One day. That's all it had taken. King had gotten approval to go around the world and the next day sent Eda a message about needing her and whatever other legal people were necessary to come to the Simmering shoals. Because just one day after leaving, he found the boat that went missing 8 years ago. And because of that, Eda was stuck on a boat with a few other council members, another right behind them with officers and healers specialized in forensics. The trip also took them a day, which just made Eda feel awful for King being stuck alone on that crashed ship.
There was the sound of a squawk behind Eda, and she turned and saw the tiny owl beast curse sitting behind her. That made it obvious it was just a dream of a memory, but that wouldn't make what was going to happen any less unpleasant. Eda scooped up and petted the owl beast and just waited for the memory to get on with it.
"Sorry you can't just turn into your harpy form, but we need to stay together. This is a serious case and professionalism matters." Darius sighed, walking over to Eda.
"I just hope King is okay. This can't be easy for him." Eda said, staring at the owl beast as she just went through the motions.
This memory wasn't uncommon for Eda to dream about. She had it practically memorized. It had been a while since she had it, though. Regardless, it was never pleasant.
"Did he give you any details?"
"Nope. Just that he found Salty's ship and evidence of Luz, meaning an actual part of her. Also a shattered disk that looked like the one the Collector had been trapped in. He sounded really scared. I just want to be there for him right now."
"You've been doing this for years now, Eda." Darius sighed, "You know we have to go the proper way."
"And besides," Raine began, walking over after overhearing their conversation, "We're here."
The landscape around the ship had indeed shifted from open ocean to jagged rocks. Steam came up from the waters and ships that had been scoured long ago warned all those who came into the area of the dangers, making the little owl beast slightly growl in Eda's arms, not liking the heat. And, not too far in the distance, was a perfectly intact ship anchored down right next to an older ship that was impaled by a rock and significantly more attacked looking than all the other crashed vessels. Despite the fact that they were technically in the Simmering Shoals, the large vessel was still moving much too slow for Eda's liking.
"Fuck this." Eda grumbled.
Before Darius or Raine could even respond to her annoyance, Eda had already changed into her harpy form, which made the little owl beast disappear from her arms, shot up into the air, and flew towards the undamaged ship. Darius tried to yell something at Eda, but she was too far to hear it, and even if she had she would have ignored it.
Eda landed on the deck of the ship King had been granted. A quality vessel that could hold a young Titan and all the food and resources they would need for an around-the-world voyage, or at least the assumed amount since nobody actually knew how long that would take. Eda looked around the deck, a mild sense of worry and panic. She could hear the curse squawking in her ears to find her chick, which just added to Eda's lingering annoyance on having to be so official.
"Eda?" King said softly, sounding choked up as he emerged from the hull and onto the deck.
Eda dropped the harpy form and rushed over to King, pulling him into a hug as the owl beast clung to her back. It chirped contently, happy as Eda was to see King safe. Even though King was a head taller than Eda, that didn't stop him from tucking his head into the crook of Eda's neck and starting to softly cry.
"I'm here, kid. I'm here."
"She can't really be gone, right?" King said through the tears.
"I don't know, kiddo. There's some forensic healers that can identify if whatever you found was Luz's."
"How will they know?"
"I…I gave them something of Luz's that I held on to. Her genetic signature should have still been there so they can see if what you found is a match." Eda explained.
"What?!" King said, a sudden panic in his voice as he pulled out of the hug and looked Eda in the eyes as he began to clutch her shoulders tightly, "What did you give them? Is it intact? Did they have to cut it up?"
Eda winced slightly from how tightly King was grabbing her shoulders. Even the owl beast crawled on top of Eda's head and hissed at King, even though it knew he couldn't see it. King noticed Eda's pained expression and let go. He took a step back as he crossed his arms and stared at the ground, having seemed to have forgotten his strength.
"I gave them her cat hoodie. And, yes, they did cut it. I'm sorry kid. I didn't want them to either but it had the strongest signature because of how much she wore it and getting a small piece to get a good sample from is just procedure."
"Since when do you care about procedure?" King said, looking up at Eda through his tears.
"Since it became my job."
