It's been a while for this one. Almost eight months actually. I felt like I had to make this one extra special, seeing as it was one many were looking forward to. Sadly, I don't think I could do this one justice but I did the best I could. More importantly, I thought I'd let everyone know that I now have a Discord account. Not sure what I'll use it for but it's there. Please enjoy.
"So what happened next?" Vee asked, getting everyone back on track.
"I think it was the Wailing Star," Amity answered.
"What happened that time?" Willow asked, surprising Amity.
"You never told her?" she asked Luz.
"You told me at the end 'This night never happened.'" Luz explained. "While I remember it vividly, I respected your wishes,"
"That's sweet of you, Luz, but I said that while I was still a different person. Now's as good a time as any for our first real adventure together,"
"The other ones don't count?" Camila asked.
"This one will involve less dissection and witch's duels," Luz promised. "Also, the last two times, we were enemies. This time, we worked together… at the end,"
"Until that point, I was still a jerk," Amity said regretfully. "I still tried to be my mother's perfect daughter instead of someone I'd actually like," Luz put a hand on her own, comforting her in the simple gesture. There was no need for words, as the two sat silently for a few seconds. They might have stayed that way longer, had Willow not cleared her throat to gain their attention. Luz straightened up at the sound, suddenly remembering where she was.
"Okay, so the morning of the Wailing Star, I was reading Azura to King, who'd been steadily getting into the books the more I read them," she recounted. "I'd had him sucked into the rereading when Hooty swung open, showing us a basket for Eda. At first, we thought it was a gift basket for Eda, but it turned out to be a baby bat demon,"
"Baby… bat demon?" Willow asked nervously. Even Gus looked over from his buckets, sharing the same thoughts Willow had.
"The same baby bat demon," Luz confirmed, confusing the others for the time-being. "Now, obviously I wasn't going to eat something still alive yet, so I read the note that came with them. The Bat Queen left her kid for Eda to babysit for the night and said she would pay her for her services,"
"It worries me that you needed to add the word yet to that sentence, mija," Camila commented. Luz chose not to address this comment and was about to continue when Hunter interrupted her train of thought.
"Wait, the Bat Queen?" he asked, getting a nod from Luz. "As in, the Bat Queen? The one that guards the abandoned palismen?"
"One and the same," Luz confirmed.
"How did she know Eda?" he asked. "And she trusted her enough to look after her kid?"
"I asked Eda and she didn't know why, actually. She'd only met the Bat Queen once and it was by accident while she was out collecting potion ingredients. They'd known of each other through rumors and reputation, but they'd only introduced themselves before leaving," Luz had answered the question honestly because even Eda hadn't known. The Bat Queen, on the night she needed a babysitter, she'd originally asked Dell Clawthorne, but he was unavailable. Perhaps through nepotism, or maybe hoping there was a chance he could see his daughter somehow through the Bat Queen, he'd recommended Eda. He'd known through acquaintances that Eda had been looking after a kind teenage girl, who may have been able to help her and used this as his reasoning. "I was on board for taking a night learning to babysit, but Eda had me take books to the library so I didn't get a cut of the money,"
"That sounds like it would have backfired," Camila said.
"The baby woke up from their nap as I was on the way out the door," Luz agreed, smirking. "I think Eda was asking for help, but I couldn't be sure over the screeches," Camila chuckled from that remark. "So I took the books to the library,"
"I'm still surprised that Malphus actually let her have a library card," Amity said. "I've seen the state the books are in once she's done with them. I mean, how do you even get coffee, grass, and bloodstains all in the same book?"
"I'd answer that, but I think it's better for my mom's sanity if I didn't explain," Luz responded, taking a glance.
"Oh, no, please do," she urged her daughter. "I'm sure any hope for sanity already went out the window," Luz gulped.
"If you insist," Luz said hesitantly. "But before I start, I want to make this clear. This only happened once," Everyone in the room nodded. "Eda was trying to try a new side business running an apple butchery. She claimed it was to challenge the monopoly the other one had, but I think it was just so she could get more apple blood more easily. Anyway, she borrowed a book on taming wild apple-demons and while she was reading it, the one we had had gotten loose and knocked it over onto the grass along with her coffee. It was about to eat King, but I distracted it with a quick light glyph and Eda threw a stray brick at it. The blood spattered over the front of the book and we drained the apple-demon for what we could. Eda vowed not to try another butchery, since she'd end up hurting the ecosystem to catch enough of the wild ones," The room was silent for a moment until Camila spoke up.
