserves it!" Luz shot back. "You know what happened when I asked her out? She hit me and called me a Luzer dyke. In front of a crowd of people. After that, I…I almost…" She clamped her mouth shut almost forcibly.
Camila looked absolutely appalled to hear this. Much to the surprise of both Willow and Luz herself, so did Mr. and Mrs. MacKinnon. Presumably, Luz had thought Clara's actions were encouraged by her parents. Either they were very good actors, or Luz was very wrong. "Clara, what the hell?" Mr. MacKinnon demanded. "How could you do such a thing?"
"I was stupid!" Clara shouted. "Okay? I was hanging out with a bad crowd, and I made a ton of mistakes. But I'm not like that anymore! I'm better now!" She turned to face Vee, a pleading expression on her face. "Please don't judge me on the mistakes of my past. I've tried to put that behind me. I've tried to apologize to Luz."
Amity stepped forward. Willow braced herself for having to defend Clara from Amity's homicidal wrath. To say that Amity got overprotective against Luz was a massive understatement. But instead, Amity said, "I understand."
"You what?" Luz shouted.
"I understand what it's like to make mistakes and still suffer the consequences of them, even after you've changed," Amity clarified. "I don't understand how you could ever do something so reprehensible to anyone, much less Luz. But I was once like you, and now I'm not. I'm willing to believe that you're a different person now. But Luz is not obligated to forgive you, and you're just going to have to accept that she likely never will." She got right in front of Clara. "And if you haven't changed, if you hurt my friends, I know a lot of ways to kill you without anyone even suspecting for a second that I was responsible."
Agent Johnston cleared his throat. As an FBI agent, he presumably was not a fan of death threats being levied against the citizens that he was charged with protecting. "I think that we should all be going our separate ways now," he suggested. "Amity, thank you for agreeing to stay with us. I can speak for the whole family when I say that we're all looking forward to it."
The car ride to Luz's house was very awkward. Camila kept on hoping that Luz was going to talk about the Clara incident, and Luz kept on trying to work up the courage to do so, but failed. Willow tried to make conversation, talking about plants and how various mechanical devices she'd seen in the Human Realm worked, but no one seemed inclined to talk.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Camila asked finally, once they all gotten into the living room of Luz's house. It was cozy and comfortable and reminded Willow a lot of the living room of her own house and absolutely none of that atmosphere was helping make anyone even better in the slightest.
Luz crossed her arms. She looked very small somehow. "I did," she said quietly. "I tried. I told you I asked someone out and got rejected, and you just said there were plenty more fish in the sea. And…I tried to ask out a girl…I wasn't sure how you'd react to that. It was just easier to hide it all in."
"But not better," Camila pointed out.
Luz's eyes flickered over to the kitchen for some reason. "No. Not better." She shook her head, clearing off disturbing thoughts, Willow could tell. "Okay, well, let me show you around the place! No point in talking about the past. It's in the past for a reason, right?"
Willow had a hunch that the past was nowhere as firmly in the past as it should have been, but she didn't think pushing would help Luz right now. So she let Luz give her a grand tour of her modest but clearly well beloved residence. Luz finished it up by showing Willow her bedroom, which had a bunk bed. Luz usually slept on the bottom bunk ("I kept on falling off the top bunk in my sleep," she explained) but she insisted Willow pick whichever one she wanted. Willow took the top bunk, just in case.
"And these are my stuffed animals," she said, opening a drawer in her dresser and taking out several plushies. She pointed at a creature vaguely resembling a bird. "That's Charlie! He's a penguin!" She pointed at a creature that looked like a minotaur, but one that went on four legs. "That's Onslow! He's a bull!" She pointed at a roughly rectangular shaped yellow creature with arms and legs and eyes covered by some sort of goggles. "That's Irving! He's a Minion. That's not a real animal; it's from a movie."
Then she pointed at a white-furred wolf-like creature. "That's Snowy! He's a dog. He's also a character from these comic books I read as a kid." Finally, she pointed at a vaguely humanoid figure with no ears, an orange nose and red hair, wearing a green lab coat. "And that's Beaker! He's a Muppet!" Willow awaited an explanation for what a Muppet was, but it did not appear to be forthcoming.
Luz put them back in the drawer and then a horrified expression abruptly came on her face. "Um…well, I mean…I used to play with these guys when I was a kid. I'm more mature now, of course…" She looked dreadfully embarrassed.
Willow gave her a gentle smile. "Luz, it's okay. Amity'd kill me if she knew I told you this, but she still has her Otabin plushie. I've got a stuffed animal or two myself. It's okay. If it brings you comfort, what's so immature about that? Recognizing what makes you happy and then taking advantage of it, as long as it's not hurting anyone else…that's true maturity, in my opinion."
Luz suddenly almost knocked Willow off her feet with a hug. It was a good thing Willow was used to them by now. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
While Luz was busy doing her homework, Willow helped Camila with the dinner. She didn't have the slightest idea what was in the dish Camila was making, but it certainly smelled very good. Amity had not been particularly enthusiastic about the food when she told Willow about her experiences in the Human Realm back in the spring, but every witch's taste buds were different, and Willow had high hopes for the meal.
"Willow…I wanted to thank you," Camila told her. "For being such a good friend to my daughter."
Willow was frankly offended by her comment. Did Camila really think so little of her that she thought such a basic thing was even worthy of mentioning? "Camila, it's not a big deal. She helped me, she's a good person, and she's really fun to be around. Who wouldn't want to be friends with her?"
Camila sighed. "Unfortunately, Willow, before you befriended Luz, the answer was everyone."
Willow blinked. Surely that couldn't be possible. Luz was such a gregarious, easygoing ball of sunshine and energy. She had melted the heart of the ice queen Amity Blight herself. Why wouldn't her classmates recognize the wonderful person she was inside? "What about her friends at her human school?" she asked eventually. They certainly acted like they'd been friends forever.