"And yet you still are selective about when to follow procedure." Darius said, hopping onto the deck.
Eda turned and saw Darius and Raine by the edge. Darius looked normal while Raine looked sympathetic for Eda.
"Shouldn't you guys be looking at the crime scene or whatever we're calling it instead of eavesdropping on my conversation with my son?" Eda asked, dropping the motherly tone for her default sass.
"While you were having that conversation, we already did a look over and let the officers and forensic team handle the rest of the technical stuff. Eberwolf is looking for the selkidomus to interview it."
"What did you find?" Eda said, walking over to them as King slowly followed behind her.
"A partly decayed and skeletal arm and a broken navy blue disc with a moon on it. Asclepius says the only reason it hasn't fully decayed is because of all the heat and humidity. It apparently preserves the bone while warding off any bug or beast demons who might want to chomp down on it. And yes, the arm did match Luz." Darius explained.
There was the sound of a loud splash and everyone looked and saw Eberwolf perched on a large rock as an adult selkidomus emerged from the water. Eber drew a spell circle and began to talk to the creature. Eda moved the owl beast from her head to her arms and petted it as it trembled slightly, intimidated by the massive demon thanks to its current state of being the size of an average human cat. Everyone just watched as Eber talked to the massive demon. Eber definitely seemed to be enjoying it too, despite what they were supposed to be talking about. Only Darius and people who knew beast keeping magic could understand Eber, so nobody but Darius really knew what was being said, and even he couldn't understand the selkidomus and thus only got half the conversation.
While everyone was looking, Eda's eyes drifted down to the selkidomus' neck. There was a long line along the front of its neck where the scales had been torn away, leaving scars behind. The scales couldn't regrow and so it just had to exist with part of its neck exposed to the boiling sea. Eda felt bad for the creature. It wasn't like when Belos wanted to straight up kill it, but the beast clearly got in a fight with something.
Before Eda could follow that line of thought further, Eberwolf had returned and began talking to Darius so he could explain what they found to everyone else.
"The selkidomus got into a fight with a strange creature years ago. She doesn't know if it was a witch or a demon, but it wasn't normal regardless. Whoever it was gave her that scar on her neck. She doesn't know if she's the one who killed it, she admitted she's eaten lots of demons, but she does know that that ship was what it arrived on."
"So Luz stole a ship, killed Salty, came here, picked a fight with a selkidomus, and got her boat crashed and eaten, leaving only her severed arm and the broken disk of the collector behind?" Raine asked, going through the information they now had.
"Seems like it." Darius shrugged, "Asclepius took the arm for further testing and the officers took the disk. We're done here."
"I'll be there in a sec. Not all of us have kids as independent as yours, Dari."
"Feel like that last part was unnecessary, but whatever. See you soon."
Once Raine, Eberwolf, and Darius were gone, Eda and King sat on the deck, King gently resting his head on Eda's shoulder as the owl beast snuggled into her lap.
"So, what now, kiddo?" Eda asked.
"I'm going to keep sailing." King said, voice full of conviction.
"King, Luz is dead. We know that for sure now."
"I know, but I can still go around the world. Not looking for her, but to explore. You know, the thing I told the council I was doing that took so much paperwork? Might as well not waste this opportunity, or the ship. I can check out other islands, I can send you letters with my portals, and I can write everything I've found! There are probably whole other civilizations that we don't know about."
"And you're sure this isn't just because you want to keep looking for Luz?"
King went silent at that question. Eda sighed and wrapped an arm around him.
"No matter how slim the chance is, I want to find her. Maybe the selkidomus just ripped off her arm without eating her. I have to see."
"Okay. You can try. Just make sure to keep me updated. You are circumnavigating the planet after all."
"I will. I promise. And the second I find Luz, you'll be the first to know."
"If you find Luz." Eda said as the owl beast drifted to sleep in her lap.
Eda loved how determined King was but still wanted him to not get his hopes up. She had stopped getting her hopes up years ago. Seeing the shipwreck was less of the final nail in the coffin and more finally burying the coffin.
"Yeah. If."
