It took quite a while to calm Luz: Eda had to cuddle her for two hours before the puppet finally stopped crying, and even after that she didn't let go of Eda for almost another hour. When she finally seemed to have relaxed enough to let her go, Eda made her lie down on the bed again and went to prepare her something to eat, since technically the puppet hadn't eaten anything since the day before; she made some hot soup for Luz, picked some leaves of fine rosemary for Willow and a few grains of rice for Gus. Then she brought the meal to the three and made them eat. During all this, Luz hadn't mumbled a single word, still too shaken by what had happened; only with a lot of patience and effort Eda managed to make her speak again. When they finally finished, evening was falling, and Luz looked tired like she had rarely seen in her life. "Go to sleep now" Eda told her. "You really need it. If you want something, I'm in the other room"

And with that she left the room, leaving her alone on the bed. Gus and Willow positioned themselves on the pillow next to her, and Luz, seeing them, pulled up a small piece of sheet to allow them to have a blanket too. "Uh, that's much better now! Thanks, Luz!" Gus said enjoying the warm covering.

Luz gave a small smile, though her eyes remained sad. "I'm sorry, guys. I should have listened to you" she said. "I am immensely grateful for the help you gave me with the assassins, but please, if I ever get into trouble like that again, run away. I don't want you to get hurt because of me"

"Don't even talk about it" Gus told her. "Sorry, but this choice isn't yours, it's ours. We choose whether to put our lives in danger for you. And I personally would do it again a hundred times"

He would never leave Luz alone, he was now absolutely convinced of it. That puppet was a magnet for trouble, and often she caused it herself, but still Gus felt ready to face all that trouble with her. "But I appreciate you caring so much about us. And I accept your apology"

Luz felt her heart beat faster: she was touched by the fact that Gus wanted to stay with her even in adversity, and even after what he had experienced because of her. "You were amazing, you know?" she told him. "You imitated that coin perfectly. And everything else too... the shadows, the yellow spider... you were very good. I will never stop telling you that you are an extraordinary illusionist"

"Heh heh! Now you are making me blush" Gus said scratching his head embarrassed. It was the first time he had received so many compliments all at once: the only person who had ever appreciated his skills had been Willow, but even she had never given him such great compliments.

"I promise I'll never go alone into the woods at night again" Luz said. "And that from now on I will listen to you much more"

Gus was happy to hear those words; he wasn't entirely sure that Luz would keep that promise, but he was satisfied that she had at least realized her mistakes. "That's the right way to do things! You'll see, stick to those resolutions and everything will be fine from now on! Right, Willow?"

The cricket had remained silent all this time. "Mh?" she said, barely opening her eyes. "Yes, yes, whatever you like"

Both Gus and Luz looked at each other with questioning eyes. Maybe Willow was just tired and wanted to sleep, but it looked more like she was ignoring them on purpose. "Um... Willow, is everything okay?" Luz asked her.

"Yes, everything is fine. Sorry, I just don't want to listen to the good intentions that you will surely not keep, so don't include me in the conversation and let me rest, since I already know that tomorrow you will give me a headache" the cricket replied to her in a very acidic voice.

Luz felt hurt hearing those words; she wanted to be angry, but the sensation she was feeling at that moment was much more like physical pain. Gus looked somewhat shocked; it was the first time he had seen Willow so hostile. "What's wrong with you? That's not a nice thing to say!"

"I'm just stating facts!" the cricket exclaimed. "We all know that tomorrow this puppet will do another mischief, and tomorrow again, and the day after tomorrow! I'm tired of being condescending"

The pain in Luz's chest intensified; every word of Willow was like a stab in the chest. "Are you angry?" she asked in a whisper.

"Of course I'm angry!" Willow almost screamed as she jumped onto her paws. "Let's make a list of what you have done over the last three days: you disobeyed your mother, you ran away from home, you had Camila arrested, you threatened me with a hammer several times, you violated public property and defrauded a guard, you skipped school, you lost the spelling book your mother bought you with her jacket, you got caught by a puppeteer, you almost got burned alive, you forced me and Gus to come to your rescue by putting I'm risking our lives, you made Camila worried to death, you went into the woods at night alone, you almost died, you threw a tantrum over a medicine that was meant to save your life and you even managed to lie to a fairy! Who in the world could be so brazen as to lie to a fairy!?"

Luz's face sank slightly beneath the covers as shame crept into her heart. In fact, she had really behaved badly. "Come on, Willow! Doesn't a fifteen-meters long nose seem like punishment enough for you?" Gus tried to intervene to help her, and Luz shivered at the memory and instinctively touched her nose once again.

But Willow didn't seem pitying at all. "No, it's not! Not everything in this world ends with 'oh, he got a punishment, now we can return to be friends like before'!" she said in a voice that almost sounded like a growl. "I helped you because I thought it was an exaggerated punishment, but that doesn't mean I forgave you! If you really want to know, if Gus hadn't convinced me I would have gladly let you cry for a little longer, and I bet Eda thought the same same way! Because, and I doubt that someone in the entire would can contradict me, you deserved it all! Because you're a bad girl, and I'm tired of pretending otherwise!"