"Oh, no, those three are a very new development," Camila explained. "You're the first friend Luz ever had. She…had difficulty connecting with people. She's different. People don't like other people who are different." She wringed her hands. "I thought for so long that it was all her fault, you know. I'm ashamed of that, but I can't deny it either. And…well, there are certainly instances where Luz has gone too far – I don't absolve her of responsibility for those. But the deck was stacked against her in ways I had no clue about until recently…and in ways I'm still suspecting she's keeping from me."
Willow gave her a sympathetic smile. "At least she's starting to tell you about things, right?"
Camila nodded. "I just feel so ashamed of the way I treated her. Like she was the problem…like she was a problem. I just wanted what was best for her, Willow. I wanted her to be happy. But I thought that meant she had to change…maybe it truly meant that I had to change."
Willow didn't buy any of this self-pitying malarkey for a second. "You think you're a bad mother? I call minotaurshit on that one – pardon my language. You made mistakes. I won't deny that. But that does not make you a bad mother. You know who's a bad mother? Odalia. Because she would never consider for a second that she was the problem. If you have doubts, that just means you're a good person. Bad people don't have them."
Camila hugged her. Her hugs were like Luz's, but gentler, more encompassing. She was a damn good hugger. "Oh, Willow, you're so sweet. You're a good friend. I'm glad you saw worth in my daughter when so many people failed to see it."
"It just means they're a bunch of morons, that's all," Willow said casually. "Now come on. These vegetables won't cook themselves. Eda tried that once – it did not work out." Camila let out a laugh.
Gus Porter was a witch on a mission. He had been preparing for it for months. Back when Amity had gone to the Human Realm on vacation back in the spring, he had asked her to write a report about her experiences for the benefit of posterity. Amity, never one to back down from an even pseudo-academically related challenge, had gamely obliged. Her report had been awe inspiring, eye opening, and desperately in need of a decent editor (because once she started talking about Luz, it was very difficult to get her to stop), but one thing she had written had been nothing short of horrifying.
While in Seattle, Amity had encountered giraffes.
It had been in a zoo, which Gus was given to understand was sort of an internment camp, albeit only for animals that were regarded as non-sentient. Apparently, from her report, it was a popular place for children to visit and gloat over the species that humans regarded as lesser. Gus wasn't sure he was all that comfortable with that, but it really wasn't his place to tell the humans they were wrong. The whole thing wasn't his concern either. What was his concern was the giraffes imprisoned therein. If indeed they were imprisoned and weren't just pretending they were confined as part of some nefarious plot.
Every witch knew of the atrocities of the Camelopardine Empire, which had taken place not three hundred years before. There were quite a few demons, thanks to their long lifespan, that were actually alive during that time. There were a lot more demons that should still be alive today, but weren't because of the giraffes' atrocities. They were bloodthirsty warlords, who cruelly oppressed their people, and those were their good qualities. They were fond of experiments. They especially liked experimenting on children.
The giraffes were so savage and brutal and a threat to the very fabric of spacetime itself that a coalition had emerged between demons, witches, and fae – enemies that had never before or since worked together to the extent they did in fighting the giraffes – in order to take them down. It had not been easy. Most records of the battles to take them down were expunged. Very few survivors wanted to talk about it. Those that did mostly gave incoherent ramblings about the blood and the horror and the…well, Gus had stopped reading those accounts to throw up at this point, and never restarted reading, so he didn't know what else, but the point was that the giraffes did not go down without a fight.
In order to ensure that they would never menace the Isles again, they were not only exiled to Earth, but also eleven million years in the past thanks to the unique time magic of the fae. No witch had ever thought they'd ever be seen again. Surely in eleven million years, they'd have destroyed themselves or been destroyed by others. But then Luz had just casually announced in the middle of lunch at Hexside, as if it was no big deal, that, yeah, giraffes were totally still living on Earth.
It was Luz's contention that either the ravages of time or a side effect of going through the portal had rendered the giraffes non-sapient. The humans knew them as mindless animals, and there was certainly no proof they'd ever presented themselves as anything more. But Gus knew better. They were pure evil. Amity had chosen to avoid killing them. Gus understood why. She had to lie low lest magic be exposed. But that ship had already sailed. Someone had to kill the giraffes, and Gus knew that it was going to be him.
"So what do you say?" Gus said when he explained all of this to Luz's friends Sean and Avery, as well as Avery's father, Mr. Harrington, at breakfast in the Harrington household a few days after his arrival in the Human Realm. "Want to help me kill them? It'll be fun, a great way to solidify the cultural bonds between our two peoples, and more!"
Mr. Harrington just blinked repeatedly. "Are you insane? Like…legitimately asking this question. Are you insane?"
"Of course I'm not!" Gus said, offended by the very idea. Was he insane for wanting a horrific threat to both their realms removed? Of course not! It wasn't as if he was telling them they should make the whole species extinct. He just wanted to kill the ones in Seattle.
Perhaps he had gone into this too quickly, he conceded. Mr. Harrington had been super friendly and cool to him. He was well versed in important human concepts such as ley lines and crop circles. More to the point, he'd shown himself to be a decent, honorable man on multiple occasions. He'd given Camila a job in his library, supported Avery when they'd come out as nonbinary despite their mother's hostility to it, and kept the secret of the Boiling Isles, even through revealing it could have made him a very rich man. But he wasn't a denizen of the Isles; he didn't understand the depths of the giraffes' depravities.
"Look, Gus, you're not killing anyone," Mr. Harrington said sternly, his hands on his hips. "I can't…God, I can't even believe we're having this conversation. Don't kill the giraffes, man! They're just wild animals!"
"Not to mention you'd get into huge trouble," Sean pointed out.