Eda's eyes slowly opened as she woke up, adjusting to the bright morning light. It seemed like she had slept in for once, which would have been nicer if it didn't mean she had had to relive so much of that awful day. It was unusual for her dreams to run that long, but if it meant sleeping in on her day off, it was fine.
With a groan, Eda rolled out of her nest, which was now cut in half and had a bed replacing that half for Raine's sake, and shuffled over to her old vanity. She sat on the stool and looked at herself in the mirror as she combed her bed head out of her hair with her fingers. She put in her fang, examined the size of her eye bags, and decided it was way too early to bother with makeup.
Eda slipped on her new slippers that Raine just got her and them as a cute matching couples thing and walked out of the bedroom, down the stairs, and out onto the main floor. Instead of going with her original plan of lounging on the couch until Raine noticed her, she instead followed the smell of burning food. When she looked into the kitchen, she saw a very intricate breakfast being prepared, and also burned. Unsurprisingly, amongst the fire was Raine who was adorably wearing their set of the matching slippers but more importantly was panicking and seemingly trying to decide if it was better for them to extinguish the food or try to salvage it. After watching for a long enough time without interfering, Eda made her presence known by lightheartedly chuckling at their partner's efforts.
"I know that I'm smoking hot, but that doesn't mean the food has to be." Eda teased, stepping into the kitchen.
Raine looked over at her and their expression cycled through joy at seeing her awake, panic at her seeing what was supposed to be a surprise, more panic at her seeing what was supposed to be a surprise on fire, and finally embarrassment at Eda seeing their poor attempt at making a nice surprise breakfast.
"I-I just wanted to do something nice for you." Raine said sheepishly, "But I bit off more than I could chew and next thing you know I'm turning the kitchen into the hexside cafeteria when you decided it would be a great idea to see how much of the school lunch items were flammable."
"And the answer was all of it." Eda said smugly, drawing a spell circle and extinguishing all the fires.
Eda smiled and pulled Raine into a side hug before kissing their forehead.
"Good morning, Rainestorm."
"Good morning, my owlet." Raine sighed with a soft smile, leaning their head over onto Eda's shoulder.
"What's the occasion?" Eda asked, "You haven't cooked since…actually, scratch that, you don't cook."
"It was supposed to be a nice breakfast in bed because our anniversary is coming up."
"Our anniversary? That isn't for a while now." Eda chuckled.
"It's in exactly one month. The idea was every day for a month leading up to our anniversary I was going to surprise you. "
"Yeah I like my strategy of waiting until our anniversary and then doing one big surprise."
"Is it really a big surprise if it's the same thing every year?" Raine asked, raising an eyebrow.
"This year was going to be something different. But I won't say how so because it's a surprise."
Raine just lovingly scoffed and the two moved to the living room and sat on the couch together after Raine grabbed their coffee and Eda got herself a mug of caffeinated apple blood.
"So, how'd you sleep? Have any weird dreams because you were so busy thinking about what my surprises would be?" Eda asked.
"Yes, actually." Raine laughed, "I dreamed of our wedding, except the officiant was Hooty, and the ring bearer was Hooty, and the flower thrower was Hooty, and then suddenly everyone was Hooty and when I went to kiss you, you had turned into Hooty wearing a wig, a dress, and a veil. I was so freaked out I woke up."
Eda began to laugh wildly at Raine's dream, and they joined her. Out of everything Eda had thought Raine might dream about, that wasn't even on the list of possibilities.
"I wonder where that weird owl tube is these days." Eda wondered as she calmed down from laughing, eyes drifting towards the sealed hole in the door, "He put the house back some point after the Collector was defeated, but he still left for some reason."
"It is weird, but I'm more curious about what you dreamt about. I shared mine so it's only fair you share yours."
All the residual humor left Eda and she changed to an awkward silence. Raine immediately got worried and pulled Eda close.
"Hey, if you don't want to talk about it, it's okay. I know that with the curse your dreams are much less…pleasant."
"No, no, it's fine." Eda assured, "It's just…I had that dream about the shipwreck again. The one that's less of a dream and more of a memory. The owl beast was there, obviously, but it was still in its tiny form and I just carried it around as I went through the motions of that day, from on the boat through talking to King."
