A/N: Thank you to everyone who has been favouriting, following and reading this fanfiction. Your continued support is greatly appreciated. I would also like to remind everyone that The Owlcast is available on AO3 as well under the same title and writer username as this site's. So, should this site ever go down, you can find this story over on AO3 too.
Chapter 57: Regretful Reminiscing
Sticking to the winding path traversing through the blood red of Bonesborough's outskirts, Xander leisurely strolled along with his gloved hands clasped behind his back, his green eyes beholding the vibrant and healthy canopies of leaves arching overhead. The young witch usually wasn't one for admiring nature or using it as a tool to relax, yet he'd made a special exception in this case. It was a welcomed distraction from the persistent ache still internally gnawing away within his chest, along with the reminder that the leader of the Emperor's Coven—a witch whom he had a very low opinion of—was walking a short distance ahead of him.
Lilith was leading the charge with her staff clutched upright in her right hand, her head raised and her back as straight as a pin, keeping her focus solely on where she was going. Since leaving Bonesborough, neither her nor Xander had attempted to strike up a conversation, not that Xander cared or minded. He was perfectly comfortable making their way to their intended destination in awkward silence, ultimately causing his thoughts to flit to the last time he'd found himself amongst the nature of the isles. At one time, he was racing through dark, dull and dead surroundings and uneven landscapes while dragging his little cousin behind him, the pair chasing a thieving basilisk disguised as his doppelganger. But now, only a little time later, he was casually strolling across even ground and through brightened foliage as the unexpected ally to the leader of the Emperor's Coven herself, on a mission to confront Elisabeth and the Owl Lady at their current hideaway. It was funny how things worked out, Xander thought.
"According to the reports, Edalyn has been hiding out in an enchanted house close to the Boiling Sea," Lilith explained, drawing Xander's gaze to the coven leader's back and tuning him in to reality once more. "Normally, the Emperor wouldn't permit us to venture to such an area." She paused to release an annoyed huff and lower her head a bit. "But seeing as my sister's capture is long overdue, he has made a special exception this once."
"An enchanted house?" Xander repeated, his head tilting to the side. "And what would that entail, if you don't mind the enquiry?"
"The reports don't specify." Lilith partially peeked over her shoulder in Xander's direction. "Though there are claimed sightings of the house walking around Bonesborough during the evening on giant owl feet."
Xander came to a stop with the drop of his jaw, prompting Lilith to halt in turn at observing the younger witch's eyes almost pop out of his sockets. "Wait." He lifted an index finger and bent it slightly. "Are you talking about the house that terrorised the night market and crushed a merchant's stand?"
It was the only example that came to mind off the top of his head. Xander recalled it happening on the night he was in the night market to meet with those demon hunters. The young coven scout hadn't witnessed it with his own two eyes, but he had been assigned to speak with the mentioned merchant when he'd come to the precinct the following morning to report his crushed stand and his stolen elixirs. What was his name again? Kibbles? Scribbles? Xander couldn't remember, not that he'd paid much attention to the pig's name at the time. He'd been too busy focusing on the merchant's mentioning of the Owl Lady and Elisabeth as the culprits behind the theft of the elixirs, along with their skeletal, scraggy demonic mutt.
"Oh?" Lilith remarked a slight octave higher than she intended, her brows raising at processing Xander's question. "You're familiar with the incident at the night market?"
"Yes, ma'am." Xander stepped closer and joined Lilith at her left side, deciding it was best to keep the conversation going without disrupting the task at hand. "I was one of the coven scouts assigned to speak with the disgruntled merchant the morning after the incident occurred."
Xander wasn't too fond of the idea of conversing with Lilith of all witches, though even he couldn't ignore the intrigue stirring within him at this new discovery—his cousin using the same enchanted home that had terrorised the town of Bonesborough that one night as her hideout alongside the Owl Lady. It was almost too coincidental to be true, and yet what were the odds considering the other surprises he'd experienced today? Plus, the more information he could gleam from this conversation about his cousin in case he needed it for later, the better!
"Is that so," Lilith said as she and Xander resumed their walk side by side, her empty hand subconsciously stroking her chin.
"Yes," Xander sighed softly and shook his head, keeping his hands behind his back in the meantime. "Coincidentally, that same merchant was robbed of a large quantity of elixirs by the Owl Lady and Elisabeth just before he lost his stand. It makes me wonder if the incident with the enchanted house was a deliberate distraction on the Owl Lady's part…" Xander saw Lilith's aquamarine eyes widen slightly and glisten at hearing the word 'elixirs', causing him to frown behind his mask as he carefully contemplated his next words. He could see something he'd said had caused Lilith's stoic mask to crack, and the last thing he needed was to inadvertently cause tension between them when it needed to stay one-sided on his part. "Was that something you were not already aware of, Madam Lilith?"