"The apples in your world are alive?" she asked.
"I still point out that plants are still living, mom," Luz said. "Just because they don't scream or run away, doesn't make them dead,"
"As the expert on plants, I can confirm this statement," Willow affirmed. "But Amity's right. How does Eda still have a library card?"
"From what little I know of her, I'd guess he didn't want to risk her wrath," Vee chimed in. "The cafe here wouldn't take a raccoon as payment so she cursed the croissants. I can only imagine what she'd do to the library if they canceled her card,"
"That's fair," Amity agreed, pondering a thought. "That might be why they also used to let her check out books from the forbidden stacks at one point as well. Otherwise, she'd probably blow the door open and take whatever book she needed and burn the things she didn't as collateral damage,"
"I think that part might be a bit exaggerated," Luz argued. "She's always been a bit wild, but she'd never burn down a library for the heck of it,"
"Yeah, but she let her reputation say otherwise," Hunter said. "There were way more wild rumors about the Owl Lady, many of which I'm sure she spread herself just to make the general public more scared of her,"
"Now that sounds like Eda," Luz laughed. It felt good to laugh about Eda's antics. She desperately missed the older witch, wanting to ask her mentor about her exploits in person. Once she calmed down, she sighed, trying to put herself back on track. When I delivered the book, the librarian on duty told me that the library was closing early for the Wailing Star meteor shower. I asked him what it was and he told me to go research it in a book. I looked through it, but never managed to find the book, but I did hear Amity's voice yell 'What do you think you're doing?' and I immediately tried to camouflage myself by pretending to be a book,"
"How do you pretend to be a book?" Hunter asked.
"Terribly," Luz answered. "This is my impression of one," She put one arm over her head and the other arm across her belly, both palms facing outward. The others laughed with her, while Amity just smiled.
"Just so you know, that disguise would not have fooled me," she remarked. "Cute impression, though," This brought a little bit of red to Luz's face, making Amity giggle.
"Once I followed her voice, I found Amity in Kid's Corner reading to a few kids. It was probably the first time I'd seen the real her. She may have been doing it for a job as well as credit in school, but it was obvious that she really liked doing it. I offered to help, but…"
"I was still focused on trying to stay on top of everyone else, the way my mother had taught me," she continued. "I yelled at her that every time she came near me, I get in trouble. In retrospect, half of it was self inflicted. And sometimes it's someone else's fault. Like the ordeal we faced that night." She took a breath, letting it out. "Despite what they did, I really hope the twins are alright,"
"Wait, Edric and Emira are in this story?" Willow asked.
"It was the first time I'd met them," Luz said. "Amity wanted me to leave her alone and while leaving, I ran into the two of them, on their way to drop off her lunch that she forgot,"
"And embarrass me in front of anyone they can," Amity added, making the witches who knew her siblings snicker. Hunter, only meeting Edric and Emira once, didn't know the pair too well. Ironically, he was probably closer in age to them than any of his actual friends, but he didn't feel any compulsion to get to know them.
"I didn't know how close Amity and the twins were, but I thought if I could befriend them, I could maybe befriend Amity later down the road," Luz explained her thought process. "We spent the next couple hours pulling some harmless pranks around the library,"
"You made Gary have three separate mental breakdowns," Amity deadpanned. Camila was about to address this, but Luz beat her to it, defending her actions.
"Okay, if he questioned reality because we erased the non in nonfiction, was he even mentally stable in the first place?"
"You also caused the lead librarian to fall off the ladder," Amity added.