"Oh. You haven't had that dream in ages. Do you know what could have triggered it?"
"Not really. Well…I have been thinking about Luz a lot recently." Eda admitted, "Ever since the council meeting 3 days ago she's been on my mind. I don't know why there's been such a spike, but I haven't been able to just move past it like I have been any other time in the last few years when Luz has come up."
Eda sighed and ran her fingers through her hair as she leaned back on the couch. Raine just sat and looked at her attentively, having a feeling Eda had more to say and not wanting to interrupt her train of thought.
"I just…" Eda continued, "I just feel so guilty about everything that happened to her. She snuck out to save King because I told her to not bother saving him. I should have known better. And because she snuck out, I wasn't there for her right away when she discovered she could do glyph-free magic. Then I told her to hide it from everyone, even her friends and girlfriend when they could have helped her. And because I limited her options, Belos actually seemed like a good teacher. She would have never crossed paths with the Titan trappers if I didn't ship her off on a mission with me then leave her alone with Belos when she had basically just gotten back. I didn't notice as she got more and more depressed then I forced her into an intervention with lots of people instead of just me and her, or even me and her friends, because I felt like having you and Darius there for some reason I don't even think I'd be able to explain back then! Her repression, her longing for freedom, her secrecy, all of it was because I was too scared of something happening to everyone at the hideout, when I should have been worried about what that would do to her."
"Well, you couldn't have known all of that would happen." Raine reasoned.
"Yes I should have! Luz got cursed thanks to Belos becoming part of her, and I have a curse too. She acted so much like how I did when I first got mine. The lying, the depression, the isolation, the outbursts, the fear, and eventually running away. Sure the curses were different, but the way they affected Luz mentally is pretty damn close to how mine affected me. And because I told Luz to keep her magic secret from her friends, she didn't have anyone to talk to about her magic which just gave Belos the space to make the curse worse. I still kinda had Lilith, and I also had Perry, Darius, Alador, and Odalia for a while. And I had you! Luz couldn't even go to her girlfriend for support because I told her to keep it secret and, since I had taken care of her for long enough she saw me as some authority figure, she listened. I should have known better. I should have been able to see it and help her before it got so bad."
"Eda," Raine said firmly, "You got cursed because your sister was jealous, but you didn't know who did it for decades. Luz was taken advantage of and manipulated by an insane old man. It's not like Belos encouraged her or even forced her to tell her friends either. He isolated her so much more by only giving her one person she felt safe with. Luz had you, Hunter, King, Viney, Emira, and Alador to talk to about her magic. And sure, she probably would have really benefited from being able to talk to Amity, but it's not like she had nobody. You did the best you could and under the conditions you were dealing with, like having to manage the health and safety of so many people all by yourself, it's not like you were able to make the best decisions. Hindsight always makes bad decisions look worse because we forget the mindset we were in. You can't hold yourself hostage with guilt for making what you thought was a good idea in a time when you didn't know how things would have panned out."
Eda didn't respond to that and just looked at the ground, knowing they were right but not wanting to admit it. It was true that Raine was right, but that didn't make her feel any better.
"Eda, maybe you're thinking about Luz because her friend Vee brought up basilisks at the meeting, which made you think of when Luz fought one on her first day of school. Or maybe just because Vee was so close to Luz she was basically her sister that that alone made you think of her." Raine reasoned.
"Yeah, it's kinda that, but also because the kids, Gus specifically, asked about King after the meeting. It just reminded me that the two kids who I took in are so far away." Eda explained.
"Why can't you just portal to King? Gus has been making so many improvements and is tracking portal use which would include King's portals here to send letters."
"He's constantly moving, never staying on one island for more than a week. Also, portals across one realm instead of between two realms aren't always the most reliable and take some added steps to get it to go somewhere in this realm than it would to go to a different realm. Until Gus makes that feature easier, we can't really do much. King can only do it so easily because he's a literal Titan and Titan's blood doesn't need any sort of programming or whatever to go somewhere."
"Oh! Speaking of King," Raine said, standing up, "when I woke up there was a letter from him in the living room."