At realising Xander had picked up on her subtle reaction, Lilith immediately averted her gaze to her feet and closed her eyes. "I was not," she responded lowly, only for her eyes to open again with a scowl at the hint of bitterness that laced her follow-up comment. "Then again, my sister has garnered a long list of offences during her time on the run. At some point, the individual details of each crime are bound to blend, aren't they?"
Xander did the wise thing then by not answering Lilith's rhetorical question, instead choosing to study her words and current expression during the awkward absence of sound that was now in the air. It was subtle, but he'd trained his eyes enough against his father's manipulative masking of his emotions to easily detect the resentment Lilith held for the Owl Lady and her evasion of the law. Had Xander been a nosy fellow when it came down to the business of others or someone looking to befriend the coven leader out of acknowledgement for their similarities, the young coven scout would have wasted no time attempting to engage in small talk and pry more into Lilith's past with her sister.
Luckily for Lilith, however, Xander despised her too much to even consider striking up a conversation that had nothing to do with his cousin or any information that was useful, giving her the opportunity to change the topic with the loud clearing of her throat.
"In any case," the older witch began, directing her aquamarine eyes to the flourishing trees around them for a moment. "it won't be long now until we reach our destination."
And Xander knew she was right.
Allowing his own green eyes to trail between the surrounding forest, he could see it was growing less dense, the trees on either side gradually spacing out the further they went. The young blonde witch tilted his head to the sky at hearing the distant waves crashing into rocks, his nose twitching at the faint briny smell beginning to sting at the inside of his nostrils; didn't Lilith mention the enchanted home was close to the Boiling Sea?
Soft fur tickling at the back of his neck briefly distracted the young scout coven with the hunch of his shoulders. Xander lightly swatted a gloved palm against the fabric of his cloak hood at registering Bandit skittishly manoeuvring between his shoulder blades.
"Cut it out, Bandit!" Xander hissed under his breath, waiting until he felt the ferret palisman fall still before giving Lilith a wary sideways glance.
Luckily for Xander, Lilith's attention remained on the forest around them, allowing his shoulders to relax with a soft sigh and the straightening of his posture. Admittedly, he found Bandit's behaviour to be odd, considering how sensitive the little guy was when it came to his surroundings because of his enhanced and animalistic senses. However, the younger witch physically brushed it off with the flick of his fingers against the shoulders of his cloak, deciding it wasn't worth pondering on. Bandit was probably startled by the movement of his head, he concluded, his attention returning to Lilith upon catching the older witch turning her head towards him from within his peripheral vision.
"As we want Elisabeth and Edalyn to comply with their arrests, I feel it's best we take a non-hostile approach—"
"—Ah!" Xander cut Lilith off with a startled cry upon hearing Bandit screech out of alarm from inside of his cloak hood, right next to his ear too. The blonde witch stumbled to a stop as Bandit scurried out onto Xander's left shoulder, with Lilith halting in her tracks with a wide blink at witnessing Xander shoot his palisman companion a slit-eyed glare. "Bandit, what are you doing?!"
Panicked screeching erupted from Bandit when the ferret palisman stood on his hind legs, his beady eyes wide whilst he gestured his front legs repeatedly at the path ahead of them. To the unsuspecting outsider or non-magical being, Bandit's rush of noise and animated gestures didn't mean a thing aside from Bandit simply acting like an ordinary ferret with some semblance of human movements. However, Lilith's bond with her own palisman and Xander's bond with Bandit allowed the two witches to hear the worrisome content behind the ferret's screeches, leaving the younger witch crossing his arms and his glare still intact.
"What do you mean you can hear noises up ahead?" Xander snapped, staring at his ferret palisman as if he'd grown a second head. "Of course there's noise! We're approaching the Boiling Sea, for Titan's sake!"
Xander's disbelief did nothing to deter Bandit's protests, though. The little fella's panic intensified and forced another round of screeching, with the addition of the wild waving of his front legs above his head. This time, however, Bandit actually went into more detail regarding the specific noises he was detecting, prompting Lilith to scowl and straighten up upon looking at where Bandit had previously been motioning to.
"You can hear tremors approaching?" she questioned in a low voice, to which Bandit nodded with an affirmative squeak and dropped onto all-fours again.
"Tremors?" Xander repeated with a squint as he followed Lilith's gaze, keeping his voice quiet as well in case it was something they needed to be worried about. He wriggled his toes around inside of his boots to assess for any movement underfoot, yet he couldn't feel or see any visible signs of shaking anywhere, a fact he vocalised to his superior without hesitation. "I can't see or feel anything."