"Okay, I admit that wasn't cool," Luz agreed, "but mom, that required magic I didn't have so my hands were clean there. I even went to help him up when he fell down. He was more mildly annoyed than actually injured,"
"I'm just going to tab that one as not knowing what kind of company you should keep," Camila commented. "Which would make you guilty by association,"
"I'll have to accept that," Luz replied sheepishly. "It won't be the last time, after all," Everyone was quiet, letting the slight melancholy Luz expressed pass. "After the lead librarian and Amity caught up to us, he kicked us out of the library and we started laughing about the whole thing,"
"I wasn't too pleased with Luz, but I knew it was probably mainly Ed and Em that were behind it," Amity commented. "I followed them out quietly when they were kicked out to eavesdrop in case they were planning something else, which is how I heard the twins invite Luz back to the library overnight,"
"They told me there was a book they forgot to check out and that the Wailing Star was supposed to do something to the library," Luz could feel what her mom was thinking about this next one. "So yes, I agreed to breaking into the library after hours, thinking we wouldn't do anything too bad. I was wrong,"
"Of course," Camila said, slightly sarcastic. "Are you going to tell me any story where you don't get in trouble?" Luz was silent, thinking about each adventure before she could answer.
"I played a sports game against the school bully," Luz answered.
"That didn't happen for a while," Willow commented.
"It was the most mundane thing I can think of worth mentioning,"
"Is it really worth mentioning, though?" Gus asked. "You lost,"
"Only because of a really dumb rule," Luz countered, thinking about the game. "But now that I think about it, it felt more like filler than anything important happening. I'll think about skipping that one,"
"Didn't you discover the fire glyph in that game, though?" Willow pointed out.
"Oh yeah," Luz recalled. "I guess that was important," She thought about it for a second before shaking her head. "I'll cross that bridge when I get to it,"
"There was a bridge?" Amity asked.
"Human expression," Gus explained.
"After I left the library, I went to the Owl House to check in with Eda and King," Luz continued. "I knew Eda wouldn't have a problem with me staying out all night, but I figured I should check in with her anyway. Plus, I could see how babysitting was going,"
"I've seen you handle those kids, Luz," Willow interrupted, "and that was just short of being a disaster. How did Eda do?"
"When I walked in, she was rocking the Baby Bat to calm them down. I told her that she looked really motherly. So, she kept up the tough act and said she'd steal my tongue,"
"Wait, I'm confused," Hunter interrupted. "You're talking about a singular kid, but willow just said kids. As in, more than one. How many were there?"
"I'm actually at that point in the story," Luz answered. "When I was going to play with them for a minute, they barfed out a second baby,"
"Barfed out?" Camila repeated, disgusted by the mental image in her head.
"Barfed out," Luz confirmed. "And then the second one barfed out a third one," Everyone was silent for a moment, the image of a small bat throwing up a whole other baby in their minds, until Vee spoke up.
"So that's where babies come from?" she asked innocently.
"Moving on," Camila said immediately. She'd have that talk with Vee someday, but considering Vee was a basilisk, she was not sure how their biology worked in comparison to humans. Come to think of it, she didn't know how witch biology differed either. She made a mental note to see if she could figure it out. "So what happened next?"
"I immediately ran out the door," Luz answered. "It was a disaster for a couple hours and then Eda probably did the only thing to possibly pacify a lot of screaming toddlers. She pulled out a knife-" Luz was cut off, her mother gasping in horror, "-and cut up some fruit for them to eat. Then, she probably pulled out a story book," Camila let out a sigh of relief, feeling slightly embarrassed that she thought Eda would do that to a bunch of kids.
"That's an oddly specific guess," Hunter commented.
"It's not a guess," Luz denied. "I asked King and that's how it went,"
"It's what I would do," Willow said. "That's what I do for the neighbor kids when I get asked to babysit,"
"I didn't know you babysit," Amity said.
"It's only an occasional thing. They said I was pretty responsible and I didn't really have any friends late at night so I was the best choice on the block,"
"It is true," Luz said. "Of all of us, you are the mom friend in the group,"
"Mom friend?" Gus asked.
"She's always reliable, looking out for us and being the voice of reason," Luz explained, making the others agree.
"While I like to be called reliable," Willow said, blushing at the attention, "we're getting sidetracked again. What did you do after you left the house?"
"I figured enough time passed to meet the twins at the library, so I just bee-lined there," Luz continued. "I wanted to look cool to impress them, so I thought about doing a pose. If only I could have jumped from a platform, then I could have done the superhero landing,"
"The what?" Hunter asked. Luz stood up and moved to the side so everyone could see.