Raine grabbed the letter from the mantle and handed it to Eda. She smiled at the letter softly, happy to get some new word from him, then opened it up. She unfolded the letter and began to read.
Dear Eda,
I'm so close to the next island! I estimate maybe 6 hours. I know that sounds like a lot but out on the sea, that's nothing. Based on my estimates and stuff like the stars, soon I'll be halfway done with my trip which means only 2 more years before I'm back. I miss you and Raine and everyone else so much. It'll be awesome to see you guys again. Being back in Bonesborough after so long will be great. Being halfway done also means that the portals are going to reach their peak of energy draining for a while before finally going down. I probably won't send too many letters after this island until I make some more progress just so it's not too tiring. Even these little letter portals can take a lot out of me with how far I am. Nevertheless, I will send you a letter around 12 hours after this one arrives to brief you on this next island. You can get the more in-depth info once I start getting closer to your Titan instead of further from it. Anyway, I can't wait to see you again. It's not too long now.
I miss you.
Your favorite son,
King
Eda smiled slightly wider as she continued to stare at the letter. The letters from King always made her feel better, and the assurance that he almost finished the first leg of the trip was assuring and amazing to hear.
Newly energized, Eda stood up from the couch, stretched, and looked at Raine now full of determination
"Well, breakfast is basically ruined so how about we go out to eat? The best brunch places should be open by now." Eda offered.
"Yeah, that's probably for the best. How about we go to that one good place by the central park? It has the best toasted death sticks and even some caramel apple blood flavored coffee."
"Sounds perfect."
Eda and Raine grabbed their staffs, walked out, and flew into town. The weather was nice so the flight was quite pleasant. The two didn't talk about anything, they just flew next to each other in silence as they took in the day. Because of work they didn't get the chance to actually go out much, even dinner dates were limited and most days off they stayed in, so any chance to go out to eat together was always nice.
Eventually they landed a block away from the diner and began to walk towards it, when they heard something weird coming from the park. They looked over and saw a small group of people in the middle of the park holding signs and chanting something. Eda was amused by this while Raine was just mildly interested in what they could be protesting, considering how rare protesters were.
"Yeah! Fight the power!" Eda yelled out over towards the group.
"Eda, we…we are literally the power. You are telling them to fight us." Raine said.
"Oh, right. Well that still doesn't change what I said." Eda shrugged, "The Isles are a free nation. If people want to protest, I say we, as the power, should encourage them. Penstagram and protesters are the best ways for us to find out problems people want us to fix. Council meetings are too infrequent and have too much paperwork for them to be reliable outlets for people to vent their frustrations or tell us what we need to change or fix. How many times have we found out about issues because of Pensta? If people are protesting, it's likely something important."
"Should we do anything about it?"
"Rainestorm, it's our day off and they aren't a problem. If they become one, one of the other counselors who are working today will just call us."
Raine just nodded and the two walked into the diner. After a bit of wait since the place was fairly popular, they got a seat and ordered. They just made small talk about who got the weirdest questions from citizens since their last day off, which Raine won by talking about one they got about someone asking if mayonnaise could be counted as an instrument.
"Here you go Mrs. and Mx. Clawthorne. Let me know if you need anything else." The waiter said as they set their food down.
Once the waiter was gone, the person in a booth near to them got up and came over to their table.
"Are you two the councilors?" the person asked.
"We sure are!" Eda said, thinking the person wasn't going to threaten them or anything weird so she didn't need to lie, "You want an autograph or something? I don't have a pen on me now, I forgot to bring my bag and Raine made me clean out my hair recently, but if you have one I'd be happy to sign anything normal."
"Actually, I wanted to ask what you're planning on doing about the protests."
"What, that harmless little group of people in the park? Hardly seems like anything that would need something to be done about. Besides, I haven't gotten any calls about it. It can't be anything that bad." Eda chuckled.
"The protests have been all over. And not just in Bonesborough either. All morning groups have been popping up. It's a whole organized thing." the person explained, "I'm asking because I was wondering if you agree with them."
"Well, what are they even protesting?"