Lilith's eyes narrowed and scanned between the sparse trees for any sign of movement, her empty hand hovering in line with her forehead to restrict her line of vision to what was in front of her. "Neither can I," she mumbled after several seconds of scrutinising. "How peculiar." The older witch lowered her hand from her face and focused on the white raven perched upon her staff, cupping her chin with her other hand. "Perhaps just to be safe, I should send my palisman ahead of us to scope for potential danger," she wondered aloud, facing Xander once more with the cock of her head. "Would you agree?"
But Xander didn't answer straightaway. He dared to give Bandit a quick sideways glance while delaying his response, observing his ferret companion visibly shaking upon his shoulder with ruffled fur stood on end.
Xander was well aware that Bandit was capable of detecting low frequency noises than they were, and while part of him wanted to believe the little guy had gotten spooked by the nearby waves of the Boiling Sea, Xander could see from his insistence to stay out in the open that was likely not the case. Bandit was very sensitive to noises and easily spooked by them, to the point where he would dive for any cover he could find to hide from danger. But instead of remaining hidden, Bandit had left his hiding place to warn them of a danger he was the only one privy to, telling Xander all he needed to know.
It was better to be safe than sorry, he concluded, even preparing to face Lilith to parrot this thought to her. Yet before he even had a chance to open his mouth… he felt slight shaking from underfoot.
"What the—?" Xander muttered, only to be silenced by Bandit's high-pitched whimpering as he dived for the safety of his cloak hood.
Immediately, the young coven scout drew his attention to the path ahead at determining that was where it was coming from, being rendered speechless at sighting the now visibly shaking landscape before them. Critters of all sizes and types scrambled down trembling tree trunks or burst through bushes to flee deeper into the woods on either side of the path. Birds flocked to the purple sky with loud and high-pitched squawks of warning. Pebbles scattered across the ground bounced and banged together like cooking popcorn. But amidst the physical disruption to the forest's tranquillity, it didn't take long for a thin line of elevated soil to emerge and make its rapid approach towards the two witches, slicing through the hardened landscape like a sharp blade through rotting flesh.
The closer the raised dirt got to their location, the more violent the shaking became, to the point where it was physically impossible for either Xander or Lilith to stay in one place. The two witches were robbed of their sturdy footing and clumsily stumbled from side-to-side like two puppets whose master was manically pulling their strings, with Xander trying (and failing) to regain his balance by frantically flapping his arms about on either side of himself. It took one harsh teeter to the right for Lilith to be given the chance to wedge the base of her staff into the toughened ground with gritted teeth, securing her gravity. In turn, the older witch reached out a hand to snatch Xander's closest elbow, immediately steadying him with a sharp tug that brought him back onto both feet and to Lilith's side.
"Get back!" she sternly shouted to Xander, just as the moving mound abruptly halted before them and the violent tremors ceased suddenly.
But Xander never got the chance to react.
A cylindrical, brown blur burst through the cracked earth and rose high above the unsuspecting witches, forcing Lilith and Xander to recoil and shield their faces against the clumps of dirt sent flying in their general direction. As a result, Xander's eyes caught the cast shadow looming over them as the danger stopped extending out of the ground, his pupils shrinking and his arms lowering from his face at the giant worm shaped silhouette he saw.
What in the Titan's name was in front of them, he worriedly thought.
An enthusiastic gasp brought Xander back to his senses, accompanied by an excited exclamation from a grating and creepily chipper high-pitched voice. "Oh boy! New friends!"
Within the split second that followed, Bandit's panicked screeching from inside his cloak hood and the oxygen sucking gasp elicited from Lilith willed Xander to focus his gaze towards the enemy, yet he didn't catch much except for a brown and beige blur diving towards Lilith, who was frozenly gaping at the danger heading her way, like she'd been petrified under orders from the emperor.
Xander didn't know what came over him in that moment, but the next thing he knew, he was running forward and harshly shoving the older witch to the right, swiftly followed by a sharp pain connecting directly with his forehead and shooting down the bridge of his nose.
From there, time seemed to slow down for the blonde witch. His body became weightless and he was plummeted backwards, the gravity literally being yanked out from under his feet like someone violently pulling a rug from underneath him. His ears started to ring, something wet and warm spurted from his nostrils, and his mask split evenly down the middle and broke in two, allowing him to catch the horrified stare of Lilith watching his descent while soundlessly yelling his name.