"That's only if I get caught," Gus retorted smugly. "As you may have noticed, I'm an illusionist, which means…" He used his magic to turn himself invisible, and then reappeared a few seconds later. "…I have a few tricks up my sleeve. They can't catch what they can't see! All I need to do is borrow one of your guns, Mr. Harrington, and –"
Mr. Harrington pointed at Gus. "No. That is a hard no, Gus. You'll have to find another host if you're going to be participating in this insane scheme. And you!" He pointed at Avery now. "If I find out you're helping him in any way, you are grounded until the end of time! If the giraffes at the Woodland Park Zoo get so much as a splinter I'm assuming you're all responsible, and I will get this whole program shut down!" He slammed his head on the table. "God! I was irresponsible and reckless as a teen, yeah, but this is taking it to a whole new level! Why can't you, like, get up to normal teen problems? You know, drinking, smoking, breaking into secret Soviet research facilities, things like that."
Without another word, he stormed out of the room. "Your dad had a weird childhood, didn't he?" Sean commented.
Avery just nodded. "Hey, man, I get why this is pissing you off. But maybe this is something that should be done through official channels, know what I mean?" Sean stared at them as if they were absolutely crazy.
Gus blinked. "You don't believe me. You think I'm insane. Just like your dad!"
Avery put up their hands. "I don't agree with you, Gus. That's not the same thing as me saying you're crazy. Look, I have not yet seen any evidence that the giraffes retained their sapience after being tossed through the portal. You said they were banished by a team of the toughest sorcerers out there – wouldn't they have taken extra precautions to ensure that the giraffes wouldn't ever be a threat again? Like turning them into mindless animals."
That…did make sense now that Gus thought about it. He would have done the same thing if he were a part of that group. And, he had to concede, the giraffes had plenty of time to make a move if they were sapient. They'd been on Earth for millions of years. If they were sapient still, wouldn't they have moved to wipe out humanity a long time ago? Like when they started to invent the wheel or something? It was a little late now, given the huge advancements in technology that humanity had made in just the last century.
"Oh…I'm so sorry!" Gus said, realizing now that he really did come across as a bloodthirsty psychopath to Luz's friends. "Oh, man, I really didn't mean any harm…I just wanted to keep everyone safe."
Sean breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, good. I did not want to get a criminal record at my age. Or any age, really, but especially this one. So…how's about we take you to see a movie? Oh, you don't know what that is, right?"
Ha! The joke was on him, because Gus did know what it was. Luz had shown him quite a few films on her tablet that summer. Gus especially liked the James Bond films, although he was much more fond of the awesome action sequences than its protagonist's questionable ethics when it came to dealing with women. He liked spy dramas of all kinds, actually, including books. "It's like a play, right? But projected on a screen instead of done on a stage?"
"Uh, yeah, actually," Sean said, sounding impressed. "You did your research before you came here, didn't you?"
Gus puffed up his chest proudly. "I happen to be an expert on humans! One of the foremost in the entire Demon Realm! Did you know that in the southern half of the world people walk around upside down and the seasons are reversed?"
"That's…only half right," Avery said, rubbing their forehead like they had a headache. "Okay, well, let's go to the movies, then! Dad'd probably be good with us going anywhere as long as we stay away from the zoo."
The giraffes had to die, of course. There was no doubt about that. They had done things that, if described in a fanfic, would automatically push it up to an E rating, and, if a level beyond that existed, to that too. But no longer did Gus believe they had to die because they were a threat, only because they deserved it. And while he wanted, desperately, to be the one to kill them, he couldn't risk the cultural exchange being shuttered either because of his actions. Anyway, if he killed the giraffes, it could have serious political repercussions. Things were too delicate now. They had time. The giraffes had been on Earth for eleven million years; a few more months wouldn't make a difference.
Gus used an illusion to make his ears look round as the three of them walked over to the local cinema. Mr. Harrington had said it was better to be safe than sorry. Gus wasn't scared of going around looking like a witch – wasn't one of the whole points of the cultural exchange to get people more used to interacting with witches? – but Gus was a guest in Mr. Harrington's house, and it was polite for him to follow Mr. Harrington's instructions as long as they didn't put himself or others at risk or were immoral. Gus was a very polite witch; his father had taught him well.
Unfortunately, it would seem that a lot of humans were very impolite. It was astonishing how many people had believed Mrs. Blight's ridiculous pack of lies. There were a ton of holes in her story, and then there was the thing about her partner being wanted for war crimes and conspiring to kill Luz's father. But unfortunately, it would seem not only were gigantic swathes of humans advocating for war against the Demon Realm, but that some of them were mercilessly killing their fellow humans out of suspicion that they were collaborating with denizens of the Demon Realm, or were even disguised inhabitants of the Demon Realm themselves.
"There's even some conspiracy theorist living in Connecticut who thinks witches and demons were sent from Mars to harvest human teeth to power their time machine!" Sean informed him.
"Nothing you just said made any sense at all," Gus said. What was Mars? What was a time machine? What did human teeth have to do with anything?
"Exactly!"
The local cinema was reshowing a movie called Avatar for some reason. Gus had seen a lot of movies, but only on a screen a few inches wide. Seeing movies on a large screen was a completely different experience, and an absolutely stunning one. Gus was almost exploding from the emotions he was feeling. He was frankly unsure that the humans weren't secretly utilizing bard spells in creating this movie, because he felt so much of it in the very depths of his soul.
"That was so cool!" Gus gushed after the film was over. "Oh, man, the coolest part was when they went flying over those floating mountains on those birds! Where did they film that?"
"Oh, it's not a real place," Avery explained. "It was all created using CGI – computer generated imagery. What, did you think the Na'vi were actually real?"
Well, that was just insulting. Gus wasn't an idiot. "I thought they were humans in costumes! How was I supposed to know about this CGI stuff? Hang on. So can I make movies like that on your computer back home, Avery?"
Avery burst out laughing, not unkindly. "No, no, you have to have a lot of money to have computers like that. There's a reason why Avatar was so expensive to make!"