"There's a new pro-basilisk account on Penstagram. They've been organizing these protests by coordinating time and location, posting information about basilisks, and even bashing the council and any other popular or influential figures who are openly anti-basilisk."
Eda was stunned. Sure there have been some protests in the past few years once the new government was set up, topics being anywhere from a few coven heads becoming councilors to one about Belos not being evil and the whole Collector ordeal being a sham made by wild witches, but nothing so organized or coordinated. A dozen or so disgruntled witches, sure that was nothing, but multiple groups across the island that were coordinated and backed up by a Penstagram account that only fueled the flames was new.
"I'll look into it." Eda said, just getting more and more curious about the protests.
The person walked away and Raine just looked at Eda, wearing a similar expression to her. Neither of them would have guessed that the protest was about the basilisks, even though after hearing that's what they were about, it made the most sense.
"I can't believe there's already a dedicated Penstagram account after just, what, 3 days since the council meeting? Maybe whoever made it had it ready and the majority anti-basilisk vote by the council just gave them the perfect opportunity to start posting for the best chance at being listened to." Raine said, " I mean, on the plus side it means that there are people out there who agree with Vee, even if she got torn apart at the meeting."
"It doesn't matter." Eda said firmly, sighing since she was hoping she could have a politics-free day off, "It's not our problem unless this account starts encouraging or inciting violence. Right now, us and the rest of the council need to play it safe. Especially now that we know that the decision wasn't received like most of us thought it would be."
"I'm curious who made the account. Probably someone at the meeting, but it was fairly packed." Raine wondered aloud, "Maybe Tinella got mad her proposal was rejected? It couldn't have been Vee because she wouldn't do something like this, even though she looked pretty angry after the proposal was denied. Honestly, after Darius ripped Vee to shreds up there, anyone who liked her and thought her ideas made sense might be inclined to do it. If we checked out the account it would narrow it down a lot."
"We can do that tomorrow. You're likely right with it being Tinella We both know how passionate she can get."
"Who knows," Raine chuckled, "Maybe a basilisk was at the meeting."
"Let's talk about something else." Eda said, trying to change the topic, "It's our day off. We don't need to spend this whole meal talking politics."
Raine nodded and began to talk about something else. But throughout the whole rest of the conversation, Eda wondered if it could be Vee. Sure it would be surprising considering how she normally was, but with her being a basilisk, the whole situation was something she would hold a lot more importance to than most other things. That fact was not helped at all by Darius being so brutal to her. He did used to be a coven head and admitted to knowing about the basilisk experiments, so she could and would definitely, at minimum, hold a grudge against him for that.
No matter who was running the account, what would happen to it could go any number of ways. Best case scenario, at least in Eda's mind, would be nothing happening to it unless it became an actual problem. Actually going after one specific activist account, especially after how tense the council meeting got, would only make things worse. And depending on who was running the account, things wouldn't go well either. If it was some random person, there would be anger for the council going after a single account. If it was Tinella, nobody would be surprised and there would be the same level of anger. And if it was Vee, that would be unexpected and there might be even more anger. And if the investigation into the account somehow revealed that Vee was a basilisk…
Eda shook off that thought before she could give it any more time. She tried to just move on and enjoy time with Raine as they ate, finished, and paid. Unfortunately, that plan failed when as they walked out, they saw a small group of officers talking to protesters. The conversation did not look peaceful and one of the officers was even reaching for magic-restricting handcuffs. Raine knew what Eda was thinking and gently took her by the arm.
"Eda, you said yourself that you didn't want to talk about politics. Let's just go home." Raine said, almost pleading with her.
Eda instead pulled out of their grip, morphed into her harpy form, and shot over to where the officers and protesters were, getting between the two groups. She turned back into her normal form and smiled in an obviously annoyed way that the officers.
"Good morning! I was just having brunch with my partner and I saw this whole situation going down. Might I ask you what's happening?" Eda asked in an obnoxiously sweet tone.
"Look," the officer in front sighed in frustration, "this protest is a public disturbance and must be disbanded. They're refusing and-"
"Officer, what does the law define as a public disturbance?" Eda interrupted.
"It's any person or persons committing an act that disrupts or disturbs the general public, councilor Clawthorne."