And then, the second he felt his back collide with the hardened earth and the oxygen rush out of his lungs, everything went black, his vision and other senses swallowed by an empty void.
In the living room of the Owl House, Lizzie was sat on the far-right side of the red sofa and leaning her elbow against the arm, supporting the right side of her face with her palm. The plate formerly containing her breakfast lay bare on the coffee table with the borrowed cutlery neatly placed atop it, her attention no longer focused on it. Instead, drooped green eyes stared at King curled up beside her on the sofa's middle cushion, his own pink eyes droopy as he stared at an overly enthusiastic Eda sitting on the sofa's far-left side.
Shortly after dragging her reluctant charges to the living room and then making them wait while she disappeared upstairs to find her school memorabilia, the Owl Lady swiftly returned with a giant cardboard box overflowing with assorted items (which included the following that was visible: a wooden blue cricket bat, two light brown balls decorated with a brown stripe and a pair eyes each across the middle, a long yellow ribbon and a purple net) that made Lizzie wonder if Eda had always been a hoarder without the influence of her curse. Lizzie's suspicions heightened when Eda carelessly dropped the box beside the sofa and she rummaged through to yank out a thick grey jacket with long, puffy light grey coloured and patch covered sleeves that she proudly proclaimed was her customised grudgby uniform (evidenced by the yellow star on the jacket's left breast and the capital red initial 'E' on the jacket's right breast). Eda showed no qualms about putting it on and proving it still fit snuggly over the top of her dress, leaving Lizzie staring at her technical employer with narrowed eyes and twisted lips. Considering the amount of times Lizzie recalled how often she'd outgrown her own clothes, she couldn't help feeling somewhat jealous.
But the jacket wasn't the only thing Eda pulled out of her old high school collection. The older witch was currently holding a dark blue binder opened between her hands that she'd clearly decorated herself (if the variously vibrant stickers Lizzie spied on the front and the back covers was any indication, with the black-based sticker with 'EDA' printed in scribbled white capitalised font heavily giving it away). It was filled with old photographs that the Owl Lady had been nostalgically rambling on about for a while, with King and Lizzie paying little heed to Eda's gloating about her grudgby skills. In King's case, it was because his naptime was being disturbed. But for Lizzie, it was because her hurtful thoughts were succeeding in drowning out the intended distraction that she was still unaware of.
'I've never known Eda to be so chatty.' The blonde witch dared to give King a brief sideways glance at hearing a yawn escape him, his bony lips smacking together shortly after. 'Doesn't seem to be doing anything to silence the voices in my head, though.'
If only the blonde witch knew that was all about to change.
"And here"—Eda said with an ear-stretching grin, finally penetrating Lizzie's thoughts and yanking the blonde witch into the present with a startled flinch—"is when we took down Epiderm High during the semi-finales!"
Eda plonked the opened book on the coffee table and tapped a finger against the right page, purposely drawing Lizzie's and King's attention to a large photograph cello taped amongst a bunch of random and colourful tickets, ticket stubs and stickers. The photograph in question depicted a teenage Eda (a fact Eda had confirmed for Lizzie and King during her rambling) smiling widely at the camera with splatters of dark coloured paint underneath her glistening golden eyes, dressed in her grudgby jacket along with a pair of black shorts with white outlines, brown fingerless gloves, golden knee pads, white socks and black shoes with spikes on the toes. She was posing with her left leg bent at the knee while holding a large trophy with a silver pillar designed base, a bronze ball atop it that matched the ones Lizzie had seen in Eda's memorabilia box, and three golden stars curling round from the bottom to the middle of the trophy. Two of the stars of the trio were smaller, whereas the third one positioned in between them was much larger and had an open maw with two sets of pointed fangs on its upper and lower jaw. Though it wasn't Eda's outfit or the trophy that ultimately distracted Lizzie, but rather the colour of Eda's bushy mane of hair (and her missing golden fang, even though Lizzie was already aware that fang was a fake). While Eda's hairstyle hadn't changed since the picture was taken, the bright orange strands made Lizzie recall what Lilith previously told her about the curse during the entire mess with the 'Bloom of Eternal Youth'.
'You don't know?'
'Know what?'
'That the curse hasn't just affected Edalyn's magic. It's also affected her appearance and accelerated her aging. It's why she has grey hair and appears older than she actually is.'
'I never knew Eda originally had such vibrant hair.' Lizzie partially turned to Eda at hearing the Owl Lady sigh contentedly and lean back against the sofa, the blonde witch subconsciously twirling her fingers through strands of her own hair. 'When I first met her, the colour still there was more reddish. It's hard to imagine her with bright orange.'