"I'd jump down from a higher up place and then land like this," she explained, crouching down. She straightened out her right leg while holding her right arm straight out and putting her left hand on the floor for balance.
"Oh, I've done that," Hunter said. "It's hard on the knees, though,"
Luz got up and took her seat again. "I never did pick the right pose because they showed up while I was practicing them,"
"Honestly, knowing them, they might've just made themselves invisible until they could catch you doing something," Amity said. "Chances are, they were there the entire time,"
"I don't doubt it. Anyway, they had some kind of paper that made the lock bigger and we walked in, just as the Wailing Star was passing by,"
"Convenient timing," Camila commented. "So what did it do?"
"The books came to life," Luz said, surprising her mom. "I opened a book on birds and a bunch just flew all over the library until I closed it again,"
"That sounds like it would be both fun and disastrous," Vee said.
"The magic itself wasn't disastrous," Luz denied. "And we mostly just played around with the books. The fashion magazines gave us new wardrobes, the graphic novels made speech bubbles pop up every time we talked, and Snowballs: A History let us have an epic snowball fight. It wasn't until we found out drawing in the books changes how things come to life that things went off the rails,"
"Nope," Camila interrupted. "I've heard you admit to doing insane things so far. Many insane things. And there's probably a lot more. But I would eat my own foot before believing you'd willingly deface a book,"
"Thanks for the trust, mom," Luz said, smiling. "And you're right. But it was while I was reading the book I saw Amity reading to the kids earlier, Otabin. The twins grabbed a picture book with a duck and then drew some obscenely buff legs on it. The duck that came from the book got those legs IRL,"
"IRL?" Hunter asked.
"In real life," Luz clarified. "Sorry, sometimes I forget that… you were a bit sheltered," Her eyes darted to Vee, who thankfully didn't notice. While they hadn't discussed it, the witches seemed to silently agree that they needed to ease Vee and Camila into Hunter's upbringing. It was only thanks to the fact that Vee hadn't seen the Emperor's Coven sigil on any of the scouts to know what it looked like. Or at least, that's what Luz guessed since they were always covered head to toe.
"Don't fee bad," Vee said. "I've been living here for five months and I'm still learning,"
"Anyway, Edric tried to egg me into doing it to Otabin, but I couldn't bring myself to doodle," she said, then looked sad, as though a melancholic thought crossed her mind. "Although, if I had, I might have drawn something nicer than they did,"
"Than a duck with legs?" Gus asked. "That's not a high bar,"
"No, I mean, after I refused, Edric took my hand and drew on Otabin. Some angry eyebrows, big fangs, and sharp claws,"
"Of course they did," Willow deadpanned. "That sounds like pre-Luz era Edric to a T,"
"To a T?" Vee asked.
"It means completely, exact, nothing left out," Camila explained.
"That's a weird phrase," Vee commented, turning to Willow. "Did Luz teach you it?"
"Actually, we already used that one in the Boiling Isles," Willow said. "I wonder how that happened," Luz, however, had already used her phone, thankfully still having service,"
"According to Wikipedia, it was invented in the 1600s," Luz said dryly. Suddenly, there was a silence among the witches, furthering the confusion of Camila and Vee. "Let's ignore that and move on. I closed the book, not wanting to see the results from the drawing. It didn't bother the twins too much because they actually came to get me to help with their real plans. They took me to the r- er, an undisclosed book shelf in the library." She took a quick glance over to Amity, who gave a soft smile at the respect of her privacy. "And there was a hidden room back there. I thought it was their secret clubhouse and thought it was so cool,"
"Except, it wasn't theirs," Amity cut in. "It was mine," Camila couldn't help but hear alarms going off in her head.
"When they told me, I saw a bunch of red flags go up in my head," Luz explained. Camila was at least grateful that she had enough social awareness to know that older siblings in their little sister's hideaway was not a good sign. They told me that Amity had been telling on them for cutting class, so they were going to take her diary and post it all over the school,"
"That's what they were planning?!" Amity yelled, startling Luz.
"Wait, you didn't hear them?" Luz asked.