"Right! So did you get a call or someone who noticed you that reported them?"
"No, we were just on patrol and noticed them, but they-"
"Has anyone around here been disrupted or disturbed by this group?" Eda called out across the park, turning away from the officer.
Nobody said anything, so she then looked to the group of protesters themselves, making sure to look at them in a way that would assure them that she was on their side in this.
"How about you all, has anyone come up to you and told you that you're a disruption or disturbance?"
All of them shook their heads. Eda smiled at them, nodded, and turned back to the officer.
"Well, nobody has told them they're a disturbance, thinks they are, or had reported them as such. Since you have no evidence of what you accuse them of, you've got nothing. They are within their legal right to protest, so you guys should probably get back to patrol and leave this group here be."
The officer grumbled something under their breath with a scowl and the group of officers began to leave. The protesters went to thank Eda and give her high fives, but she just smiled at them and began to walk back to Raine.
"Basilisk sympathizer!" someone angrily yelled at her as she walked away.
She didn't bother turning to look, instead just going back to Raine and pulling out her staff. Raine gave her a saddened look and Eda looked away.
"Just because it's my day off doesn't mean I should let people get treated unfairly just because people with authority disagree with them."
Raine didn't respond and just pulled out their staff. The two of them flew back to the owl house in silence, but this time much less peaceful than it was on their way to brunch. They flew much slower than they did on their way to the restaurant. Partly because they weren't in a rush, but partly because neither of them wanted to have the inevitable conversation they'd need to have when they landed.
They did eventually get back and head inside, only to find that the crow phone on the wall was cawing loudly. Raine went over to answer it as Eda slowly trailed behind. Raine listened to whoever was on the other end, nodded, then held the phone out to Eda.
"It's for you."
Eda nodded, took the phone, and walked over to the wall where the setup was as Raine leaned against the mantle.
"Councilor Eda Clawthorne speaking. This is my day off so this better be good."
"Oh this is definitely good." an exasperated Darius said on the other line, "The best of the good."
"Dari, if this is about-"
"What happened in the park? Yes, I already know about it. I was looking through the hourly reports from the local officers and was shocked, even though I shouldn't have been, to hear you stepped into a civil conversation with protesters and offered your two snails."
"Look, those officers were out of line and one of them was reaching from magic-restricting cuffs. Those people were doing nothing wrong."
"Did you only step in because it was a cause you agreed with? I know how much you value your days off and doubt you would have done anything otherwise. Or have you still not gotten past your hatred of officers and authority, because news flash Eda, you are authority."
"Oh you've got some real nerve acting all high and mighty," Eda laughed, starting to get offended, "Just because you hate basilisks for some Titan damn reason doesn't mean everyone else has to or that those who don't deserve legal action against them. If people want to protest, you just have to deal with it. Titan, I have no idea what Hunter looks up to you for because you are just a stuck up, petty, grudge-holding excuse for a reasonable leader!"
Eda hung up the phone by practically slamming it back into its station on the wall. She turned around in a huff and saw Raine looking at her not with a frustrated or even annoyed look on their face, but a sympathetic one. Wordlessly, they walked over to her and pulled her into a hug.
"Do you want to talk about anything?" they softly asked.
"I-I don't have anything more to say about the whole basilisk thing." Eda said, pinpricks of tears forming in the corners of her eyes.
"I don't mean the basilisk thing, I mean the Luz thing."
Eda's breath hitched as a few tears began to fall. She grabbed Raine tight as she practically collapsed to the ground and started to sob into their chest. Raine just kept their arms wrapped around Eda and held her close, running their fingers through her hair to try and add some extra comfort.
"I shouldn't be this distressed about a kid that wasn't even mine." Eda cried.
"Well, Luz was kind of like your d-"
"No, she wasn't." Eda interrupted, "Luz was just some kid that I took care of for a while who died a long time ago."
"Well, even if she wasn't like a…your kid, that doesn't mean you weren't allowed to care for her. You were worried about Willow, Gus, Hunter, and Amity when they were trapped in the human realm. Not as much as you were worried about Luz, but you were still worried. You can care for the kid without seeing them like your child." Raine reasoned, even though they knew Eda was in denial.