"Ah, I remember it was hard being the youngest on the team!" Eda continued reminiscently. "But I had what many called—" She paused to flick her hair over her shoulder and puff out her chest. "—star power. AKA…" Eda arched her body over to the cardboard box and stuck a hand inside, whisking out a metal lunchbox by its handle after a few seconds and holding it in Lizzie's and King's view line with a cheeky grin. "this!"
The lunchbox was primarily black on its front and burgundy around its sides and back, yet was decorated with an assortment of colourful shapes along the front face's sides (such as three points of a yellow star in the bottom right corner, a random red shape just above it, random green and blue shapes in its top right corner and across its top side respectively, and part of a thick white circle in its top left corner, as examples). While Lizzie was impressed with how good its condition was considering how many years it had been since Eda probably used it (and how notorious the Owl Lady was with destroying or damaging her belongings alongside King and Hooty), her focus ended up going to the writing plastered in the middle of vibrant and scattered shapes, with 'EDA'S' scrawled in black ink across a yellow, spiky sticker and 'RAD CHEATZ' scrawled underneath it in white across two, rectangular, black stickers.
"Oh, now your antics back at Covention make sense," Lizzie commented sarcastically, wiping Eda's smile clean off her face and replacing it with a scowl directed at her young charge. "Apparently, it wasn't just the written tests you cheated on during your school days…"
"And what's wrong with cheating?" Eda questioned and placed the lunchbox on the coffee table.
"Everything." Lizzie gave Eda a pointed look the moment she realised the Owl Lady was being serious, with King perking up with a blink to tune into the conversation between the two witches. Lizzie couldn't blame him; it was the most interesting thing to happen since Eda's reminiscent rambling started. "If all you did was cheat your way to victory, that means you weren't actually good."
"Oh, yeah? Then answer this, wisecrack!" The older witch placed a hand to her puffed out chest and stuck her nose in the air with the closing of her eyes. "If 'cheaters never prosper', why did I never lose a game with my cheat box?"
"Because you were never caught," Lizzie answered matter-of-factly, causing Eda's eyes to snap open with a forced blink and the slump of her shoulders.
"HA!" King laughed loudly and rolled over onto his back, placing his paws to his stomach. "She's got you there, Eda!"
"Ugh!" Eda groaned with the roll of her eyes and scrunch of her nose, averting her gaze to the trio's reflection in the mirror above the fireplace to hide the pink flush her pale cheeks had taken. "You're starting to sound like Luz! Has her goody-goody attitude finally rubbed off on you?"
"Did the events of Covention get erased from your memory?" the younger witch quipped nonchalantly. "I was never in agreement with it to begin with. Just ask my cheating cousin."
Eda gave Lizzie a sideways glance upon hearing her jab at Xander, causing her brows to furrow out of guilt with the reminder of what Lizzie's cousin had done (and potentially striking a nerve with her). But then she and King were looking on with forced blinks when Lizzie stood from the sofa and used her palms to smooth the creases in her skirt. "Where're you going?"
"To my room," Lizzie answered without sparing the Owl Lady a glance while rounding the coffee table. "Thank you for the breakfast, though."
"Already?!" Eda exclaimed with wide eyes, hastily scooping her binder off the table and standing up to hold the opened pages in Lizzie's direction. "But we haven't gotten into the gory part yet!"
"Sorry, Eda," Lizzie apologised through an exasperated sigh, halting close to the living room doorway and placing a hand to her forehead to partially face her technical employer. "I have work I really need to get back to, so—"
However, the blonde witch's excuse fell short when her gaze locked with the page Eda was showing them mere seconds ago, having caught a small, rectangular-like object stuck close to the binder's spine. It was a tiny photograph of teenage Eda out and about in Bonesborough (Lizzie vaguely recognised some of the building structures in the background) in her Hexside uniform, her sleeves and leggings bearing the colours of the Potions Magic track. But it wasn't Eda holding a pink ice cream made up of three balls stacked on top of a stick in her left hand and giving an open-mouthed smile to the camera that had drawn Lizzie's attention to the picture, but rather the two unknown teenage witches on either side of her. To Eda's left side was a witch with medium brown skin, also bearing Hexside's uniform and the red sleeves and leggings associated with the Bard Magic track. Like Eda, the Bard student was clutching the ball-stacked pink ice cream in their right hand, with their right arm linked with Eda's left. However, their face was covered by a stray red ticket from the other page, so Lizzie couldn't see them clearly. The same, luckily, couldn't be said for the other witch with wavy and fluffy orange-red hair on Eda's right side, who could be seen clearly walking along a little in the background with their body partially turned away from the camera. Just like Eda, they bore Hexside's uniform and the yellow-coloured sleeves and leggings of the Potions Magic track, licking away at their matching ice cream with drooped aquamarine eyes hiding behind a pair of round spectacles.