"I didn't even know there was a plan. I thought they were just showing you where my diary was so you could get some dirt on me,"
"That… isn't a terrible conclusion," Luz admitted. "Especially since you'd only gotten there a minute or two later. I tried talking them out of it, saying it was going too far, but they brushed it off, saying it's okay because they're her family and it's tough love,"
"I swear to Titan, when I see them again, it will be a very serious debate of whether I should hug them first or slap them,"
"Hug one with one arm while slapping the other," Hunter offered. "Then you can do both at the same time,"
"That might work," Amity growled. "Willow, you have to hold them down,"
"I'm in," Willow smiled. "I never did get them back for that whipped cream prank they pulled on me,"
"That was six years ago," Amity remembered.
"As long as you all know how long I can hold a grudge," Willow said, having a threatening expression. All the others made a note not to upset Willow anytime soon.
"I thought they apologized to you everyday for two weeks straight after that," Luz recalled. "They never told you?"
"Again, they told me they were getting you some dirt to use against me," Amity repeated. "It didn't sound right, only because you'd never agree to it, but then again, it didn't seem like they told you,"
"I wouldn't have agreed," Luz confirmed. "I initially tried to get them out, seeing as there wasn't any diary around to read, but then I saw something that distracted me. Amity had the first four books of The Good Witch Azura,"
"Of course that would make you lose focus," Willow deadpanned.
"Hey, imagine just suddenly finding your favorite book series in this realm," Luz pointed out. "That's what it felt like. And then finding someone else who actually liked the series," She smiled at Amity, who returned the smile with a blush. "Except, that was the bigger mistake. She actually camouflaged her diary with the other books. It was a hand drawn one that drew my interest, but anyone else would probably have never seen it,"
"I know I wouldn't," Hunter said. "That was clever, Blight," Amity rarely got praise from Hunter, but she knew he always meant it. It felt weird, though, seeing as they still had a rivalrous tension between them. They could get along fairly well and their goals and friendships aligned, but they'd never had time to resolve their issues from Eclipse Lake. She never understood how Luz could so easily forgive and forget, but right now, she wished she could do it, too.
"It was clever," Luz agreed. "Too bad I ruined it and now she'll never be able to use the same trick again. When I found it on accident, they heard the little version of Amity that popped out of the book. That felt terrible and I didn't know what to do, so I didn't get to hide it before they saw it. I tried to convince them to put it back. No one deserves to have their privacy publicized like that, but they weren't budging. We had a tug-of-war for the book but some pages fell out,"
"Hold up," Willow stopped. "You were trying to out muscle the Blight twins and were able to match them?" Luz thought about it and that was true. "How are you so strong? Does anything involving Amity just give you muscles?"
"I, uh, I don't know," Luz admitted, turning a slight shade of red. "If only it could stay consistent,"
"Sure, sure," Willow teased.
"Moving on, some pages fell out and more tiny Amitys just popped out from the pages. I tried to pick them all up before too much was shown, but Amity walked in at that exact moment,"
"It didn't paint a good picture of Luz," Amity said. "She's on her knees grabbing pages from my diary while Ed and Em are in the back snickering and she looked extremely guilty. I told off the twins for their part in it, but I already expected them to be mean. Luz always showed kindness, even if I never took it well. So when she's there holding my diary… I just didn't know what to think. I called her a bully and left,"
"And I couldn't bring myself to disagree," Luz stated glumly. She knew what Amity and the others would say, so she spoke up. "I know you all want to defend me, but think about it. I'd spent all day making trouble in the library or helping Ed and Em make trouble. They vandalized books and I couldn't speak up against it. We'd broken into your hideaway and I was the one who found your diary for them. I was acting like a bully that day and I almost got you humiliated in school. Mom's right. I didn't keep good company that day," For a second no one said anything, not really knowing how to respond. Camila spoke up for this one.
"Mija, you knew when they were going too far," Camila said. "You may not have shown good judgment, but you knew what was right when it counted and never gave in to peer pressure. I don't know a lot of people who could say the same at your age," Luz smiled at this.
"So what happened after Amity left?" Willow asked, trying to get the tense moment over with. It wasn't very subtle, but no one commented on it.