"Really?" She said, looking up at Raine.
"Yes, of course."
Raine helped Eda stand back up as she wiped away any remaining tears. Eda smiled at them and Raine smiled back. No matter what happened, they were always there for each other. It didn't matter if they agreed or not, they still were there to comfort the other when they were needed.
"Hey, maybe we can watch that really old human movie you have? The, uh, amimoo? Dragon-fang B?"
"It's an anime, the name is Dragonclaw Z, and it's only 40 years old." Eda chuckled, "And yes, I'd love to watch it with you."
They settled down on the couch and watched the movie, enjoying the mindless action-comedy as they just snuggled together. The movie ended after around an hour and a half and they just stayed on the couch together. Eventually, the crow phone began to ring again. Raine got up to answer it and Eda got up too in case it was Darius calling her back. Raine handed the phone to Eda, but it wasn't actually Darius on the other end.
"Eda!" Gus excitedly said, "I got so much info from my most recent human realm work day yesterday. And, even cooler, I got a new invention! It could really help, it just needs some work done to it, but since you're technically in charge of the Human Realm-Demon Realm relations department I need your approval before I can do any new projects."
"Well what is this cool new toy you got? And how are your other projects going?"
"The single-use collapsible portal door is almost done testing and the new thing is a magic detector! If I get approval I can reverse engineer it and make some changes so that it can be so refined as to be able to trace specific magical signatures! Basically, it will be able to determine the caster of any given spell after that caster's magical signature is in its database. Gone are the days of only having rough ideas like power level and magic type. Soon, we'll have the equivalent of a fingerprint analysis but for spells."
"Wow, great find Goops." Eda said, genuinely impressed, "Yeah go ahead and continue with whatever you need. I can get the paperwork done tomorrow when I'm actually at work. Today's my day off and so I'm technically not supposed to do any work but…yeah you have my approval. Just don't tell anyone until I get the paperwork done. Okay, kid?"
"Got it. Thanks! I'll let you get back to your day off."
"Keep me posted."
"Wait! One last thing. You know the occasional unregistered portals that have popped up on the tracer? Well recently there has been a massive spike and I don't think it's just a malfunction anymore."
"Hey, you're a smart kid. You can figure it out. Anything else?"
"Just that I saw King while testing the single-use portals. He's doing good."
"Yeah, he's sending me a letter later, should be pretty soon honestly. Anyways, I should get back to my day off. Call me if you need anything else, preferably not today."
"Will do. Bye!"
"Bye!"
Eda hung up and turned to Raine, her chipper expression quickly turning serious.
"So Rainestorm, is there a chance that someone that we don't know about would be able to make a portal?" She asked, which helped Raine get some more context into the conversation she just had with Gus.
"Not unless they had Titan's blood. But the only source is King and we know King hasn't been kidnapped and gotten his blood harvested or something and the supply hasn't had any signs of being stolen from."
Before Eda could ask another hypothetical, they both heard a strange noise coming from the middle of the entry room. They looked and saw one of King's claws poking through the air and creating a portal. For a moment Eda thought he was sending the update letter, but that was clearly not the case as the portal grew. It opened big enough that they could see King fully. He was much bigger than when he left by a wide margin, but more importantly he looked exhausted, his now fully grown wings were tied up in a net, he was standing in visibly broken the hull of his ship, and there was the sound of people chasing him in the background. As people began to flood into the ship hull, King stumbled forward through the portal. It closed behind him and Eda and Raine just stared as King looked at them, eyes glazed over with tiredness.
"Luz," he began, weak and breathless, "She's alive."
King collapsed onto the ground and Eda and Raine rushed over. He slowly blinked as the two looked at each other, wearing similar expressions of shock, confusion, and concern.
"King, hey, are you okay? Are you still with us buddy?" Raine asked, looking down at King.
"What's going on? We need more than three words, kiddo." Eda urged.
His eyes flickered shut as he finally passed out from exhaustion. Raine and Eda looked at each other once again, but this time all the color drained from Eda's face as what King said set in.
"Holy shit."