It was the latter witch that made Lizzie to fully turn around and walk over to Eda with a slight squint, the sour expression reflected in the unknown witch's eyes causing déjà vu to wash over her for a few seconds.
"Eda," Lizzie began hesitantly, leaving Eda cocking a brow at her technical charge until the younger witch reached her and pointed to the Potions Magic track student in the photograph. "Who's that?"
Eda peeked over the binder to get a better look at the picture in question, deciding to entertain the young blonde at noting her curiosity had been piqued. "Oh!" she exclaimed with a wide blink, tapping a nail against the corner close to where the unknown witch was. "That's just Lilith."
Lizzie's head snapped up the moment the name of the witch passed through her ears, acting as though the Owl Lady had just slapped her across the face. "… Wait," she said slowly after a few seconds of delay. Her green eyes flitted between Eda and the teenage Lilith with multiple blinks. "That's Lilith?"
"Yeah, that's Lily, all right," Eda replied casually. She couldn't help grinning cheekily at Lizzie's jaw dropping wide open at her response, prompting an amused snort to escape her. "Surprised?" Lizzie numbly nodded after several seconds, which Eda took as her cue to plop down on the sofa again and return the binder to the coffee table. "I don't blame you. She did a good job trying to hide our relation."
And the blonde witch didn't doubt Eda's words one bit. Teenage Lilith's and adult Lilith's expressions and eyes matched up when she compared their appearances using the mental images inside her head, but that didn't change the bewilderment she now held over the fact that the leader of the Emperor's Coven and the Potions Magic track student in that picture were the same witch. The Lilith who Lizzie was more familiar with had straight, neat and teal-coloured hair that matched her usual uniform, giving off a refined and elegant air and a cold and intimidating outlook. This Lilith, though? Her hair was more vibrant in colour and unkempt, the style and colour making it more obvious that she and Eda were sisters. And on top of that, the expression worn with the addition of her glasses seemed to match more with the childish moments Lizzie recalled witnessing from Lilith at Covention and in the Webbed Woods. Lizzie was well aware that witches could change drastically over the years for a multitude of reasons (as she herself had experienced, to boot), yet the change between teenage Lilith and adult Lilith appeared so drastic that the blonde witch was struggling to comprehend how such a change had come about. Heck, trying to imagine Lilith with her former hair colour and fluffy hair on her present self just didn't sit right with Lizzie at all.
'Wouldn't be surprised if it had something to do with working under the emperor. Can't imagine a job like Lilith's not being stressful.'
"You can say that again…" Lizzie eventually mumbled upon getting over her shock, returning to her previous seat on the sofa beside King (who had laid down on his front and closed his eyes). "At least the resemblance is more obvious there." The blonde witch rested her chin on her knuckles and her elbows on her knees, leaning forward some to get closer to the coffee table. "Is it weird that I'm not shocked she's wearing glasses?"
"Not at all," Eda jested with a smile to match, refusing to hide her happiness at seeing her distraction plan actually working. "Even as girls, Lily's always been the hardworking and no-nonsense type. With or without the glasses, it works both ways!"
"I couldn't agree more." Lizzie giggled and let a smile of her own slip, allowing her gaze to trail back to the photograph for good measure. "What's up with her sour expression, though? Do you remember what caused that?"
Eda shook her head and waved Lizzie's question off with a hand. "Ain't got a clue! It was a long time ago."
"Figured." Lizzie stuck her tongue out at Eda following her cheeky remark, prompting Eda to frown faintly and lightly smack the younger witch on her closest shoulder.
"Oi! Watch it, you!" she teased, her false annoyance melting away at witnessing Lizzie laugh loudly and briefly close her eyes. Eda couldn't help it. She was practically beaming at finally seeing Lizzie starting to act like her old self again, something none of the Owl House residents had seen in days. "Hope you're not trying to imply I'm senile!"
"I wasn't," the younger witch choked out between bouts of laughter. "But you just did!" When Eda shook her head and clicked her tongue in disapproval (her smile remaining intact), Lizzie took a deep breath to calm down and decided to change the topic, even though she could admit she'd really needed that laugh. "Looks like you and Lilith were both in the Potions Magic track too." Lizzie cocked her head in Eda's direction with a smirk. "Another strange coincidence to add to the list, then."
Eda's brows furrowed at this, trying to understand what Lizzie was getting at. It took a few seconds for them to raise again with the snap of her fingers. "Oh, yeah! Because of you and Tool-bag!"