Gus's mind was whirling. "I bet I could make movies a lot cheaper with illusion magic! They'd look even better than this!"
"You probably could," Sean admitted. "That sounds like it'd be awesome. I mean, you'd probably have to be an adult first before any studio would work with you, but once you were…man, you could probably write your own ticket in Hollywood."
Gus was just envisioning all the possibilities. He could make films that people would love for generations at a fraction of the price. That way, there'd be more money to spend on the crew's salaries! And hiring better writers! Maybe he could create his own movie studio. He could make movies out of the Good Witch Azura books! Luz would get such a kick out of that.
Slaughtering the giraffes en masse was a noble goal, but Gus had a new dream now. Killing the giraffes would just have to wait.
To say that Vee's childhood had been utterly miserable was a gross understatement. Xyr entire life up until the overthrow of Belos had been an endless array of pain and suffering. It had been completely devoid of hope. Xyr earliest memory was someone carving a brand on xyr back. The only people xe could trust to look out for xyr were xyr fellow basilisks, and most of them were unreliable at best, their minds buckling and breaking under the constant torture and experimentation.
Number One had led an escape attempt shortly before Luz had come to the Boiling Isles. Vee, Number One, and two other basilisks, Numbers Seven and Nine, had taken advantage of a momentary flaw in the wards preventing them from using their magic, sucked out the magic from several guards, and fled the Conformatorium. Unfortunately, Number Seven had sold them out to the Emperor's Coven shortly thereafter, having been promised freedom to do so. The only freedom they received, xe learned later, had been the freedom of the grave. In the ensuing battle, Vee was recaptured, Number Nine was killed, and Number One managed to escape.
Vee had almost been able to escape before the battle started. Xe had given serious thought to impersonating Luz, having spotted her entering the Demon Realm through the portal, and fleeing to the Human Realm. In the end, though, xe was glad xe didn't do that. Luz was a good person at the core, and didn't deserve to have someone stealing her life.
Number One went crazy and attacked Hexside, trying to suck up enough magic to defeat and kill Belos once and for all. Perhaps it would have worked, but Vee had a hunch that Number One would have become a tyrant far worse than Belos in due time. The cure would have been far, far worse than the disease.
The torture intensified. There were days when Vee couldn't even remember xyr name, the pain was so bad. There didn't seem to be much point to it anymore, either. Not that there was truly a point to her suffering, but at least there had been the pretense of scientific research behind it. Now xyr tormentors weren't even bothering. Just when Vee was giving serious thought to just killing xyrself, because even oblivion seemed like a preferable outcome to the torment, the torture just…stopped.
It was a few days before someone actually found the secret area in the Conformatorium where the basilisks were experimented on, but the news Vee received when they did was the best xe'd ever received in xyr life. Belos was dead. The Isles were free. Vee was free.
Well, mostly free. Since Vee was considered a minor, xe was sent to live in an orphanage. In retrospect, the place had been rather shabby and not much to write home about. But compared to the existence Vee had lived before that, it had been paradise. Xe slept on a bed. Xe got three meals a day! Xe could ask people questions without being whipped for xyr insolence! In fact, no one even laid a finger on xyr anymore!
Vee also got a chance to go to school. It took xyr a lot less time to adjust to that new existence than xe thought it would. Xe learned how to read and write. And xe found out that there were amazing things called books that contained stories beyond anything Vee could possibly envision! It was truly magnificent.
A lot of people thought xe was dangerous or a threat just because xe was a basilisk. But Vee wouldn't let that get xyr down. Xe was a naturally cheery individual, despite the horrific things xe'd endured, and xe had been told by the witches who ran the orphanage that if you were nice to people, they'd be nice to you back. This didn't seem all that rooted in reality from Vee's past experiences, but Vee was slowly starting to realize that xyr experiences had been abnormal in the extreme.
When Vee had gotten a bad grade on a test in one of the classes on the plant track, xe'd taken xyr teacher's advice and gotten the best student in the class, Willow Park, to tutor xyr. Vee found Willow's enthusiasm about plants to be utterly enthralling. Xe'd never heard anyone talk about something with such enthusiasm that wasn't how much they were looking forward to hurting xyr. And there was just something about the curve of her face, the way her hair glinted in the sunlight, the way that she blushed whenever someone paid her a compliment that Vee just found…enchanting.
It wasn't long before Vee found xyrself sitting with Willow at lunch, and visiting her at her house, and going to places with her. Vee had finally made a friend, and it felt absolutely fantastic. So why, xe wondered, did it feel like xe wanted more from Willow? Xe often looked at xyr face and thought about what it would be like to kiss it. When that happened, Vee always wondered if Willow felt the same way.
And as it turned out, she did! Willow asked Vee to be her datemate and to go to Grom with her! It was scary being Willow's datemate, in a way. For the first time in xyr life, someone truly loved xyr and xe was petrified that xe'd do something to mess it up. For a long while, xe was paranoid that Willow would break up with xyr for even the tiniest slipups. But Vee confided xyr fears in Willow, and Willow helped xyr through them. She was awesome like that. Vee would follow xyr girlfriend to the ends of the universe and beyond.
And xe meant that literally, so when Willow asked xyr to join her on a cultural exchange to the Human Realm, Vee agreed without an instant of hesitation. The Demon Realm, honestly, was strange and unfamiliar to xyr. Concepts that most witches found basic still evaded xyr. So, honestly, how much worse could the Human Realm be? At least xe would have a very decent excuse for not knowing things there.
Vee had been quite frightened to go back to the MacKinnon residence after Luz had warned her that Clara was pure evil. But she quickly came to realize that Clara wasn't anything of the kind. Luz was privileged – she didn't know the slightest thing about what pure evil truly was. Yes, Clara had been rude to her. Certainly Vee didn't condone her past actions. But Clara was trying to change. And while uttering homophobic comments and provoking mockery was not a good thing, it certainly paled before the vast array of indignities the Emperor's Coven had performed on Vee.