"Edric and Emira went to go goblin tipping and wanted me to go, but I wasn't willing to do it," Luz continued. "Not that I actually know what goblin tipping is, but I owed Amity an apology first and foremost. Even if it was an accident, I ended up reading her diary and that wasn't okay,"
"Which might have gone better had I been willing to listen," Amity commented, "but I was too busy feeling embarrassed that anyone had read the pages. And before Luz could get me to listen, we were interrupted,"
"Ed and Em came back?" Willow asked.
"That would've been nice, but no," Luz said, making everyone else nervous. "It turns out the Otabin book that Ed made me draw in hadn't been closed all the way and the graffiti turned him into a monster,"
"Well, he couldn't have been that threatening," Willow said hopefully. "Otabin is only a foot tall,"
"Yes, but the new monster Otabin was nine feet tall with the book embedded into his chest," Luz responded. "He was determined to sew us into a book to make us his friends forever,"
"So the most twisted version of a children's book you could possibly get," Willow said. Luz chuckled at that.
"That's some irony," Luz said. "In the Demon Realm, your children's stories start out pretty cute, but then I get involved and suddenly Otabin's a monster. And in the Human Realm, our fairy tales actually started out really dark. Then at some point, someone decides to make them cuter so they don't scare little kids,"
"That can't be true," Vee protested. "I watched that kid's movie about the deformed guy living in a church. It was really sweet how the girl treated him with kindness, no matter how he looked," Luz averted her eyes from the basilisk, not wanting to tell Vee the truth about the dark origins of that particular movie.
"So Otabin took Amity and started sewing her to a giant book," Luz continued, hoping Vee wouldn't question the subject further. Luckily, she didn't seem to want to question it. "I didn't know what to do. The only spell I could do was a light ball. That wasn't going to stop him so I was starting to panic until I saw Amity's diary. Or more accurately, the picture of Azura I saw on the diary. I was hit by inspiration,"
"You went back to the secret room and got the four Azura books Amity had," Vee guessed.
"That way, you'd have a team of experienced, powerful witches that could easily fight Otabin," Willow finished. Luz was silent for a moment, realizing how much easier it would have been to do that.
"I drew myself in an Azura outfit, intending to use her magic," Luz said, denying their theory, making her friends face palm.
"While Luz was drawing up her plan, Otabin was sewing me into the book," Amity said. "He sewed some thread around my hand, pulling it tight and my hand bonded with the page. It was weird. It didn't hurt, but I could still feel my hand and the threads holding it down. I thought I was going to be trapped forever until Luz showed up with her Azura staff, ready to fight Otabin,"
"I had to do something," Luz said, smiling softly before frowning. "It was my fault you were in that book anyway,"
"Stop saying that," Amity said, giving Luz a serious look. "Not every bad thing that happened is your fault, Luz,"
"It kind of is," Luz thought, but decided not to get in an argument by voicing her thoughts. Instead, she continued. "I tried hitting Otabin with my staff but he just grabbed it and yanked it from my hands instead. In hindsight, I should have probably written a power or something instead but I was too focused on the appearance. I ended up getting thrown onto the book too, on the page across from Amity," Picturing the scene, Willow had a thought that made her giggle. "What's funny, Willow?"
"You were seconds away from your faces being smushed together for the rest of your lives," Willow answered, making the two girls' cheeks redden. The other kids giggle at the site, Camila hiding a smile.