Luz sank further into the blankets. She was feeling even worse than before drinking the medicine to heal the tracheal injury. It was as if someone was constantly stabbing her in the heart with an extremely sharp needle.

Gus bit his lip. "Willow, please, I think that now you should…"

"Don't tell me to calm down!" Willow roared, and she visibly began to tremble. "Just think of all the things that have happened to us because of this damned puppet! Until three days ago we lived a quiet and safe life in a plant in a shop, away from any danger, then she arrived and we were forced to leaving the house after years! I don't remember ever being more scared than I was in that moment! And then? I punched a person in the face, or rather two! Do you have any idea how I felt at that moment!? I thought I was going to die from any second, and not without reason! I risked being crushed I don't know how many times! I'm not a bodyguard for a girl who doesn't even know how to obey her mother, I'm a damn cricket! I should pass my days eating leaves and rubbing my wings, not saving a puppet from a circus of madmen or from two criminals who had decided to cosplay as a ghost immersed in tar!"

Luz clenched her teeth and fists as those words stuck like spikes in her little wooden heart. For the first time she truly realized how Willow must have felt as she helped her. Luz had always thought that she was amazing, and that she had been very good at overcoming her fear and fighting seriously... but she had never considered the cricket's feelings. She had always seen Willow as an unshakeable rock, but in reality, as she herself said, she was just a cricket. Risking being crushed so many times couldn't have been pleasant at all, in fact, it must have been terrifying. And she hadn't even considered that...

"And you too, Gus!" Willow didn't stop, pointing her finger at the spider, so urgently it almost seemed like a curse, so much so that he took a couple of steps back. "Do you want me to believe that you too haven't almost died of fear these days? She threw guards at you who almost crushed you! And I remember how you reacted when we left the house, you almost had a panic attack And then you had to be carried around by me, which by the way was the most physical effort I've ever done in my life! And then you had to impersonate a dime and have two assassins chase you, and they had you. Tried to crush you once! Are you really okay with that? Really!?" Gus wanted to argue back, to tell Willow that yes, he was fine with it, but that would be totally untrue. Just like Willow, he had lost something like ten years of life in the span of those three days, and to say he wasn't upset about that would be a lie. But Gus' silence, ironically, was even more painful for Luz to hear than Willow's accusatory words; this time it felt as if someone had not just stabbed her in the heart, but had directly taken a hammer and crushed her with it.

"As I thought" Willow said when she saw Gus' silence. By now she was shaking so hard she felt like a leaf, and Gus clearly saw some furious tears forming in her eyes. "This girl is a walking pest, so no, I'm not going to forgive her just because she got a punishment! I'm not going to do it again! And you shouldn't either! You need to stop being so condescending to her, Gus! If no one scolds her properly she will never get her head straight! I'm telling you, sooner or later she will make both us die of a broken heart, and that poor woman who made the mistake of building her too!"

For an instant the world went black; Luz couldn't see or hear anything. She felt as if the air had disappeared from her lungs and her heart had stopped. She felt as if she had just... died, or something very close to it anyway. It all lasted barely a second, but when the world finally resumed color and sound around her, Luz still felt as if every part of her body had been pierced by a spear, and even though Willow was no longer saying anything, her words they continued to echo in her head, and each time it was a new stab straight to her wooden heart. A tear formed in her right eye and fell onto the mattress. Almost mechanically, she pulled up the covers and stood up, and she quickly headed for the door.

Gus and Willow were taken aback by the sudden behavior, and only after a few moments they noticed Luz's wet tear mark on the mattress. Gus gave Willow an angry look: "I hope that you are happy now! You made her cry again!"

Willow felt very guilty, but despite this she didn't give in. "Tsk! Well, maybe now she'll learn how her actions affect others!"

Meanwhile, Eda was in the kitchen, busy putting away the dishes she had used to prepare dinner for her three new tenants, when Luz entered, moving with steps so small that a snail could have outrun her. "Hey, kiddo, do you need something?" Eda greeted her warmly as usual, but her smile when she saw the expression on Luz's face. "Hey, is everything okay?"

"Eda... can you stay with me until I fall asleep? Please?" Luz murmured in a voice that sounded like a whisper.

Eda didn't even need to think about it: something was clearly wrong, so her presence was absolutely required. "Of course, kiddo. I'll stay with you all night if you want me to"

"Thank you" Luz said in a broken voice.

The two returned to the bedroom and Luz got back under the covers, while Eda took a chair and sat next to the edge of the bed. Gus and Willow looked surprised by the fairy's presence, but they didn't say a word. Eda stretched out a hand on the mattress, and Luz squeezed it so tightly that for a moment the fairy feared she would break her finger, but despite this she didn't bat an eyelid. "Do you want to tell me what's going on, kiddo?"

Luz trembled and seemed on the verge of tears again. "Eda... am I really an evil person?"

This and the next chapter are also not present in Collodi's original book; I included them in order to show even more the relationship between Luz and Eda, as well as the one she has with her friends. Besides, it was a miracle that no one hadn't scolded Luz harshly yet considering everything she had done.