In fact, Clara was very polite to xyr. So were her parents, who made it very clear to Vee that they had neither encouraged nor condoned Clara's past behavior. All three of them went out of their ways to help Vee whenever xe needed it. They explained simple human concepts such as phones, cars, and televisions to xyr without making xe feel stupid for having asked the questions. In fact, the MacKinnons were quite enthusiastic about answering all of Vee's questions about the Human Realm. Gus had spoken much of the Human Realm, but somehow Vee didn't think he was a tremendously reliable source, and had largely been proven right since xyr arrival on Earth.
Vee had been guarded with how xe responded to xyr hosts' questions. But xe could tell that they were quite alarmed by what little xe had let slip regarding xyr past. In Vee's defense, how was xe supposed to know it wasn't normal to be beaten for requesting more food? It's not like anyone had ever told xyr these things!
"I don't see how we can send you back to such an environment, Vee," Mrs. MacKinnon said as they ate dinner as a family one night, sounding genuinely worried. A thrill went through Vee's entire body. This was the first time anyone aside from Willow had expressed the slightest concern for xyr welfare. Was this what it was like to be loved by a parent? Vee could definitely see the appeal.
"Oh, you don't have to worry, ma'am," Vee assured her. "I'm very safe now. Everyone responsible for experimenting on me has been punished." Most of them were dead. The few that survived had died in custody; even with the newfangled due process being introduced to the Isles, some witches in the Law Enforcement Coven had a very direct approach to justice. "The new government won't let anything bad happen to me. After all, I am the princess's best friend's datemate."
Clara reached out and squeezed Vee's hand. Vee felt a thrill echo through her body. It was like being electrocuted; xe knew intimately what that felt like, but also…good somehow? And not dissimilar to how xe felt around…Willow…oh, dear. Okay. Calm. Everything's fine, Vee. Just focus on what the human is saying and not how pretty her blue eyes look. You have a girlfriend already!
"Sweetie, are you all right?" Clara asked urgently. "You were zoning out on me."
"Uh, of course I'm fine…sorry, must be more tired than I thought," Vee awkwardly lied. "What were you saying?"
Clara smirked. Did she know what Vee had been thinking? Xe hoped not. "I was just saying that I won't let anything bad happen to you here. I'll protect you with my life if I have to."
Vee smiled at her. "You're nice, Clara. I don't understand why Luz hates you so much."
Clara sighed. "Luz is right to hate me. I made her life utterly miserable. I could have let her down gently, but I chose to mock her."
Mrs. MacKinnon shook her head in dismay. "I just don't understand why, Clara. Haven't we taught you to be polite and respectful to people? I know peer pressure leads you kids to do crazy things at times, but still…it's not how we raised you."
Vee cleared xyr throat. "I think I'd like to talk about more pleasant things." Clara gave her a grateful look. "Um, so…can I ask why you decided to take me in? I mean, it's a big thing. A basilisk in your home."
Mr. MacKinnon nodded at her. "A good question, Vee. Actually, I did it for my country. I wanted to show my fellow Americans that there was nothing to fear, that there can be peace between our two realms." A wistful expression came on his face. "Perhaps then people might see that there can be peace between fellow humans as well…though I think we all know that's a bit of a pipe dream."
"Well, thank you so much for your hospitality, sir," Vee said fervently. "I promise I'll never forget it."
School turned out to be not all that much different from Hexside, in Vee's opinion. In fact, it was so much easier on xyr because at Hexside, Vee was surrounded by magic that xyr instincts kept telling xyr to devour. Xe could and did ignore them, but it was…difficult at times. There was no magic in the Human Realm. Well, not much, anyway. Some background magic was slipping in through the portal. It was a mere trickle, though. Not enough for sustenance…not yet anyway.
It was strange, though. People freaked out when they learned xe was a basilisk. A lot of them wouldn't even look at xyr, although some of them tried to be sociable while doing so. And almost everyone refused to look xyr in the eyes like their lives depended on it. At first, Vee had attributed it to a generalized aversion to people from the Demon Realm. But then xe noticed they didn't react the same way to the witches at the school. It was truly strange. Vee asked Luz for her opinion, but she just laughed and asked Vee to tell her how xe had accomplished such a feet when xe found out. Apparently, Luz despised eye contact.
That wasn't to say it was all a barrel of laughs, as the humans sometimes said. (Human phrases were ridiculously bewildering, and Luz wasn't any help deciphering them at all, as she often found them just as confusing as Vee did.) Some of the students openly despised her, and so did some of the teachers.
Take Mrs. Claremont, xyr language arts teacher, who apparently taught students literature and writing. She had despised Vee from the get-go, the instant she laid eyes on xyr. Vee had no idea why. Granted, it appeared that Mrs. Claremont despised a lot of her students, and teaching in general, so perhaps it didn't have anything to do with Vee in particular?
But Mrs. Claremont flipped out when Vee introduced xyrself. It was a totally innocuous introduction. "Hi, my name is Vee!" xe said to the class with a friendly wave. "I'm a basilisk and my pronouns are xe/xyr! If you have any questions about the Demon Realm, I'm happy to answer them!"
Mrs. Claremont sneered at xyr. "You can't just give yourself random pronouns. I don't know how they do things in hell, but here, we have respect for the English language."
Vee blinked at her. "I'm sure the English language is a wonderful thing, ma'am. But a binary system of pronouns just simply doesn't work for me. I can look like a man." Xe shapeshifted into a male human form to gasps from the class. "Or a woman." Xe shapeshifted into a female human form, then back to xyr basilisk form. "We were engineered without any reproductive organs or genitalia of any kind so we wouldn't be able to breed, so I don't really see how I can call myself a man or a woman. And, with respect, I've kind of noticed that a gender binary doesn't work for a lot of other people either."