"And my father and uncle, apparently," Lizzie added, taking a hand away from her face and tracing her fingertip across the edge of the table. "Funny how that applies both ways with my family, doesn't it?"
"Yeah," Eda agreed with a nod. "Though for you and Tool-bag, it probably doesn't help that Lily is the oldest of the two of us."
Lizzie whipped her head towards Eda so fast, she swore for a moment that it was going to snap off her neck. "Is she?!" She almost shrieked an octave higher than necessary, making Eda scowl and cross her arms.
"Way to go making me feel bad about my age," the Owl Lady quipped sarcastically, prompting Lizzie to raise her palms up in surrender at the faint tingle of heat on her cheeks.
"S-Sorry!" she stuttered out of embarrassment, being reminded of what happened the last time she'd insulted Eda's age.
'Still, Lilith is the older relative? The coincidences between me and Eda just keep on coming, don't they?'
Eda waved her young charge off with a hand and leaned back against the sofa with one leg crossed over the other. "Eh! It's not that surprising." She pointed a finger at her closest cheek. "If it wasn't for the curse, it'd be more obvious."
"True, but to be fair…" Lizzie briefly trailed off and reached an elbow over to Eda's closest knee to give it a light knock. "She certainly doesn't act her age sometimes."
Eda ended up snickering and throwing her head back to the ceiling at this, recalling her sister's fits of rage at Covention and the Webbed Woods. "And how!"
But Lizzie's mirth quickly faded at the sudden thought that came to her, glancing at Eda's binder once more and steepling her fingers underneath her chin. "Though speaking of that 'Blackwood' student you formerly knew…" The blonde witch gave the older witch a brief sideways glance and pointed her fingertips in the direction of the opened binder. "Do you happen to have any photographs of them?"
Lizzie's enquiry caused Eda to slowly hoist herself to sit up with a forced blink, having not expected it. But after a few seconds, she reached a hand to her chin and gave it a few scratches with her fingernail.
"Hm…" She hummed in thought and tilted her gaze to the ceiling with the pursing of her lips. "I don't think so. We weren't really friends, from what I can remember. We only ever interacted when we both wound up in the principal's office." The Owl Lady squinted a little and turned her gaze to her lap. "In fact, I think he was a grade or two below me…"
Lizzie's brows raised in surprise at Eda's response. "Surely, you remember what he looked like, though. Or perhaps his first name at least." The older witch immediately shook her head in response, causing the younger witch's jaw to drop with a small gasp. "Seriously?"
"Hey! Don't go judging, all right!" Eda said defensively and held her palms up with a quick shrug of the shoulders. "This was thirty-something years ago! A lot has happened since then!"—Eda failed to see Lizzie's eyes bulge when she said 'thirty-something years ago'—"I think he was also one of those quiet kids, so he wasn't very memorable to—" The grey-haired witch interrupted herself at finally catching Lizzie's frozenly shocked expression. "… What?"
"You said you were in your teens when those photos were taken, didn't you?"
"… Yeah," Eda replied carefully with the slight lift of her brow.
Lizzie frowned at this answer and jabbed a finger against the closest page to her. "So, would that mean these photos were taken thirty-plus years ago too?"
Eda nodded stiffly, her expression and speech unchanged. "Uh-huh."
"Which would make you around forty-plus years old now, yes?"
"Where are you going with this, Lizzie?" Eda bluntly asked. "Because if you're trying to take another jab at my age—"
"No, no!" Lizzie hastily cut the older witch off with the panicked waving of her palms in front of her. "T-That's not it at all! It's…" The blonde witch trailed off and thickly gulped, lowering her hands to the bottom of her vest to fiddle with the material between her fingers. "Well…"
Lizzie didn't dare to continue her answer after that. For a moment, the absence of sound filled the air, leaving gold and green locked in tense silence, but for different reasons. The former was patiently awaiting the answers she sought for, while the latter was trying to decide if she should dare speak her thoughts, a fact Eda knew without having to ask. Admittedly, Lizzie had changed quite a bit since Luz's induction into their merry band of outcasts, but if there was one thing that hadn't changed about her that Eda could easily pick up on from the three years she'd known her, it was when she wanted to say something and was conflicted about it. And that fact hadn't changed as she watched her charge mess with her clothes, her frown deepening ever so slightly. Though based on the way Lizzie squared her shoulders and sucked a breath in and out of her nostrils, it looked like she was actually going to come clean on her own. However, before Lizzie could even utter a word…
Bang!
The front door of the Owl House suddenly burst open, causing Lizzie and Eda to straighten up with a violent shudder and King's eyes to shoot open.