"As pleasant as that thought is, we were trying to avoid that happening for the time being," Luz said, trying to keep the story rolling from that thought. "We were about to be stuck until I realized we could still move our hands as part of the page. How that connected to my idea, I honestly can't remember. I had Amity help me tilt the book so our feet could touch the ground and we ran away from Otabin,"
"I thought she had more of a plan so I kept following her lead. I asked what we should do, but she didn't know,"
"I wasn't even sure the running thing would work. I was all like roaaar," she said, making the sound again. Amity giggled at the memory. "And then Amity laughed just like that," Luz smiled at the memory. "And then the bonding moment was ruined by a giant needle stabbing through the book,"
"It was like five inches from Luz's head," Amity recalled, making Camila stiffen up. It was never nice to hear how close her daughter had come to dying, but as long as it was close to happening instead of actually happening. "Otabin pulled the needle, reeling us in like fish. I grabbed onto a ladder in the library, holding onto it with all three of my free limbs. I was able to pull my arm free from the book, but Luz was still stuck. I called out to her, but she was still stuck,"
I thought I was done for this time," Luz recalled. "I didn't even call for Amity because I knew she could get to safety. I even thought she would, the entire time Otabin was sewing me to the book, right up until he wrapped my head in thread. But before he could permanently bind me to the book, Amity rode in on a library cart, knocking Otabin into a bookshelf which fell on him. Amity pulled off the strings and my arm was no longer flat. I had never been so happy to be three dimensional. Sadly, the relief was short lived, as Otabin had gotten up and grabbed me. There was no doubt that he wouldn't give up in his mission, no matter what,"
"It was at that moment I knew what had to be done," Amity cut in. "I took out a pencil and wrote into Otabin's giant book that Luz had to right a wrong and a giant eraser popped out of the book. I threw it to Luz since she was close enough to Otabin to do what needed to be done. Using the eraser, she wiped the book clean of Edric's graffiti, making Otabin return to his normal self. He fell into my hands, apologizing for the whole night. Knowing it wasn't his fault, I immediately forgave him and told him we're still friends, letting him go back to his book,"
"Once the danger passed, we started cleaning up the library. With our adventure and Edric, Emira, and I messing around, the library was a mess. Luckily, at least all the stuff the twins and I did with the books just went away when we closed the books, but any shelves that got knocked over still had to be set right along with the books that were on them. It took the rest of the night but once we were done, there was no evidence we were ever there,"
"As nice as it was to get to know Luz better, I knew I had to keep up appearances still so I ended the night telling her 'This never happened,' and almost walked away, but Luz stopped me first,"
"I knew she only had Azura one through four and I happened to have my copy of number five in my bag with me. I figured I could let her borrow it, given all the trouble I caused her and having read her diary,"
"Don't blame yourself for that, Luz," Amity said firmly. "I don't want you blaming yourself for anything, but that was especially not your fault. You tried your best to keep it from my siblings, no matter what they said. You defended me when I wouldn't even call you by name," Amity was making a lot of sense and it did help alleviate some of the guilt Luz had, but she could only recall a specific detail.
Now that I think of it, that was the first time you'd ever called me by name," Luz stated, "when I was getting taken by Otabin and about to be trapped. You'd called me by name
"It was, wasn't it?" Amity confirmed, smiling. "I guess with both of us in a life or fate-worse-than-death situations, I just let go of my prejudices. You weren't a human at that point, you were just Luz to me," Hunter, Willow, and Gus smiled. At first, they were all in the same boat when it came to Luz. She was a human first and anything else second. Willow didn't even bother introducing her properly to Gus when they first met and Gus saw a mythical creature he wanted to study. Hunter actually saw her as a criminal first, but human was a close second to the point he only referred to her as human until much later.
"That might have been the longest we'd gone without getting interrupted to nitpick a detail," Luz said.
"Well, not only was there nothing to question, you two were really into telling the story," Willow said.
"You both were getting more and more dramatic as it went," Gus agreed.
"It reminded me of when you read your Azura fanfiction to me," Camila said fondly.
"I read some of what you wrote and that checks out," Vee said. "I was hooked onto your every word,"
"Did you guys ever end up starting that writing club?" Willow asked. "I kind of want to read some of your work,"
"I kept whatever we wrote at the Owl House so that Amity's mother didn't find it," Luz said glumly, remembering what happened to all her possessions.
"So what happened next?" Vee asked.
"Not much. There was this thing that happened, but we all promised never to speak of it again," Luz said. "It's not like anything important happened anyway. I just learned that there was a time when Eda wanted to join the Emperor's Coven. I think I'll skip that one. After that, Gus took me to school,"
And there's my first update in almost eight months. I spent too long on this one. Hopefully I won't take as long for Something Ventured, Someone Framed. Please review.
Also, don't be afraid to point out any errors to me on this chapter or any previous ones. I intend to go back and edit them to the best of my ability.