Mrs. Claremont's face went an alarming shade of red. Vee was kind of wondering if xe needed to call a healer for a few moments. "Office! Now!"
Vee shrugged and left the classroom. Xe had absolutely no idea what xe'd done wrong. Humans were very into gender, but Vee, as a shapeshifter, never really saw the point of it. Some days, Vee liked looking like a boy, and other days like a girl, but it wasn't because xe actually felt like those things, anymore than she felt like a dress or a suit because xe wanted to wear them. Gender was just a fashion accessory to xyr.
Principal Weiss didn't seem to have any clue what Vee had done wrong either, because after he and Mrs. Claremont retreated to his office for a private discussion that got very loud, xe was told to go to xyr next class and that xe wasn't in any trouble. That was a relief. Vee certainly didn't want to make any waves. Luz may have been proud of being a troublemaker, but Vee was a model student at Hexside and xe had every intention of remaining so in Luz's school.
Vee wanted to have lunch with Clara, but Luz refused to be at the same table as Clara, which put Willow in the awkward position of having to choose whether to sit with her best friend or her datemate. Eventually, it was decided that she'd alternate. On this day, she was sitting with Clara and Vee. "Oh, man, you should have been there! Xe took down Claremont like a boss!"
"I'm…not her boss?" Vee said confusedly.
"No, it's an expression…it just means you were awesome!" Clara said with a radiant smile that set Vee's heart aflutter. Titandamn it. This was going to be a problem. Clara spotted a friend of hers on the other side of the lunchroom who was gesturing her to come over to her table. "I'll be right back."
Willow looked Vee straight in the eyes, the first person in a long time to do that. "So…I've seen how you're looking at Clara."
Vee let out a yelp. "I'm so sorry, Willow! I didn't mean anything by it! You're enough for me, I swear it! I just can't help but feel…things when I look at her. Please don't break up with me!"
Willow leaned forward and gave Vee a passionate kiss. "Do I sound like a witch who wants to break up with her awesome datemate?" Vee had to admit that she did not. "It's okay to have a crush, Vee. It doesn't make you a bad person. And, you know…if it happens that she can see what an awesome person you are just like I can and she wants to date you…I wouldn't be amiss to sharing."
Clara returned to the table. "Sorry about that! Did I miss anything important?"
"Nothing important…for now," Willow said teasingly. She winked and Vee let out an eep.
Luz Noceda was oblivious. It was an inexorable law of the multiverse. Water was wet, fire was hot, and Luz was oblivious. Amity knew this as surely as she knew her own name. As brilliant as Luz could be, she had ridiculously wide emotional and social blind spots. Sometimes, she breezed through life without considering the consequences of her actions, both good or bad. She could figure out ridiculously complex iterations of glyphs one moment, and then totally misunderstand Amity's blatantly obvious hints that she wanted kisses. And, of course, Luz had been completely blind to the idea that Amity could possibly have a crush on her, only acting when she got a crush on Amity.
For pity's sake, the girl didn't even know Amity had wanted to ask her out to that first Grom. She still sometimes had paranoid fears that Amity would dump her in favor of her Grom crush, blissfully unaware that the two were one and the same.
But it wasn't until Amity started to go to Luz's school that she understood why Luz was so oblivious. Of course, a large chunk of it was because of her autism, making it difficult to read social cues of the neurotypical (or, in Amity's case, those forced to act as if they were neurotypical). But Amity was starting to realize, both from observing how people were acting around Luz now and from stories that were slowly trickling in about how Luz's peers had acted in the past, that Luz had subconsciously chosen to become oblivious to how people think of her as a survival skill.
Amity knew Luz had been bullied, but it was becoming clearer and clearer that it hadn't just been to the level that, for example, Amity had bullied Willow. It was a systematic campaign of terror, more or less, dedicated to destroying Luz on every single possible level. Eventually, Luz had just…checked out. Reality wasn't changing, so she buried herself in media and writing and reading in self-defense, because if she interacted with the real world too much, she'd have to come face to face with the fact that she was universally despised.
Camila had sent Luz to Reality Check Camp to make her interact with the real world more, to allow her to make friends, but the problem had never been with Luz. It had been with everyone else. Luz had proven that when she came to Hexside and made friends effortlessly like she'd been doing it her whole life. She'd even made friends with Amity, and showed Amity what it was like to have a true friend for the first time since Amity had been friends with Willow.
It was Luz's innate obliviousness that had allowed her to sail through her classes heedless to the horrible things some of her peers were saying about her behind her back, and, honestly, sometimes within earshot too. Luz was used to people saying horrible things about her. That hadn't changed when her secret life was revealed to the world.
Amity, however, was not, and it bothered her to no end. Her girlfriend was an incredible person, and people were spreading horrible lies about her. Even if she and Luz had been dressing up and traveling together, as the Demon Realm euphemism went, which they were not, it wouldn't have been anyone's business, and certainly not that of total strangers. Amity had tried to tell people the truth to counteract the rumors, but it was an exercise in futility.
In addition to maliciously spread rumors, Amity was also hearing a wide variety of ridiculous rumors spread out of pure ignorance, not malice. Amity didn't know what a Parseltongue was, but she was sure whatever it was, she wasn't it. She wasn't made of wood or weigh the same as a duck, whatever that was. And she sure as hell didn't trap people in sitcom realities like Scarlet Witch either, even if that was sounding increasingly appealing.
Well, Amity was not a witch who gave up on anything ever. This also included times when it was quite advisable to give up and "get some giraffing sleep already, Amity. Honestly, have you been taking care of yourself at all?" as Emira put it, but still, it could be a positive quality too. Amity decided she had a moral responsibility to educate people about life in the Demon Realm.
That was why she and Caroline were going to the Demon Realm for the afternoon. The Johnstons had reluctantly given their approval. In the end, Amity suspected that the fact that the American government would have more actionable intelligence to work with at the end of it, even if everyone else also possessed the same knowledge, had factored in Agent Johnston's decision to approve the plan. He was a very shrewd man when all was said and done.