"WEH!" the young demon cried out as he leapt partway into the air with his fur stood on end, with Eda and Lizzie instinctively jumping to their feet and whipping their bodies in the direction of the doorway.
Upon doing so, however, the three residents of the Owl House were instantly met with the sight of a proudly beaming Hooty stretching part of his currently elongated body into the living room from outside.
"Hoot hoot!" Hooty greeted cheerily. "Aw! Did you guys miss me?"
There was a few seconds of delay as the trio collectively processed the situation. Yet upon determining they weren't in any danger, Lizzie and Eda both slumped forward with relieved sighs, with the former of the pair placing a hand to her chest for good measure.
"Dang it, Hooty," she grumbled, watching King collapse flat onto his front on the sofa with his legs and arms spread out, his pink eyes drooping.
"My life just flashed before my eyes…" the little demon remarked under his breath, giving Eda the prompt to direct a displeased frown towards the mentioned house demon and cross her arms ready for an appropriate scolding.
"Hooty, how many times do I have to tell you not to barge in like that unless it's an emergency?!"
"Sorry, Eda!" Hooty apologised, his jovial demeanour remaining unaffected by the scolding. In fact, Lizzie swore she saw the owl demon's semblant smile widen slightly, unless it was just her eyes. "I guess I'm still excited about the two special friends I've found in the forest!"
Eda cocked a brow and shared confused glances with Lizzie and King, expecting one of them to know what Hooty was talking about. When the younger witch and little demon gave the Owl Lady open-armed shrugs and head shakes to show they didn't, however, the older witch returned her attention to Hooty while scratching the side of her head. "What friends?"
Hooty beamed and straightened himself up, looking mighty pleased for some strange reason. "Oh, I'm so glad you asked! Hoot!" Without even waiting for a prompt, Hooty lifted his stretched body hidden outside into the air and moved it to the middle of the living room, treating it as if it was a pair of giant hands. Now visible past the threshold, Lizzie's, King's and Eda's eyes widened at beholding a humanoid figure entangled in the owl demon's snake-like body, violently squirming against their restraints with muffled protests. "Ta-da!" Hooty's proud exclamation was quickly followed by the release of his hold upon his prey, causing them to drop to the carpet face-first with a surprised and familiar female voiced grunt.
Straight, teal hair and a long-sleeved, flowing black gown were revealed to the trio on the other side of the coffee table, leaving them all frozen and speechless at the familiar appearance. But the snails piece didn't drop until the familiar face quickly recovered and hoisted themselves onto their knees with exasperated panting, their head raising to expose the vitriol-fuelled glare from the aquamarine eyes of a dishevelled Lilith Clawthorne.
A/N: ... Yeah. I'm not gonna lie. This chapter got so many rewrites, it was unreal. Originally, I'd planned to stop it after Lilith and Eda agreed to their grudgby match. But as I was attempting to write out the scene, I could not sum it up satisfyingly, especially because Lizzie's and Xander's added presence made it much more difficult to just go along with some of the show's natural jokes. That scene needed more detail to it, so you will be getting that in the following chapter. But that was just one of the many ideas that was the reason behind why this chapter took so long to finish.
The scene with Xander and Lilith, for example, was actually going to be extended from the moment they encountered Hooty. I actually entertained the idea of the two fighting the owl demon before getting captured. But when I was rewatching Episode 18 to observe Hooty's fight with Lilith and her coven scouts, I noticed that even on the second try, she got defeated by Hooty fairly quickly. It seemed like prior to Episode 17, Lilith obviously wasn't aware of who Hooty was and thus wasn't prepared for his antics, which is why she seemed to get caught off guard. Given how Hooty is and the fear and confusion he strikes into other beings throughout the show, it made more sense for me to have Xander get knocked unconscious right off the bat for the same reason. He is a skilled fighter in his own right, but come on... he's not a match for Hooty. XD Not to mention it provided a good excuse for something else that I've decided to reveal a little earlier than originally planned, which may or may not be appearing in the next chapter...
And then there was the talk between Eda and Lizzie. You guys have likely noticed that the main purpose of their talk was to act as a funny parallel between Lilith's and Xander's conversation, showing you the differences in their relationships and the way they talk about each other to the other witch. But this also acts as the build-up to another little secret that I have spent a few past chapters hinting towards, something I was once again going to reveal at a later date, but have since decided to do it a little earlier in conjunction with the main surprise these chapters are building up to. I'm not going to say much more than that, but hopefully, you guys can guess where Lizzie's talk with Eda was about to go, and what it will likely lead up to in the next chapter as well...