Caroline was absolutely enthralled with the Demon Realm. Details that Amity had written off as perfectly mundane were looked on with Caroline with ridiculous amounts of awe. Everywhere she looked, Caroline seemed to find something that made her even happier and more excited to be there than before. It was sweet and endearing and also made it pretty easy to see how she and Luz had become friends.
Amity brought Caroline into Hexside. Caroline looked actually a bit disappointed by the school. "I don't know, I was kind of expecting something more…Hogwarts-like."
"I don't know what that is," Amity pointed out.
"Oh, there's this book series called Harry Potter," Caroline said, sounding vaguely embarrassed for having assumed Amity knew about it. "Hogwarts was the school Harry went to." Amity could vaguely recall Luz mentioning something about that series. All she remembered was that its titular protagonist was a wizard and its author had turned out to be a giant transphobe.
"I assure you, miss," the voice of Principal Bump said from behind them, "that Hexside is the most highly regarded institute of magical learning in the entire Demon Realm. Far superior to any imaginary ones."
Caroline turned to face Bump. She appeared slightly alarmed by the seeing eye demon on Bump's head, which was Amity was so used to that she hadn't even thought to mention it to her. But she recovered herself with admirable swiftness. "It's a pleasure to meet you, sir. You must be Principal Bump. I'm Caroline Johnston, a friend of Luz Noceda."
Bump's face lit up slightly, almost imperceptibly, when Luz's name was mentioned. "Ah! Well, it is a delight to hear that Luz has been making new friends. I gather that was something of an issue for her in the past. The changes she's brought to the Isles have improved Hexside immensely, and you may quote me on that."
Amity cleared her throat. "Speaking of quoting, sir, Caroline and I were thinking about making some videos to introduce people in the Human Realm to the Demon Realm and the various forms of magic in our realm. There are a lot of stories floating around, and I thought it best to tell people the truth straight from the pegasus' mouth."
Bump nodded approvingly at her. "That is a very clever idea, Miss Blight." Amity beamed. Praise from her principal would never stop being a rush for her, even if it wasn't necessarily the be all and end all of her existence anymore. "It certainly would do good things for our school's reputation to be seen as the leading facility for magical education." Ah, there was the Bump Amity remembered.
He looked over at Caroline. "Miss Johnston, you should be quite proud of how well your peers have been able to adjust to the Demon Realm. They are already quite adept at glyphs and doing relatively well in their classes, for the most part. Naturally, there is a rather steep learning curve, so we are taking that into account."
Bump pulled the three human students (the only ones who had been willing to volunteer to be part of the program) out of their classes temporarily so they could talk to them. There was a girl with medium length brown hair, wearing clothes that Amity was given to understand were in a style known as goth, a dark-skinned boy with shaggy black hair covering his eyes, and a human whose gender Amity was uncertain of with short brown hair and glasses. The girl introduced herself as Maria Papadopoulos, the boy was Michael Fielding, and the third human, who turned out to be nonbinary like Avery, was Linus O'Malley.
"You mind participating in some videos we're going to be making?" Caroline asked them. "We want to show people that the Demon Realm is nothing to be feared."
"Sounds awesome!" Linus enthused. "I've been having a blast since I got here. I kind of wanted my own wand, but the glyphs are pretty cool too. Honestly, my school back home is more of a hell than this place is."
Maria and Michael both eagerly agreed to participate in the videos as well. Caroline turned out to be a very good interviewer, asking incisive but not overly probing questions, and allowing her subjects to set the pace of the conversation. Amity had no doubt that it would be a hit once Caroline uploaded it to her YouTube channel when they'd returned to Earth. Of course, the nature of the video would make it a hit no matter how good it was, but it would be better with Caroline's excellent skills.
"Do we…actually have authorization to do this?" Caroline wondered after the interview of the human students was finished. "I don't want to get into trouble."
"Oh, don't worry, I got Eda – I mean, Prime Minister Clawthorne's permission before we came here," Amity assured her truthfully. "Anyway, even if we hadn't, all that matters is that Bump is okay with it. We're private citizens with the right to free speech; we can make whatever videos we want."
Not only was Bump okay with the whole thing, but he was actually quite eager to participate in the interview. He gleefully chattered about the school and the various forms of magic taught in it. He bragged constantly about how his students had shattered various records year after year. Amity had a hunch, actually, that a good chunk of his verbiage was specifically directed to appeal to human investors who wanted to pitch in to providing Hexside funding. She didn't begrudge him this. He wasn't fudging the truth too much and, as an educator himself, was able to provide an overview that was basic enough to be understood by the average human without being overly condescending.
Bump then called an impromptu school assembly, seemingly completely at a whim, and had various teachers and students demonstrate various forms of magic. Some part of Amity actually felt resentful that she wasn't being asked to give a demonstration, but Amity was ignoring that part of her. She and Caroline had agreed that Amity wouldn't actually be in the videos because she didn't want the story of them to be about her. Still, it rankled that her peers in the bard track would become the most famous bards in the Human Realm, not her. Well, famous for being bards, anyway.
"Miss Johnston, thank you for a delightful afternoon," Bump said when their afternoon at Hexside had come to a close. They'd acquired enough footage for several episodes worth of videos, and Caroline was extremely excited to see how people would react when they posted them. "We eagerly look forward to more students from the Human Realm participating at Hexside. Tell me, have Miss Blight, Mx. Vee, Mr. Porter, and Miss Park integrated well into your school?"
Caroline looked like a snawfus caught in the headlights of a car for a few moments, unsure what to say to Bump. "Their grades have been exemplary so far, Principal Bump, and they've been a credit to Hexside's reputation," Amity said eventually for her. Bump nodded. That had been all he had been interested in.
Amity was tired when she emerged back from the portal, but very pleased as well. They'd accomplished great things. "So can I do magic now?" Caroline wondered, her voice sounding eager. Amity tossed over a notepad and a pen to her. "Why don't you find out?"
Caroline made a light glyph and tapped it, and a light emerged from it and floated into the sky. It was very small; it'd take more exposure than just the few hours she got for her to accomplish much more. But it was still magic and the glorious look of wonder in Caroline's eyes was a sight to behold. Amity wondered if Luz had looked like that the first time she'd discovered her own magic.
The two of them chattered about various things like they were old friends as they made their way back to the Johnston residence. Amity managed to persuade Caroline to try reading the Good Witch Azura series (which had experienced an explosion in popularity now that people knew they were Luz's favorite series), and Caroline managed to persuade Amity to read a series called the Grishaverse, and just as they reached the front door, they were interrupted by the sound of a gunshot reverberating through the air.
Gunshots, as it turned out, were absurdly loud. Amity had actually held a gun before, during her trip to New York, while tussling with Swaard, but she'd never had a chance to fire it. She'd heard gunshot in movies before, but it would seem, quite sensibly, that the moviemakers had toned down the noise so the viewers wouldn't be deafened. Amity lost all her hearing, so she wasn't able to hear Caroline pleading for her not to enter the house.
When she went inside, Amity saw none other than Swaard himself opening fire on Agent Johnston with an expression of furious anger on his face. Mrs. Johnston was lying on the floor in the corner of the room, bound and gagged. There was a nasty bruise on the side of her head. Amity summoned an abomination which roared in Swaard's face. Swaard let out a barely detectable yelp and then directed his firepower at the abomination. His discipline in the face of unfamiliar magic would be admirable if he wasn't such a horrible person.
The bullets smashed through the abomination, weakening it slightly, but not by too much. It quickly regenerated the damage taken; unlike humans, it didn't have any internal organs to damage. Swaard could tell very quickly that he was taking the wrong approach, because he lunged at Amity with astonishing swiftness, dodging the abomination's attempts to grab him in favor of slamming her against a wall and strangling her.
It was, unfortunately, the correct approach to take. The physical approach caused Amity's magic to abruptly fizzle out, and the abomination dissolved into a pile of goo. "Killing me…won't get you anything…" Amity managed to get out.
"Oh, I'm not going to kill you, dear child," Swaard said, his voice filled with hatred. Being outwitted by Amity back when they'd first met in New York had rankled, Amity could tell. Well, on the bright side, her hearing was back. "But when I'm done with you, you'll be wishing you were dead…and that's before I deliver you to your mother."
Amity tried to come up with some response that would convince Swaard to back off, but the fact that the life was being choked out of her was definitely impeding her wits. Also, she was pretty certain she couldn't say anything even if she had come up with something to say. It was embarrassing, really.
Fortunately for her, her embarrassment, as well as her strangulation, came to an abrupt end when several loud gunshots rang out, the bullets smashing into Swaard's back. Evidently, he'd completely forgotten about Agent Johnston. Amity lost her hearing yet again as Swaard lost his grip and fell to the ground. Agent Johnston said something, presumably some pithy remark, but Amity didn't know what it was.
Swaard looked dead. Agent Johnston walked over to him and checked for a pulse, and that was when Swaard reached out a hand and wrapped it around Agent Johnston's throat. Amity reached out and managed to pull off Swaard's hand with minimal effort. Swaard looked absolutely petrified, presumably of dying, and said something to Amity in what she guessed was a pleading tone, but she still couldn't hear him, and a few moments later, Swaard breathed his last.
The door opened and Caroline came in. She'd been crying. "Oh, Amity, I'm so sorry!" she sobbed, as Amity's hearing returned to her. "I just…I heard the shots and I just hid in the bushes…I'm a coward."
"You are not a coward, Caroline," Agent Johnston said sternly, and gave her a hug. Caroline looked surprised, but she certainly didn't seem like she was complaining either. "You were quite right to not engage in combat with Swaard. He is a highly dangerous individual. Was, I suppose now." He walked over to his wife and removed the ropes and gags from her. "It's going to be okay. You're all safe now. I'll make sure of it."
It had been something of a surprise, to say the least, for Swaard to learn that magic and other realms were real. When his old friend Arend Havik had informed him about the Demon Realm and its magic, he had frankly thought Arend was high on something. But he wasn't. As Swaard and the elite strike team Arend hired to break Odalia out of prison learned in short order, there was indeed more on heaven and earth than was dreamt in many peoples' philosophies.
Swaard had spent several weeks in the Demon Realm doing reconnaissance, and during that time, his body had been exposed to the Demon Realm's ambient magic. He was now capable of using glyphs to do magic, and since returning, Arend's scientists had been discovering many ingenious uses for the glyphs. One of them, they found, was allowing two bodies to swap. As long as the two people were living, they'd swap back in exactly seven hours – but if one of the bodies was killed in that time, they wouldn't swap back.
Swaard hadn't gone to the Johnston residence with the intention of switching bodies with Agent Johnston. He'd gone there to kidnap Amity so Odalia could be distracted enough that he wouldn't have to spend so much time in the crone's company, or run her errands. He'd been kidnapping homeless LGBT people and delivering them to her so she could "cure" them. Her experiments evidently hadn't been bearing any fruit because he kept on having to dispose of their corpses.
But when the fight had turned against him, he'd seized on the opportunity to use the body swap glyph to go into Johnston's body, attaching it to his neck just before Swaard's original body could die. Thankfully, Amity hadn't heard Johnston's words of warning that he issued before he succumbed to the injuries he himself had inflicted. Now it was Johnston who was dead and Swaard who was above suspicion and in a prime position to spy both on Amity and the American government to boot. And what's more, he didn't have to run any more errands for Odalia, since she thought he was dead.
Things were definitely looking up.